Dog-N-Shake Drive-In

Dog N Shake is one of those places you drive past and can’t possibly envision a point in your life where you would so desperate to ever consider eating there. It doesn’t stay open late, it looks old, and a little dirty, even from the outside.
At the same time, we — the people of the fast food capital of the country — have long had trouble embracing the hot dog as a legitimate source of good eats, when cities much bigger and much smaller than us make hotdoggery an art. Still, we turn our noses up at places like Linkhäus, Dogs n’ Hots, Let’s Be Frank aka And the Wiener Is…, and Imbiss Grill, rejecting our sausage options over and over again until we’re left with British Banger Company; Bierocks, Brats, & BBQ; Relish It! (when the guy gets off his butt to wheel the cart to Old Town…) and Dog N Shake.
Specialty sausages aside, the simple hot dog is fast food, and not hard to make in itself. Even DnS’ approach — cooking the dogs on a rotating carousel not unlike your neighborhood gas station — is fine by me. The fast food frankfurter is about the whole package, and DnS works to create a dog that doesn’t end up down the front of your shirt. Between the pressed and toasted bun (I liked that quite a bit, actually) and the careful application of chili and slaw, it went down without a fight. I have severe doubts how freshly-​made the chili was, and fries were frozen (though my preferred wavy frozen type of fry), but this was supposed to be cheap and fast, so I didn’t mind.
Judging the messiness of the breading, the onion rings certainly weren’t frozen, and they were left in the fryer for a really long time, so everything, including the bare pieces of onion themselves, were super crispy. Definitely the way to go here.
The Polish sausage on the menu isn’t a polish sausage in the literal sense, but rather a normal dog that gets a dip in the deep fryer. Perhaps harkening back to those good old days when people were making Dumb Polish jokes instead of Dumb Blonde jokes? DnS has been doing this since 1954, after all. In any case, I liked it better than the normal dog, though I don’t see why I have to pay and extra $.50 for the privilege.
Don’t worry — I also tested the vanilla shakes, and they passed muster. All for the sake of the review, of course.
I thought Dog N Shake was going to be a pit, but they rose above my meek expectations to provide about as close to a fast food hot dog as you’re going to find in Wichita. It’s not glamorous, but there’s something comforting about chowing down on a couple of mystery meat frankfurters every once in a while.

Love the cinnamon shakes, I’m addicted to them.
Also, who doesn’t love a good kraut dog?
Hey, it’s not a steak house. I’m happy as it is.

Stopped in here to give their burger and fries a try.
What was your first impression? I was the only customer and could hear the two people that were working flirting with each other the whole time there.
How was the Quality of Food? Order double cheese burger, they were processed patties and just had no flavor. There was no lettuce, tomato on it either. It did have mustard, onion and a pickle. The fries were also processed wavy style fries.
What about the valve for the Buck? Normal prices as most fast food places.
How was the appearance and cleanliness? Tables were dirty, hadn’t been wiped down from the last people. All the tables were like that too, not just mine.
Did you receive exactly what you ordered? I guess I have to say yes to this.
How was the service? average but not very professional with the flirting going on.
Summary and will you go back? Not a chance…

I drug my husband here promising the most amazing dogs and burgers on a toasted bun and to die for malts. Well it wasn’t quite what I remembered it to be from my childhood. First, we got overcharged for a drink we didn’t order. My order was wrong (it came out with everything when I wanted it plain), and my malt cup was covered in stickiness to the point that it practically couldn’t be touched for fear of contamination.
The place was dead, we were the only customers in there for half an hour, but they had like 4 employees. I can’t see how they are making any money at all.
Overall, sad, I miss the good old days.