Coney Island 2023

My companion has been wanting to visit Coney Island, I think specifically for the hot dogs. One time I made the mistake of not checking when the Mermaid Parade was happening and that was such a disaster. Also, the key is to pick a warm but not too warm day to go. It was a little cloudy early in the day and fairly cool, so I thought it would be a good day to go.

Since I have a WCS Zoo membership, this includes the NY Aquarium AND parking there. So we first visited the aquarium, which only takes about an hour to do. I was sad that the otter exhibit had no more otters. I hope they come back soon.

From there, we headed to the original location of Nathan’s Hot Dogs.

If you’re looking to the actual original location, don’t be fooled by the one that is on the boardwalk. That is actually a secondary location, and since it’s on the boardwalk, I think it was much busier. The original is on Surf Ave, basically across the street from the Coney Island MTA station.

I know there are many locations of Nathan’s now since it’s a national chain, but this one serves more than those. A lot of quintessential NorthEast beach eats. One of my faves is the Fried Clams, which I got with a side of onion rings too.

I need to make a note though. These are actually fried clam strips, so I feel like they need to be more clear. New England fried clams include the bellies, which are the sweetest part. These have a little too much breading on them so you can’t even taste the sweetness of the clams. I think next year I need to finally not order them.

However, I did learn from last year and only ordered a 1/2 lb instead of 1 lb. AND I only ordered a small drink as it’s the size of what used to be a large. But in addition to the clams, I had to get a classic hot dog.

The hot dog did not disappoint. There was a nice snap to each bite. If you’re looking for something different, they also have Fish Sandwiches, and an entire raw bar plus chowders.

Later in the day we wanted something sweet to eat and kept seeing stands with fried oreos. It’s not a treat you see everywhere plus it’s not something that should be consumed all the time. I have made them before for a bake sale at the hotel - we took oreos and dipped them in the breakfast pancake batter and put them right in the deep fryer. So easy and so delicious.

These might have been good if they were freshly fried. The problem was that the stand had pre-fried all of the oreos so when they are ordered, they put them back in some hot oil to warm them up again. But this essentially double fries them so the batter on the outside is dried out and harder. The only part that was still a little moist were the oreos themselves, but the coating was just too hard. Overall they were still okay, but not what I know they could have been.

As I stated above, a cooler gray day is a great day to go to Coney Island especially early in the season. Why? Because there are almost no lines.