A century-old hot dog joint that closed during the pandemic has announced it will reopen its doors — much to the delight of its many, many fans.
The Patros family founded M&M Red Hots in 1919 in downtown Elmira, about 230 miles northwest of New York City.
The understated restaurant is best known for preparing hot dogs with the famous meat sauce on top, but also serves breakfast.
It’s also revered for its consistently reasonable prices, with a regular hot dog costing you just $3.40 before tax in 2020, according to the vintage Coca-Cola menu board.
The restaurant owners wrote in a surprising Facebook post on Wednesday that they have been preparing the business for opening for a few months.
It hasn’t officially opened yet, but they said they would post again when a grand reopening is planned.
Pictured: M&M Red Hots since March 2020, when state-level social distancing requirements went into effect
An order of two M&M’s hot dogs with meat sauce and ketchup
“Thank you for your continued love and support during the many years that Katie’s father, Andy, was head hotdogger, and even before him when her grandmother Wilda DeHaas was,” the message read.
“Many years of hotdoggin’ downtown has created a wonderful group of customers who will support us for generations to come, customers who are like family to us!”
“We’ve missed you all as much as you’ve missed us, and we can’t wait to see your smiling faces! So hold on tight Elmira, your desires will soon be satisfied!”
The owners signed the message: “Sincerely, Your Next Generation of Hot Dog Slingers.”
To say that this cozy Frankfurt restaurant received a lot of attention with this announcement would be an understatement.
On Friday, the Facebook post received more than 1,500 likes, representing a whopping 6 percent of Elmira’s 25,000 residents.
The comments were full of people — Elmira residents and others who have long moved — raving about M&M hot dogs and saying they couldn’t wait to come back.
Pat Jackson, who went to high school in Elmira, said M&M remains his family’s favorite hot dog place.
He even made it a tradition to bring 25 hot dogs and the restaurant’s famous meat sauce back to where he lives in Illinois.
A group of customers pose for a photo at one of M&M’s three green counters in 2015
In the photo: The restaurant is about to become operational this summer
“We moved a while ago, but every year we came back to Elmira we made sure to visit with family,” he wrote. “We’ve been going since the early 1960s.”
Others gave vivid memories of visiting M&M as children.
John Baker, who has lived and worked in Elmira for decades, said he may have to return to Elmira from rural Thailand, where he has retired, just to get two hot dogs at “everything.”
‘I enjoyed my first M&M weinie [sic] in 1952 at the age of 6. My dad took me out to dinner after my dentist appointment,” he wrote.
Another person said the news of the reopening “literally made me cry.”
If the 500-plus comments on M&M’s post are any indication, Elmira could soon see a decent influx of visitors this summer.