I have mixed feelings on whether or not to post this one. I went towards ‘yes’ for the main reason of trying to find the best food for a given locale. You saw my admiration for Idaho Finger Steaks, you’ve been introduced to the Nebraskan Runza. We’ll move on towards Ohio. For those that have been around, you know I enjoy a hot dog. I enjoy a hot dog that has a great chili sauce on top of it. I don’t know if anyone can beat the Detroit Coney Dog, but I’m willing to accept challengers. The first one to try to claim the throne: Skyline Chili.
The Introduction
Late 2025 a layover led me to CVG airport and I was in the presence of my first Skyline Chili joint. The fact they had habanero cheese as an option was an instant plus in my book. The Cincinnati spaghetti thing has no appeal to me whatsoever. But the Coney dog does. Let’s order one up and see how it compares.
If I could go back to that day, I’d prefer to not even be in the presence of that Skyline shop. Would’ve booked a flight to a different airport even. That coney dog was awful. The hot dog was pathetic, the cheese was over the top, but the chili was awful. There’s no way my experience was this bad. Had to be the airport, couldn’t actually be the chili.
The Preparation
I was aghast. I’ve had my fair share of hot dogs.. that one was terrible. I saw the Skyline chili at the store and thought, I’ll try to redeem it as best I could. I had to stay true to their concept, but I’ll try. First thing first, All beef Costco hot dog. At least let’s start with something good. Let’s heat up the chili.
This is where I almost threw the towel in. This was not appealing. I get it, I don’t eat the healthiest, but even this is beyond. I told Skyline I’d try again, so let’s power through.
The Build
Dog in bun all by itself is a good sandwich. I don’t know how Skyline stays in business, but it had to be just the airport experience. And maybe I grabbed a bad can of their chili. Maybe.
Kinda where it loses me, with all that cheese, but I’ll be honest with you – I dressed it for the photo and then pushed it off and ate what I deemed an appropriate cheese quantity was per bite.
The Review
Stay away from Skyline Chili. Maybe Cincinnati and/or Ohio in general if that’s their claim to fame. Awful chili ruins the entire plate. Can’t imagine throwing that on a bowl of spaghetti and calling it a masterpiece. Don’t even know what you’d top that with, but I promptly placed the remainder in a ziploc bag and topped my trash with it.
I don’t even want to mention the gold standard to coney dog chili in this post, as I feel it’d be a disservice. Use the search function on the main page and look for “Coney”. Support them instead.