I'm not really sure how Joey's was voted best hot dog in the Valley by readers of Phoenix Magazine. I'll bet George W. was rigging that election too.
I am a hot dog aficionado so anything decent in a bun would garner a good review from me. Needless to say, I was heartbroken to discover that Joey's was not what I thought it was.
A couple of my fellow In-n-Out coworkers and I decided to meet up at this restaurant for lunch to "talk shop" so to speak. After ordering we attempted to get ketchup. This is a typical waiting for food activity, is it not? And wouldn't one expect to find a plethora of ketchup at a place the sells hot dogs? Well, no. Or at least not accessible ketchup anyways. There was a container with a large bag of ketchup available, but exactly how one was supposed to procure said ketchup still remains a mystery.
After giving up the ketchup quest, we tried unsuccessfully to find a clean table. "This would never happen at In-n-Out" was fighting furiously to escape all of our lips by this point.
Then our food came out, disappointment ensued. Paying $7.85 for a hot dog and fries that looks like it came out of a kid's meal at the Wienerschnitzel is not my idea of a good meal. The taste did not make up for the portioning either.
TLl;DR: Go to Wienerschnitzel or Costco if you want a hot dog.
EDIT: I ate at Joey's sometime in January, and there were a total of 3 other customers in the store which doesn't excuse a filthy dining room.
The ketchup was not empty. There was a large open container of ketchup sitting on the drink station. Since that violates several heath codes in addition to being extremely pointless, I'd say there is no excuse for that either.