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You've seen him on the FOOD Channel living out one of the best possible jobs. Holly Moore travels around the nation eating what others might call junk food. Like our own Penny Gourmet, if it's cheap and tasty, Holly loves it.

VISIT the HOLLY EATS web site

I am not a gastronome. I prefer a house salad to the Waldorf, meatloaf to prime rib and an ice cream sandwich to terra misu. I hate paying more than $5 for lunch, and that should include the beverage. I can part with $10 for a fine dinner, as long as I don't have to wait for a table, eat anything that's on fire or have my plate sprinkled in green stuff.

I fancy myself a walking encyclopedia of good low-cost food. I don't mean the fast franchise stuff. I prefer nice meals by nice local people. But I bow to the expertise of Holly Moore, a food critic after my own heart. This guy openly prefers chowing down to dining out, and looks for restaurants where the parking lot is full of Chevy Trucks, not BMW’s. His food site avoids the trendy.

But back to me. Here’s an abbreviated list of local meals I enjoy often. Feel free to take notes:

The chowder at Petey's in Rye, the giant calzone at Savario's in Portsmouth, the house salad at The Rosa in Portsmouth, the daily special at Ceres Bakery in Portsmouth, tacos grande at Burrito Mio in Dover, cinnamon donuts at Calef's in Barrington, the original Moe sandwich at Moe's in Portsmouth, soup at the Loaf and Ladle in Exeter, Sunday brunch at the Cliff House in Ogunquit, grinders at Janeto's meat counter in Dover, a fish sandwich at the Ice House in New Castle, the ice cream at Browns in York, the "South Mill Pond" pizza at the Gaslight, any Smuttynose beer at the Brewery and fish and chips at the Press Room in Portsmouth, the roast beef at Wheelie's in Newmarket, clams at Bob's Clam Hut in Kittery, breakfast at Rick's All Season in York, lime rickeys at the Oceanic Hotel on Star Island, Tom Yum soup at Thai Paradise and Mulligatawny at Shalimar in Portsmouth and, of course, the codfish cake and artichokes at Emilios in Portsmouth.

It is my goal to honor each of these places and more with the Penny Fourmet award, a special page on my web site. I've done probably a half dozen so far. Which brings us to the topic of this week's review. I was adding a new Penny Gourmet page dedicated to the famous Flo's Steamed Hotdogs, an institution in Cape Neddick, Maine for the last 40 years. Just for fun, I typed "Flo's Hotdogs" into Google.com to see how many other budget food reviewers had mentioned the "flo-dog" online.

A lot of low-rent food critics, it seems, have discovered Flo's. Among them, the best was called HollyEats.com. The design, the tone, the clear writing all told me I had been out-gunned by a Philly reviewer. So I wrote to critic/owner Holly Moore whose site includes over 300 food profiles from across the nation and beyond -- each rated with two, three, or four grease stains. Following is a transcript of my short interview with the man who, for my $5, should be crowned King of low-rent online food sites.

THE WEB SITE MAKER

Dennis: Did you review all 300 eateries on your web site in person?

Holly: Just me. It's taken years of study to develop the grease stain rating system. I can't trust that to anyone else.

Dennis: How do you manage to cover the entire nation?

Holly: Basically, I pick an area and I eat my way through it. Mostly I just head somewhere and eat. This year I need to get to Chicago for hot dogs and spend some more time in Texas and the West Coast.

Dennis: How did you come to review cheap food online?

Holly: The web site started in July 2000. After 15 years I had parted ways with the Philadelphia City Paper where I wrote a column on food. The web site gave me total editorial and content control, and better interaction with readers.

Dennis: Who actually does the web site?

Holly: All my doing. I use Front Page because I learned it from the web site I do for my other business interests. (Holly’ other web sites sell prison supplies online and promote a military-type training camp that offers "Prisoner of War Interrogation Resistance Program".) I also own a copy and sign shop in Center City, Philadelphia called Can Do!

Dennis: Is this food thing an obsession?

Holly: Yes, also an avocation and a higher calling.

Dennis: Does the site bring in any income or bring other benefits?

Holly: No income, but it's gaining national exposure. I was invited to be one of the original moderators for www.eGullet.com, one of the best web sites out there about food. I was featured on a WQED TV special talking about lobster rolls, Philadelphia cheesesteaks and Hoagies.

Dennis: How about web traffic?

Holly: About 1,200 people a day hit the site through search engines. Another 200 regulars come through the homepage.

THE UP SHOT

Halfway through writing this column I met a couple of friends for fancy drinks at one of Portsmouth’s trendy places downtown. By my memory it's the fourth trendy restaurant on the same site in five years. Even my simple beer came in what looked like a flower vase. The waitress at the bar was gregarious, jumping in and out of our conversation like an old friend, then reading the daily specials. One went something like this:

"Today we have a delicately basted salmon soufflé, braised with just a hint of saffron and modestly pan-fried with the hearts of baby artichokes and succulent pearl onions with a hummingbird tongue glaze, then marinated in a kiln-dried oven and mashed by the feet of indigenous people."

I may have misheard. My companions had the calamari and the Cornish game hen. In my world that’s octopus and parakeet. Not for me. I asked for the cheapest thing on the menu. It turned out to be a $5 collection of what looked and tasted like clippings from a hundred different houseplants in a smoky vinaigrette dressing. Smoke, for my money, is not a food.

It wasn't bad, if you like that kind of thing. But after the tip and drink, for the same price I could have had a small tuna, an Italian and a ham-n-cheese grinder at Moe's, plus three bags of salt and vinegar chips and three sodas.

Maybe I’ll learn culture, but don’t hold your breath. You can have the Iron Chef. When it comes to food, I’ll take Holly Moore.