Waffle House

Don and Kirk Lewis use to run the local waffle houses all the way from Ga to Knoxville under the name Collis Foods. Now ran by Choo Choo waffles. Not as clean but just as good.

I’ve been here 10 minutes and had to wait 10 minutes for them to clean up the mess sitting in front of me! Finally a server (not my server) came up apologized and cleaned up the mess and proceeded to take my order. I get that your busy but you could stop to clean up the mess sitting in front of your customers! To lady that finally came and took my order, THANK YOU! To the other lady, GET YOUR PRIORITIES IN ORDER!

for a waffle house. the ladies working were tired, but classically we came in around 11pm. However, they were very nice, got our orders done correctly and everything came out exactly as good as we pictured it to be. We went to Waffle House over the diner attached to the Days Inn nearby– and I am glad we did

It seems like the only time I ever want to eat at Waffle House is late at night, piss drunk. Waffle House, like most 24-​hour places in the middle of the night is always an interesting place. I feel almost as if it’s one of the lost institutions of the American road and night-​life — a place you go to late at night, alone, still drunk, to sit in a booth or at the counter and engage with the waitresses and cooks as they hang out and chat and cut up with you and the other patrons also out on a late night stop for strangely satisfying breakfast food.
Waffle House in the suburbs are different from the ones on the great American interstates, and are different from the ones in the industrial/​airport/​motel/​highway stop areas. I had decided to stay, for the first time, in a Days Inn near Chattanooga Airport because I figured I’d only be there to sleep and I wanted to save a few bucks. Near the Days Inn was a Waffle House, so I decided one night to stop by and get my fill of sausages, scrambled eggs, hash browns, waffles and biscuits & gravy. As I sat there chatting with the waitresses, they were telling me about the night before, when there were TWO different fights in the parking lot, one of them being a large group of teenagers mob fighting, with property damage and all.
As she was finishing telling me about the fights last night, a drugged-​out guy stumbled into the restaurant, walked up to one of the other waitresses, pointed at her nametag and said «(name)? I’ve got something for YOU.» and stumbled out back to a car. Everyone was on-​edge, thinking that he was going to return with a gun and start shooting; so everyone was looking out the window in case he started spraying the restaurant with gunfire. He came back in a few minutes later, after I had pulled my wire basket of condiment bottles close to me on the table, at an angle which I could fling at him if he came in with a gun to distract him, ready to belay and disarm him while disoriented.
Surprisingly and fortunately, he walked back in, handed a $ 5 bill to the waitress and told her that he forgot her tip last time and walked back out.
FOOD:
There are several thousand Waffle Houses across the country, but they started in this area of the country, spreading out from Atlanta. The food is fairly standard across all Waffle Houses, but the QUALITY depends a lot on the skill of the short order cook preparing your food. We had a big black guy named Will who really could cook up a mean breakfast. I had a plate with Two rounds of Sausage, two scrambled eggs, and a huge heap of smothered, smashed and covered Hash Browns, with a Pecan waffle, and all were great but pretty basic.
PARKING:
Plenty of parking. The lot is huge.
ORDERING:
Walk in, have a seat, order off of the plastic menu they have on the table. One thing that a lot of people don’t know is that they can make all kinds of custom orders to suit your taste. I was told someone had just come in earlier for whom they made a chocolate and Reeses waffle, although I’m not sure if the customer brought in the ingredients for it or not. Waffles and pancakes can be ordered with a variety of different ingredients built in. Lead time is usually pretty fast, depending on how busy their cooks are. I usually experience about 15 minutes on average. You can also call in your order from nearby hotels, come in to pick up and bring back.
SEATING:
About 10 or so booths, and a bunch of stools at the bar. Never packed (at least I’ve never seen a Waffle House with a lack of seating).
SERVICE:
One of my favorite parts of Waffle House is the service. It seems no matter where I go, the Waffle House always has interesting and chatty waitresses and cooks; it almost feels like a bar, except instead of booze they serve breakfast. My service has always been friendly and always attentive, especially if you sit at one of the booths along the length of the service corridor.
ATMOSPHERE:
It’s a Waffle House. I’m not sure how to explain beyond that. Fast food style bench seating and tables. Stools at a bar. Service corridor along the length of the restaurant with servers and line cooks behind it.
COST:
Usually between $ 4 and $ 8 or so.
VALUE:
GREAT value. I just wish they’d serve more food with each serving. There are times when a man needs to eat a half-​pound of bacon and a half-​dozen eggs with country-​gravy covered hash browns at three o’clock in the morning; though I suppose you could always just order multiple plates.
CONCLUSION:
⁴⁄₅ — Waffle House is the old reliable breakfast in the middle of the night joint for me. I’ll probably keep coming back forever. If not to this location, to any one of the thousands of them across the country. As aforementioned though, this one is in kind of a sketchy area; if that doesn’t suit you, drive down the road a little bit in any direction and you’ll find another one.