The Original Pancake House

I had breakfast with my son and husband this morning. The service was deplorable. The wrong eggs came out for my husband and it took over 15 minutes to get the scrambled eggs that he had ordered while his meat grew cold and we were almost done with our meal. There was no service recovery of I am so sorry at the table. When I got up to the register and I informed the little girl at the cash register of our experience she did not apologize nor do anything to even take off any of the money from the bill. The manager then came over he again had no apology and actually told me to get out of the restaurant I will never ever go back to the original House of Pancakes again. I had been a loyal customer for over 30 years and this is the type of service recovery I get? Should I seek out the owner? Would he care?

Hmmm, so I came here w the gf as she lives close to this place and likes it, save for its ‘watery’ coffee, or so she says; I actually happen to like their decidedly «diner coffee» coffee but she’s a Sbux snob so there’s that. We’ve been a few times, the first being ok, the second, not so much.
I think it’s probably best to stick with what they do best and that’s their pancakes, they are quite good. However on 2^nd visit I did what i’ve been known to do of late and order the wrong damn item.
So we are in a true, «Original» Pancake House and what does I do? Order the Huevos Rancheros? Big fail, gran error on my part, wow, these were bad. I mean really bad. If the first bite is with the eyes, then I hurled upon the plate being tossed down, in true diner style fashion, which, again, I can appreciate. I took a few bites of the over easy coldish eggs, tried to put it in the flour tortilla but it almost broke it was so dated. The Chorizo «patties» looked vom inducing and didn’t even touch them.
So, had them take it back and ordered what I thought would be some welcomed comfort food… the biscuits and gravy. 2/​5, and very heavy handed with the heavy laden crème, took a few bites and just called it a day.

Walked in for the first time at this place with 6 people for breakfast, they refused to seat us together and wouldn’t put 2 tables together. They said they would do this in the back but there were no tables available. The front half was completely empty. Lousy service and arrogant host.

Parking was scarce on this particular Saturday because of the St. Patrick’s day parade. We ended up finding street parking a few blocks away within walking distance, surprisingly it was not crowded around 11:30am and for a party of 4 we were seated right away.
I ordered a breakfast skillet including potatoes, green peppers, scrambled eggs & sausage w/​American cheese which comes with a side order of pancakes. Awesome flavors and big portion sizes so expect to have a take home box. Being from Michigan, it was surprising that this restaurant don’t offer split bills. Aside from that, food was excellent, service was good and I had a great time with friends.

My wife and I have been to this restaurant 15 – 20 times. There are three reasons to go to this restaurant:
1) The owners commitment to quality.
2) The best bacon in the Chicago area.
3) The server named Erica who is charming and nearly telepathic, in discerning her customer’s needs.
This place is a rare find amongst the greasy diners that litter Chicagoland. The restaurant has a menu mostly focused on breakfast but including some lunch items. It is open early and closed for the day by 3pm.
The big deal here is the pancakes of all varieties cooked to perfection and the quality of the bacon. As well, very few restaurants North of the Mason /​Dixon know how to prepare grits. These people do. Mmmm! Mmmm!
My favorite breakfast is a big plate of the thin 49er pancakes, with a side of five large perfectly crisp but not dry bacon strips, with two eggs over easy and a small bowl of grits.
My wife enjoys the 49ers with the sausage links that are never greasy. We have tried much of the menu and keep coming back.
To all of you folks who come to Oak Park, IL to see the Frank Lloyd Wright home district or Hemingway house /​museum, this jewel of a restaurant is only 10 minutes away and better than any breakfast in the area.
Thanks again to OUR FAVORITE server Erica, for making our dining experience today spot-​on great!

Im a big fan of all Pancake House restaurants. They all have really good coffee and not the tipical watery coffee. This time the hostess was very friendly and we got seated right away. Our waitress came to us almost immediately after we got seated. We got our coffee and chocolate milk. We ordered the New York crapes and the Bear pancake for my son. I fell in love with the crapes but the bear pancake looked a bit too thin and not as fluffy as I imagined. Waiting time for food was not long despite how busy it was.
Service was really good. Very friend and attentive staff. Pricing is not bad for the quality of food you get.
Most Pancake house restaurants have that home old fashioned look but this one looks more modern with local curent art. It looks nice.
Parking is never difficult to find no mater what time I go there.
Definitely recommend it.

Favorites include the baked omelets — can’t get those anywhere else! — and of course the pancakes. When the pumpkin ones come in the fall… yum! I wish they paid more attention to the accouterments. Pancakes this good deserve real maple syrup, for example. And while I love the fluffiness of the omelets, the ingredients are chopped so small you can’t really taste them at all. Meanwhile they absolutely load it with cheese so every omelet ends up tasting like a cheese omelet. Better off with no cheese or just a little sprinkled on top. Tried the Belgian waffle but the batter was salty and the waffle soggy. I also have tried take out from here (many ppl do), but the quality drops significantly when you do. Overall can’t go wrong with a basic breakfast, but try elsewhere for flair and real concern for flavor.

Out of all of the «Original Pancake Houses» I’ve been too, this is the best one. It’s no frills, just good food at a good price.
I always get the junior plate. Three pancakes and a side of sausage, bacon, or egg for $ 5.99. Not a bad deal.
Pancakes are soft and perfectly buttery. Plus, the food always comes out in less than 10 minutes.
Blueberry pancakes come fully loaded and are served with a side of sweet blueberries in a syrup sauce. Bacon is more on the crispy side and sausages are flavorful and juicy.
The only annoying thing can be their seating. They have two full rooms but only use their first room for breakfast. On busy days they make you wait for a table in the first room even though they have more than enough tables in their back room. Don’t get it.
Parking out front is free but there is a 2 hour limit.

The folks at this location are really nice. We had a great waitress and nice hostess. We also had a huge appetite this past Sunday morning. Unfortunately, what we ordered seemed as if it needed to be presented on a smaller plate so that we wouldn’t be as visually disappointed as we were.
I ordered the bacon and eggs with a side of toast. He ordered the scrambled eggs with sausage and pancakes. I saw his face deflate as the plate was placed in front of him. My poor baby should of had the sausage links, then it would look like he had more food. The scrambled eggs were so sad looking on that huge plate.
The breakfast he and I made the day before was the same amount of eggs and looked so much fuller on the plate. Sure we knew it was two eggs, but it really looked smaller than I had hoped for what you pay (7 or 8 bucks for two sausage patties, two eggs and two pancakes). Food was pretty good, but perhaps, if you come with a huge appetite, order the scrambler or the baked pancakes so that you’ll fill up a little more for about the same price.
I do like traditional hash browns so when I have a pang for a really hearty breakfast, I go across the street to Louie’s. I’ll have to take my honey there next time cause he didn’t get hash browns as he had hoped. They do serve breakfast potatoes which are ok (had them in the past) but I prefer real hash browns.

I have read other constructive criticism of this place and I noticed the resounding theme is poor customer service which should always be the foundation of a business.
I was looking for a quick bite to eat one morning and decided to stop in. The host sat me promptly and I began reviewing the menu, 10 minutes went by and I’m thinking «ok maybe they are just super swamped». I then look around and see other patrons waiting impatiently as well so as I’m getting up to head to Al’s grill up the street the waitress comes over to explain how the other table in the back kept her occupied. I ended up eating the amazing food, however without top notch customer service that will hurt the backbone of the business and I will head over to Al’s next time.

Great food, bad customer service, won’t be returning.
My fiancé and I went there for the third time this morning because he had received a buy one, get one free coupon in his email. Our printer wasn’t working, but we decided to go anyway since we liked their food. After our meal went to pay our bill and were told the rule was that they couldn’t accept a coupon on a mobile device. We spoke to the manager about it, who wouldn’t budge on their policy. We pointed out that having that rule could hurt business and were told «Well it doesn’t seem to be hurting it!»
Since $ 12 today is more important than our business in the future, we won’t be returning. It’s not like we were asking for something we weren’t entitled to, and there are plenty of people (like us) who don’t have working printers. What are they supposed to do? They clearly care more about making a few extra bucks than keeping customers. There are plenty of breakfast places in the area with better customer service and high quality food.

Cute little neighborhood breakfast place in forest Park. When you are hungry and want to grab something quick but good this is a great place to go. They do get pretty busy so sometimes it takes a little bit to be served but overall a nice place if your in the neighborhood.

I Love their skillets and their dutch Apple pancake. It’s always busy on the weekends.
Other Pros:
1. Some free parking spots outside
2. The line is long at times but wait time not usually too long.
3. Supposedly fresh squeezed grapefruit juice
4. Good service
Cons:
Bathroom is not always in tip top shape
Otherwise reasonable prices and decent food. Best thing are the skillets. You should really go for one.

Server was very friendly and helpful. Pancakes, bacon, and potato pancakes were all tasty-​not the best ever but tasty. Eggs benedict was not very good-​smoothered in sauce, small english muffin.
Did not feel like the restaurant was overly clean-​dirty high chairs visible from outside. Broken bench by door.

Good pancakes, bad spelling, questionable service.
I’m still stunned in this day and age that businesses don’t use spellcheck before publishing something. The menus here at Forest Park’s Original Pancake House had several noticeable typos, which just doesn’t exude professionalism. It’s not *that hard* to proofread your stuff before printing out dozens of copies to distribute to your customers. Seriously.
Point in case, one breakfast combo was described as being «chewPy» (supposed to be ‘chewy’). Elsewhere on the menu was the improper use of ‘your’ (e.g. ‘your going to love it!’) which drove me absolutely bonkers because I’m a grammar freak. I counted no less than 3 spelling/​grammar errors – and I didn’t even peruse the entire menu – which I think is just unacceptable.
But the whole point of coming here was for pancakes. Caty D loved her coconut pancakes that came with tropical syrup and there was a huge variety of other things like waffles, skillets, and savory crepes. The selection was impressive, but the prices worried me a little. The standard 2×2×2 (2 eggs, 2 bacon/​sausage, 2 pancakes) clocked in at a whopping $ 7.29, which is WAY more than you should expect to pay for that. Not to mention, that figure doesn’t include hash browns – which are, disappointingly, merely breakfast potatoes – or anything else.
In fact, the grub is pretty damn expensive and most of the items are a-​la-​carte. My side order of thick-​cut bacon amounted to $ 1/​slice, although it was amazingballs good. Ironically, it never got rung up at the register, so my guess is they blanked and forgot to include it. Regardless, FREE BACON WOOO!
I wasn’t too enthralled with the service. Our waitress forgot that my order came with pancakes until I double-​checked what I got off the menu and politely reminded her (like how do you forget that? That’s akin to going to an Outback and having them bring out the soup and baked potato, but then forgetting to bring your steak. derp.)
If you’re a pancake fancier, then this is the place for you.
If you’re looking for inexpensive breakfast, seek elsewhere.
Maybe if I get a hankering for Crêpe Suzette someday in the future I’ll return, but until then this place is a hard pass.

I was rather disappointed with the quality of the food when I visited this Original Pancake House on a weekday. The Dutch Fruit bowl pancake was burned when it first arrived. I sent it back and the second one was sloppily made. When I got to the bottom of the pancake, there was a puddle of grease inside my fruit bowl. I was thoroughly disgusted. The manager discounted the plate 25% only after seeing pictures. He did not trust that my dissatisfaction as a customer was bad business. I will probably not visit this establishment again.

We came in at 2:30 on a rainy Saturday afternoon.
They were closing at 3 but we were immediately seated. It was a little cool in there but the place was well lit and clean. It has nice local artwork to add a bit of flair. I had the Bacon and eggs which is about $ 8 and comes with 3 pancakes. The food can quickly, as breakfast food should, and it was just enough. The pancakes were buttery and hot. The syrup was watery though which is odd but it didnt dampen the experience. Service was good. Great place.

I usually go to the Lincoln Park location, but since I was in the area I decided to try this one for my Sunday breakfast. I knew they’d be crowded, but they did a great job of cleaning tables quickly and getting people seated.
The food was great, but the service was simply TERRIBLE.
Once we were seated (a party of two) it was as if we were completely forgotten. After a 30 minute wait for a table, we sat and waited another 20 – 30 min for our food — two very simple skillets. (During our wait, our waitress did not check on us at all.) Our waitress finally dropped off our food and rushed away again — she did not bring us ketchup or refills, even though we tried to flag her down several times. The people sitting across from us had to ask a bus boy to get them water and syrup because the waitress was so completely unavailable. After we finished and sat patiently waiting for several minutes, my boyfriend finally had to physically tap our waitress on the shoulder and ask for our check. (At that point we were too irritated to wait for refills.) Not once did she ask how everything was, or if we needed anything else.
Needless to say, I will NOT be returning to this location. and while I understand that Sunday is sure to be a busy time — you do NOT completely ignore your patrons. I should not have to beg for a refill, ketchup, or my bill. Nobody wears name tags so I couldn’t pass her info along to management. and the man at the front register (maybe a manager?) didn’t bother to ask how our meal was.
The food at Original Pancake House is always really good with huge portions and great prices, but with many other — much better — locations to choose from.

To be fair I had this order to go
Their Swedish pancakes tasted good but looked sloppy
The Canadian ham was great
but the hash browns were undercooked and poorly seasoned it brought everything else down.
Just wanted to clarify, why this was to go:
1. Walked in and waited for a good two minutes while standing five feet away from at least 4 staff members asked me if i was eating in or ordering out. this was the reason I ordered to go,.
2. along with one of the waitresses rubbing her nose with her hand (left) and touching all over the menus. no thanks less things she would or could touch was fine with me
Also noticed A lot of employees standing around instead of cleaning… anything. usually not a good sign.

Good food, l go there for the potato pancakes. BUT for the second time I was served dirty flatware. This time I had already stirred & drank from a glass of tea b4 noticing the spoon had food stuck to it. I checked the fork, dried eggs on it !
Another time my husband’s tea came in a glass with a lipstick swap on it!
We’re only offered an apology from the waitress! BE SURE TO CHECK YOUR DISHES HERE B4 EATING FROM THEM!