The West Essex Diner — Restaurant in Fairfield

I'm going to give as much detail as I can about my experience at this diner so those reading can truly decide if they'd like to try this diner. Firstly I visited this place twice in one day 07/10/24, first time was for breakfast, second time was for lunch & even brought my co-workers along with me which one of them is my fiancé. The first visit was decent, food was not great, but the waiter was so I decided not to harshly judge the diner & gave it a second shot for lunch later the same day. Second visit was not acceptable at all! The waiter was ok, but being very short with us all in the same token, which we did not make a big deal over. I was still slightly full from the first visit so I decided I wasn't going to order another plate of food, however, my fiancé decided to order a steak shishkabob over rice (he also ate breakfast with me the same morning). I'm currently pregnant & being curious of how his food tasted, I grabbed a fork full of his rice & a piece of his steak (which I did not enjoy the steak but the rice was ok) & that was it. Once it was time for us to leave, we paid for our food & was about to leave until we noticed the itemized receipt & there was a charge for "open food sharing" for $3.00 dollars. We we're highly confused because according to the restaurant, "sharing food" consisted of having another plate present and sharing food off one plate, which was not the case as I stated before I only grabbed a fork full directly from his plate. We were not informed by the waitress of this bogus policy & when we talked to the manager the demeanor she gave was one of "oh well too bad". I explained the least the waitress could've done was inform us of the policy & let us know she added that to the bill. The "$3" add on was not the issue rather the not informing us of the restaurants policy & tacking on such a bogus charge sneakily. We still left the waitress a nice tip & informed the manager we would not be patronizing this diner ever again for the lack of consideration to inform their patrons of their "made up" policies concerning "food sharing" (which we were not doing) & that in the future they should train their staff a little better as well as accommodating patrons on such bogus policies. Will not return for mentioned reasons as well as the food being...

Tried out the new West Essex Diner for the first time since they bought and remodeled the old Versailles Diner. The interior is really nice, looks more like a restaurant then a diner, that being said the service was not even up to diner standards and the food was so-so. Our waiter was constantly walking by and stating he would be right with us. Even after he took our order he could not seem to complete one task like bringing our drinks (2 sodas, 1 coffee with milk, 1 water). First the sodas came, he would be right back with the coffee, brings coffee and said he be right back with the milk, still missing water when he returned with milk, one more trip and we now could place our food order. Ordered 1 appy (philly cheesesteak rolls) which were very good but took a long time to come out. They came with dipping sauces in little take-out plastic cups with lids on, very odd, you think they could put them in little dishes or take off the lids. As he puts them on the table he said our main courses are coming out too. 30 seconds later all the food is brought out. He is missing my cranberry sauce and said he would bring that right out. My wife was missing her balsamic vinegar for her sandwich but he disappeared before we could tell him. Finally reappears 5 minutes later (still no cranberry) and we ask for the balsamic. Halfway done with sandwich when he returns with it (still no cranberry but I'm now done). Hot open turkey was a large portion but very bland, peas and carrots were an overcooked mess, mashed potatoes were tasteless, Sinatra sandwich was ok and the super 3 burger was good but not super. Nothing came with garnish or coleslaw or pickles. Maybe the sandwiches were suppose to have those things but the waiter forgot, who knows. Place was not busy so there is no excuse for the poor service and the underwhelming food. Loved the Versailles and I know it declined in the last few years but even at the end it was better than its...

We are staying in Jersey for a girls trip and decided to come to this establishment for some lunch. We were sat fast and the waiter came right away, we got drinks and said we needed another minute. When we were ready we looked for our waitress who was no where to be found, we had to ask another waitress to get ours so we can order. We got our food and it all went down hill from there. We got a breakfast sandwich which was alright and then a a chicken Caesar salad wrap and for a Caesar salad it’s was dry and there was brown lettuce. The real issue was when we got the chicken sliders which we requested no tomato as there is a tomato allergy. When we took off the bun it’s had tomato all over it indicating that there was tomato on the sandwich but taken off after remembering there wasn’t supposed to be tomato. After further looking in to our food a bug came out of the lettuce as shown in the picture. We were appalled. We waited for our waitress for a long time, we never got refills on our water or coffees nor did she check on us AT ALL, until we were so ready to leave that we asked another waitress to just get the manager. Once we asked for the manager the waitress finally came over and asked if everything was alright and of course we said No! We explained to her what happened and unapologetically she just said “Oh I’ll be back” no apology nothing. The manager came she very much so believed she knew what she was doing and clearly she doesn’t. We told her what happened and she looked very confused and didn’t care nor did she know how anything could happen. She took the meal off the bill but didn’t seem to have a caring or apologetic bone in her body. This was a horrific experience as a culinary art graduate and a waitress myself I will never recommend or come back to this establishment. Save your money,sanity, and first of all your health before ever risking yourself for this establishment. Absolutely good riddance and...