Mel & Faye’s Diner

Love this place. Whenever we go up in that area we stop to eat here. The food is wonderful and the staff is always friendly. We were just recently in the area and the family wanted a nice juicy burger and so of course we stopped. It was just what we needed after a day on the river. I have had many items on the menu and everything I have tasted had been the bomb.

The salad bar is the best! I also had a cheeseburger and that was tasty. The wait wasn’t too long and the staff was ok.

We ate dinner here on a Monday night. This was not our first choice but a BUNCH of other establishments were closed on Monday evening. .. we are glad they were!
Mel & Faye’s Diner is very homey. It has a «local» feel to go with solid food. The menu is varied enough to probably fit most tastes and includes breakfast/​lunch/​dinner. The Giants baseball game was on and it appeared that some of the locals came in to watch it.
We cannot speak for everything but we saw some awesome meals that smelled great go by. We concentrated on a couple of the wide variety of burgers. Those are solid and the pile of French fries is substantial. We saw others coming with large piles of onion rings that looked fantastic.
Our server was friendly, helpful and attentive. One of us had a chocolate shake and the other had a tasty draft IPA. We will be back to try out breakfast or expand on our burger exploration when we are in the area again.

Mel’s and Fayes is an amazing place. I’ve been eating here since before they built bigger place. My only complaint is sometimes their staffing as personable as they once were and some of the female employees could dress a bit more appropriate for work. Midriff shirts and low jeans shouldn’t be allowed. Also the employees smoke in the outdoor seating area by the window to order food and I’m sure some people don’t enjoy the taste of smoke while they eat I know I don’t. But over all Mel’s and Fayes had amazing Food and I would recommend coming here to especially if your out of town.

My experience here was great, Logan showed great customer service when helping me decide what I wanted. He also made sure to check on us throughout the night. Food was perfect, I will be back!

Ordered prime rib dinner for 19.99. The meat came out room temperature to cold, the veggies are slaughtered and so over done I could easily mash them and the baked potato is the only thing acceptable. I do not like to send things back nor do I like to complain to a restaurant when they are this busy. However, I do like to warn others that there is probably better items on the menu to order.

We ate here our first night in Jackson, and like it so much we came back on our second.
This is the place where locals go. We saw tables of kids grabbing a bite before the senior prom, assorted senior citizens, and a bunch of guys in camouflage fatigues fresh from the hunt. A dad at this table proudly wore a shirt that read «Lots of men go through life looking for a hunting partner, but I raised mine.» Probably the most colorful of all was a hefty man missing a bunch of teeth who wheeled his hefty mom into the joint. Mom lost a foot to the diabetes but was obviously hungry: she kept pestering junior to purchase Red Vines from the jar on the counter to tide her over as they waited the ten minutes for their table.
The food is very good, and the portions are big. One night I had the enormous «Moo Burger,» two ¼ lb. patties with gooey cheese and all the fixins. The other night I had an okay reuben sandwich — the pastrami was a bit chewy. This came with a cup of creamy clam chowder — they certainly didn’t skimp on the cream, but there wasn’t a lot of clams or even clam flavor. Fries and onion rings are both very good. My wife had the Cowboy Plate — 8 oz. of ground chuck and a baked potato, including a visit to the pretty okay salad bar.
The kids menu is a bargain at $ 5 a pop. Choices include grilled cheese, burgers, tacos and hot dogs each accompanied with fries or sliced fruit and juice or soda with free refills.
The beer list was also nice. Several smaller things on tap including Amador Brewing Company’s very tasty Dirty Blonde.
For dessert there is housemade pie — we liked the coconut cream and cherry very much, but thought the blackberry a tad sour.
Very impressive and well-​trained staff. They are well-​scrubbed, friendly and quite efficient. Both nights the restaurant hummed along like a well-​oiled machine. Businesses don’t work this well by accident — whoever runs the place knows exactly what they are doing.
We feel lucky to have found Mel & Faye’s. The next time we head to scenic Amador County, I can’t imagine why we’d have dinner anywhere else.

Staying in Jackson this last weekend for a family birthday party, things got kinda late and decided we wanted to go out to eat. Drove around this quiet town kinda late and stumbled upon this great diner. Dinner was great, service was exceptional.

I’ve been there with my friend for dinner we only saw burger, waffles, pancakes, and shakes, we were curious and actually very nice surprise the menu is full of different things. It’s a really nice place with good smiley workers and good people, the food is really good and the place itself is really pleasant.

This place has that old school diner feel before you even walk in. I always have breakfast here when I’m in the area. The service has always been prompt, and very attentive during my entire meal.
I’ve tried several different omelets, pancakes, biscuits and gravy and they’ve all been good.
The place does get busy at times and occasionally it takes a little while to get your food, but it’s always been worth the wait.

Tonight I had the corned beef and cabbage special, for St. PATRICK’S DAY… it was pretty damn good! A few fatty chunks were thrown on the plate, but other than that it was almost as good as mine.

Went for a late lunch and the place was still crowded. Ordered burgers and malt. The Malt was very good. Burger was good, but not much in the topping department, just some lettuce was expecting more produce. Service was excellent and everyone was nice.

Mel & Faye’s is SO killer. We randomly stopped into this place after a long day of snowboarding and we were not let down. They have great dinner food, the waitresses especially «Shorty» are the sweetest and they have the best brownie sundae I have ever eaten. You have to order dessert if you stop in. everything is incredible! Their salad bar is my second favorite thing they offer… endless supply of veggies!
Every time we go to Kirkwood we stop in! They never let us down!

What a great place to eat when you are heading down the mountain from Kirkwood. We were there with a large group of 15 and our waitress (Sethina) gave everyone separate checks with a smile on her face. She was super helpful and professional. Truly the best waitress I have had at a restaurant in years.
To top it all off I dropped my ID on the way out of the restaurant and didn’t realize it until I was home in the Bay Area. The owner mailed it to me the next day — priority mail. What a super staff and super place. They take time with their food… because it’s good!

Don’t eat here if you’re in hurry
We stopped on the road to eat here, unfortunately. Killed over 1 ½ hours of our time. There is something wrong when the waiter comes to you and brings the drinks and then you have to wait over 45 minutes to get your food. When you look around you see people just sitting with no food. We should have got the clue and left, but being with family one need to be more patient. My wife ordered soup and salad and she had to wait when they brought all the food (45 min later) that she could have just go get her salad. The food was a bit over average. Staff seemed to work hard but there is a problem with service folks.

We stopped by Jackson during our trip out to gold country. After checking out some of the shops open later, we heard of Mel & Faye’s from some locals.
So we decided to stop by. It looked like an old ‘50s diner from the outside, and the inside looks like it’s been remodeled, but still has a homey feel to it.
The menu consisted of mostly burgers, sandwiches, and all-​day breakfast – diner food. I, myself, had the bacon cheeseburger with Swiss cheese and BBQ sauce, which was fairly enjoyable. The BBQ sauce was somewhat generic, but worked with the burger well. The meat quality was better than your average diner-​quality meat. I substituted the fries with the «award-​winning salad bar» for $ 2.50 extra, which turned out to be a single-​trip salad bar. But no worries because I absolutely loaded my plate to the brim.
My girlfriend had the brisket sandwich, which was actually very good, although her fries weren’t very good.
Our server had apparently told my girlfriend what her side options were instead of the chili that also came with the burger. I did not hear the options because I still had my nose in my menu trying to decide what to order. So when it was my turn, I asked the waitress what my options were instead of fries and she simply said, «It’s the same as her’s,» pointing to my girlfriend, «Do you remember them, or…» I said it’s fine and then just asked what vegetable options they had. She said that there was a vegetable mix, but wasn’t sure what it consisted of, and didn’t offer to check for me. I decided that fries fine. After she walked away, my mom informed me that I could have just gotten a salad bar trip for $ 2.50 extra. Wondering why the waitress hadn’t mentioned it, I got up to find her and changed my fries to the salad. The service after that was prompt, but was oddly equivocating with information.
And maybe this is just nitpicky, but the burger options on the menu were confusing, as 3 burgers seem to be virtually the same thing with only arbitrary differences – perhaps providing themselves with an excuse to give them more burgers to find names for.
I will say that you get a lot of food for $ 10 ($ 12.50 if you include the salad). And the burger wasn’t bad at all. It was about ²⁄₃ lb. And then a salad that you can make as big as you want provided the size of your plate can hold it all.
Not a bad option if you want a lot of food or if you’re with a big group, but I’d probably explore other spots next time I’m in town.

This is one of the most consistent restaurant/​diners in the Mother Lode area. They offer great specials and their regular menu has a good selection of meals no matter what time of day you come to eat. They also have a nice salad bar and BG’s lounge is just a door away for a cocktail. What else can you ask for?
My favorite is the Old Timer Burger with a Peanut butter milkshake– (they use «REAL» peanut butter) — try it, you’ll love it !

A overly interior with a speedy gracious staff.
I had a blackened steak, not a top grade cut but this is a diner of course. Terrific salad bar included with this reasonable meal.
Ample parking and warm fun feel!

Went here to grab some dinner at some time at the river over the Memorial Day Weekend. It was surprisingly better than what my friend and I thought it would be. I just got the fish and chips. I could definitely tell it was from frozen food, but I really don’t expect much more than that when you’re OTP from San Francisco.
The service was really great though! They have prime rib on the weekends as well!

Great expectations, not disappointed in the slightest.
We came here after a long day of lounging by the river and it was everything we needed.
They have a few tvs and an adjoining bar/​lounge. They had a decent salad bar, there even some hidden spinach and multiple salad dressing choices.
My friend ordered the fish and chips while I had the infamous Moo Moo Burger. She enjoys her dish and how fast it came! My burger was a blend between a five guys with the works and an in n out double double.
All in all it was a great experience. Their salad bar had some scary chicken strips and some browning lettuce, but hey… It ain’t too shabby. Overall, I’ll probably come her again-it’s great for groups but for now, adiós Jackson!