Thompson Diner

Brunch is pretty okay here. It’s nice that its open ²⁴⁄₇ so great for late nights or super late brunches in my case. It’s got your classic diner feel so a bit grungy and the service isn’t the best, but for a quick meal it’s definitely not bad.

DO NOT EAT HERE! The food is terrible and over priced. They charged me $ 3 bucks for a side of toast and when I asked for it to be buttered they refused (rude wanna be hipster). No self-​respecting Torontonian would EVER put up with the crap in this place. It’s a COMPLETE waste of time.
Thompson Diner, get your SHIT together! Or stop calling yourself a «Diner».

Came here to avoid Second Cup as I needed a place to stay warm at near The Hoxton that would have acceptable dessert options. This establishment is open ²⁴⁄₇ and is really cozy. We ordered one of their mason jar desserts to share, the banana dulce de leche tower. I was going to order a tea as well, until I noticed they charge $ 4 for them. Methinks not.
The dessert itself didn’t WOW me, but I wasn’t expecting it to. It was fairly decent however! The tower consists of banana bread, caramel syrup, whipped cream, dulce de leche freshly sliced banana. I noted how moist the banana bread was. This dessert hit the spot despite its humble execution. I would order it again. The staff here were also very nice. There are more appealing places nearby (Forno Cultura, Lee, Thor, Wvrst) but it’s nice to know I can depend on this place as a solid option in the future if I ever need something late night. Maybe I’ll get the chance to try their savoury food in the future.

We went on New Year’s Eve (last night) after the party we went to. Surprisingly there was no wait at 1:30 AM! My friend and I split a buttermilk chicken and waffles as well as a chocolate milkshake ($ 7). The milkshake was thick and delicious and worth it.
The chicken and waffles looked amazing and tasted average. More skin than meat on the chicken. The chipotle mayo was good. The waffle was average too.
Our friend ordered the Mac n Cheese and it was very rich tasting (truffle oil), large portion and very yummy/​cheesy! We all helped her eat it.
Service:
Prompt and pleasant. They were attentive in clearing our plates. They told us after we were seated that the wait was ~20 mins which wasn’t bad given it was New Year’s Eve. We didn’t notice the wait as we were busy chatting.
Seating:
Bonus that they have booth seating for up to 4 people.
Bathroom:
Only 2 stalls. One toilet bowl was dirty (someone had been sick).
Line up:
When we left at 2:45 AM ish there was quite a line, i.e. After the bars closed.
Although I only rated it 3 stars I would go back as it’s a great location, open 24 hrs, and the service was good.

Apparently the Turkey Burger is good, I wouldn’t know though as they brought me a chicken breast on a bun when I ordered it…

I came here for brunch with my sister. I have to say if you live near by this could be a good place to go for brunch if you don’t have an idea as to where to go. The food here I would say is good. The prices of their menu is en par with other brunch menus in the area. The servers here are nice and friendly too. Overall, I would say this place is average, at least for their brunch menu (I have not tried their lunch or dinner menu yet). To be very honest, I thought this place was just average. There wasn’t anything that really captivated me. After my brunch experience here, I was more like «meh… this is okay I guess…» I think I was expecting a little more.

A perfect spot for cravings and the ultimate comfort. Very nice service and warm and friendly manager. It was a pleasant evening with my friends. The Mac and cheese is a must get to share with your friends. Grilled cheese burger was the perfect amount and not overwhelming or too much of it. The Sante Fe Salad was my favorite and what I ordered! Love love this place for cravings and for comfort food

Their burgers seem to lack ‘integration’ — they look good, and are huge, but the bun seems disconnected from the burger.
They make an alcoholic mud-​slide milk-​shake that is ¹⁰⁄₁₀. Did not see it on the menu last time but they pulled it off.
The food seems to be designed to ‘photograph well’, and is generally well prepared, but could stand some tweaks to make it more delicious (see integration). Twice my guests and I had to disassemble the burger into component pieces to eat it.
If it were more ‘diner’ like it would be greasier — the food they make is not greasy enough! :) haha

Came here on Sunday for what was intended as brunch but I saw fried chicken ($ 17.95 I think?) and couldn’t resist. It was kinda brunchy since I got it with breakfast potatoes! My friend got the regular breakfast with 3 eggs, turkey sausage, home fries and toast ($ 12.95).
The fried chicken was lacking a bit of flavour to be honest. It wasn’t bad but it definitely wasn’t the best I’ve had (which currently is from parts and labour). There were 5 pieces — 3 drumsticks, a small thigh and half a breast. It came with ranch sauce that definitely helped give it some omph. The batter wasn’t heavy but I think the chicken was just a tiiiiiiny bit over cooked cuz it didn’t have the juices flowing out when I bit into it. The home fries were delicious though with little pieces of almost burnt onions.
My friends breakfast was probably the better meal. It said 3 eggs but it looked like 5. They were fluffy and not in little bits and pieces like other places do them. The turkey sausage was alright but I favour pork sausages more.
Side note: they have jam in these individual little jars that were so cute!
Overall I wouldn’t be back for the fried chicken but if I happen to pass by and want breakfast I might drop in (they’re open 24 hours with all day breakfast).

The Thompson Diner is a standby favorite but the recent menu changes are a big downgrade for this former Toronto treasure. Now resting on its laurels, the quality of the food, the service, and the overall attention to detail seems to be flagging. The take away is that when you offer outstanding food and service in a hip, cool atmosphere, you can get away with charging a fortune for the food. When the food is lackluster and the service is poor, then the menu prices should reflect that. Unfortunately, that’s not the case at the Thompson Diner. The prices are as high as ever, and the food has slid a few pegs.
The famous omlettes served on a piping hot griddle are still here but the griddle is no longer even warm and the signature choices (caramelized onions) and variety of add-​ins (like green peppers) have been significantly downgraded and the limited number of choices makes me think that the kitchen is more of a heat-​up pre-​portioned place than it is an actual kitchen. The choices for vegetarians and gluten free folks (compared to the former menu) are almost nil.
Definitely a significant step down from its former self.
In addition the place seems understaffed compared to a few years ago and the hipster edge seems to be gone. Now, it seems like any other diner with a resentful crew — lots of attitude and not a lot of smiles.

Strange experiences in the few times I’ve been there. I heard about this place through co-​workers when we all worked at a private club that stayed open until the early hours so naturally the food options are pretty sparse at that time. They were pretty enthusiastic about and given my love of classic 50’s style diners, I was down to give it a try.
First time I went, I saw that they had footlong hot dogs in the menu and several different kinds. Dogs are usually something that restaurants only have on the kids menu or you have to hit a food cart to find, and I gotta’ admit as gross as they can be I still love ‘em, so I gave the whistle dog a try. First thing I noticed was the bun was stale and they had tried to compensate by over toasting it. The hot dog was the cheap kind you get at lower end street near stops which didn’t help. Fries were okay. It wasn’t terrible but it wasn’t that great either. Still, when a friend suggested we go another time, I was willing to give it another shot. Ordered the poutine Quebecoise. Pretty ho-​hum. Definitely not from Quebec, otherwise the cheese would have been melted and the gravy better quality. Somehow I made it a third time and got the burger. It wasn’t bad.
What holds me back from giving this place more stars is the potential it has to be so much better. From what you’ve read, I’ve never had terrible food there, but nothing spectacular either. The service has always been fairly good but the food is always just sub-​par, and that’s disappointing because from the exterior and décor and the act that it’s attached to the Thompson hotel, you’d think it would be better. If it had food the quality of a real greasy spoon and at the cherry location they’re at, they’d be swamped all the time but they’re not. It’s never been very busy when I’ve gone.
Try it out if you’re just hungry, but bring the clients to the Keg.

I’m dismayed to write this review as I rarely give 1 star (& I’m inclined to put none) but based on some friends who have come here before, it will get 1 for now.
Let’s start off by saying I came with a few VIP’s from the Juno’s after-​party, after the party (lol) to eat some major food! We walked in, took the left side of the place-there’s the right side which has a bar; it wasn’t overly busy then. We got seated immediately. Good, here’s where it starts to go downhill already. We waited for 30 minutes for the server to come to take our orders! We give our food & Drink orders all at once– fine we figure it may take 30 minutes for the food to cook, but the guy server never came back with our drink order! We slowly sipped our water that another girl server brought us. Well wait wait wait… you getting the idea? After waiting almost 2 hours! Yes ridiculous I know — normally I wouldn’t entertain waiting so long but it was the only place open in the late night/​early morn hour & we had a table of 10 people. I asked my friend if this was normal & he said it’s generally slow here but it was beyond compare at this point! So I flagged our server down & asked to check on the food and let us know how much longer (we waited this long, we figured maybe 10 – 15 minutes more). Well he never came back! I kept saying to my friends «oh maybe it’s coming now-​just give it 10 more mintes; We decided to leave! I really tried to hold out & give this place a chance. Oh guess who we see now? Our Server. He did this fake «apologetic» sort of excuse that the kitchen couldn’t handle the amount of people that came in after us. I don’t think he even put our order in. Just a note– I watched food keep going out from the kitchen to the bar side (some people that came waaaay after our table) now I knew some of the other people sitting at the other tables because some of them just came from the same party as we did. I did notice this place seems to attract quite the «pimping-​hooker» crowd. (They were quick to give them attention– even the «manager» on duty rushed over to them) hmmmm. Things that make you go hmmm?
Anyway we left after waiting over 2 hours & left extremely annoyed & hungry. What a waste of our time –this place lost HUGE bucks because even though we all ordered lots of food; the loss was to the server for one as my friends whom I were with are «big tippers!» Two, I will never go here again (I’m not one to say never) but it’s a first.
All of my friends were staying at the Thompson Hotel, so if this Diner is associated with this hotel… Shock & dismay. I read some of the reviews just before writing this so even more disappointed that I didn’t get to have a good experience not even minutely!
Clean up your act for the late night crowd!
Epic Fail. :(

While in Toronta, we were told this was a great scene and not to be missed. We were at another hotel, but our concierge got us on the list for the rooftop bar and we headed over. Upon arrival, the rooftop was closed, so we came downstairs and found the diner by accident.
We started off with the cheese plate: it came with about ½ oz servings of 4 cheeses. We were told it was Parmesan, Blue, a sheeps milk and «not sure on that one». It wasn’t parmesan, it was sometime of truffle infused sheep milk. The «unsure» one was a jalapeño infused cheddar. Besides the portions being so small, the cheese was all cold, as if the dish had just been pulled from the walk-​in. If you’re going to offer a cheese plate, your kitchen should at least understand temperatures!
The Pork belly appetizer came in a small cast iron croc and was nice and crispy with a side bowl of an orange dipping sauce. The porkbelly itself had no real flavor to it, I would suspect it wasn’t braised, but instead just fried in the deep fryer. The sauce though was excellent and brought some flavor to the pork belly.
The service was excellent. Friendly staff, giving recommendations on where to go and what to do for the night.
The appetizer experience was disappointing that we didn’t want to waste our only night in Toronoto with a bad dinner,

I met my boyfriend on Queens Quay after work and headed up Bathurst towards King Street West. The Thompson Diner caught our eye. The lighting seemed cozy from the outside and we craved comfort food.
There was a parking lot across the street, which is refreshing for such a chaotic neighbourhood with tons of construction. This diner took us both away.
He had the West coast burger, which came on a wooden board with in a cute small fries basket on the side. The burger looked delicious with all the spinach, cheese, tomatoes, and more! It was such a large burger that he had to cut it up into bitesized pieces!
I ordered the spaghetti with meatballs. I have to make a correction n that you get a massive veal-​and-​pork meatball on top of the spaghetti it was the perfect portion size. The dish was flavourful, with the right amount of cheese that complemented the fresh tomato sauce.
For dessert, we split the pecan pie. It was so buttery good. It is the best pecan pie that I have ever had. It came with vanilla bean ice cream.
The food is so good. I’d come back for the pecan pie alone! The setting is nice with booths everywhere. You can even sit at the bar and watch the game. I will definitely go back here. It made our date night even more memorable.

Gord and I had supper at Thompson Diner.
They serve their beer in an old-​school mugs.
Gord was craving Mac ‘n Cheese, which is why we went there. He ordered it with bacon and said it was good and would order it again.
I ordered Butter Chicken. It was yummy and I’d get it again. There were lots of chunks of chicken
Our server took goo care of us.
We’ll be back.