The Forest Inn

We love the old fashioned diner quaintness with a local «cheers» feel. The food is good but not fancy; and a good value too. The service is also friendly and attentive. This is a local bar restaurant and offers local people flair — I always look forward to breakfast with my dad when I’m back in the area.

A very rude blonde bartender ruined my evening before I could even take two sips off my drink. I handed it back to her and left. I won’t be back.

This is the place to go for simple fare. Don’t expect white glove service but do expect a great casual atmosphere. You can tell the bartenders care about the people that come time and time again. A nice vibe for sure!

Great Place! Friendly Staff, fun to watch local sports, Wizards, Nats, Caps! And if Your Hungry? Go for a Bacon Cheesburger yum yum…

As a bar, it’s OK – cheap, basic, but clean and not at all creepy or dangerous – nothing like what is described in the older reviews. I went with a friend for a couple of beers; they still only serve Bud, but it’s $ 3 a beer, or I think $ 9 a pitcher. The service was good, and the folks at the bar were a mix of guys watching the game, a couple of working-​class 40-​something women, and one single guy of indeterminate orientation. About what you would expect at a neighborhood bar in a suburban area. Parking is abundant.
The top shelf here is Jameson Irish Whiskey and Jose Cuervo. I did not see any liqeurs behind the bar. If you’re looking for a single-​malt or a daiquiri, forget it.
Breakfast: I went here hoping to be surprised. Unfortunately, it was overpriced and not very good. A stack of pancakes is $ 8, served with unforgivably soggy bacon. The friendly owner did refry it for me, which helped – but still, who the hell wants soggy bacon? The thick pancakes were just OK. Forest Inn does not serve waffles.
A supposedly large glass of OJ was $ 3.50. It was on the small side – maybe 5 inches tall. Definitely not large and barely even medium. The «butter» served with the pancakes is the irritating little pats of unlabeled margarine that make you peel off a square of wax paper for each one. For $ 8 worth of flour, milk, egg, and sugar, would it be too much to ask for some actual butter, from a cow?
It’s not that hard to do breakfast right, if you just use fresh, real ingredients and cook everything at a high temperature.
Bottom line: As a modest but serviceable bar with great prices, Forest Inn succeeds. As a breakfast joint, it has major room for improvement.

If you’re looking for a place to end the night… this is it. I can assure you it will get ugly, but the stories you’ll have afterwards will make it worth it. Forest Inn is walking distance form my house, so I’ve been here 4 or 5 times late night. The place has the cheapest drinks around… only Bud on tap, but don’t worry… there’s PBR by the can ;). The food looks nuked, but after a couple $ 4 vodka tonic doubles, you won’t care. The «juke box» is Awesome… but the real gems are the patrons. The «regulars» are highly entertaining. Seriously, I’ve never talked so much in my life. Be prepared to chat it up w/​random people and be prepared for hilarity to ensue.
In the 4 or 5 times I’ve been, I’ve seen:
— A fight break out
— A con man trying to score drinks by saying he’s a war veteran and telling stories from the war (hell he was so convincing we would’ve bought him one anyways until the bartender kicked him out)
— A 70 yr old (or at least he looked 70) throwing out one liners. He had game.
— Someone puking out back
It’s been a while since I’ve gone, but me thinks I’m due back soon for some entertainment.

We have been wanting to give this place a try for quite a while and finally had the chance to stumble in last night after stopping at 7 – 11 on the way home from a boring uptight Arlington bar. Maybe it was an off night (Thursday) but it was not packed at all. Sat down at the bar was was greeted quickly by the bartender. Three of us ordered beers and she suggested a pitcher would be cheaper. Only one beer on tap and it was Budweiser, can’t complain about that! One pitcher and a bottle of Bud cost $ 10. Seemed to be friendly local drunks there. Not a very large liqueur selection but all the basics.
Only thing missing is the cigarette smoke. Dive bars just aren’t the same without it. Even if you don’t smoke, it adds to the character of the place. If you want a good smoke filled dive bar, check out Neighbors in Vienna
Will definitely be back, maybe even to try some food there sometime.

It’s a local dive bar, and I am a local. When you need a stiff drink and don’t want to drive anywhere, The Forest Inn is always there for you!!!

if adam sandler were doing a movie scene in a bar, these people would be the extras… so strange, completely random and i mean this in the most awesome way possible. Everyone looks like they’re in their 60’s and they’re more drunk than you were on your 21^st birthday. I tell no lies.
I would go here every day if it were closer to my house to see the characters. oh, and they spell «nuggets» with one «g» and most importantly, the beers are CHEAP!
I love. this bar.

Quirky? Malodorous? Unique? Scary? Yes, the FI is all of these things and more! Ok, ok, it’s not a 5-​star restaurant, but I’m rating it in it’s own catagory, call it ‘dive bars’, ‘gin joints’, cheap eats…
The food is good ’nuff! Breakfast is available all day — and who doesn’t love pancakes, bacon, sausage and eggs for dinner? With, say, a Jack and ginger? Sweeeet dreams, fellow Inn-​mates!
The owners are great guys — they take good care of their barkeeps — the ‘angels’ of the Inn… if you are good to them, they are really good to you! Act like a schmuck and the regulars will step in. No one likes a schmuck…
As for entertainment, they have a video crack machine, internet jukebox, Golden Tee 2010, the bowling game, and a video dart machine from the 90’s that ROCKS — it’s so much more fun than you’d think! Trust me… I’m an office manager.
They just bought us 2 GIANT flat-​screen tvs (and there is a rumor that they are replacing the other 3 old tvs with new ones! ssshhhhh!!!)
They love their Redskins… LOVE the ‘skins…and serve a free buffet during half-​time with pizza, spaghetti and giant meatballs, salad… and folks bring in their own home-​made dishes, too… awesome!
The crowd is a giant, weird, dysfunctional family… same faces every day, and new faces all the time– young and old, crazy and sane, drunken or dry, we all play nice together… friendships are created here… we are regulars and proud of it! And no, not a bunch of Unilocal users in there… some! but not a lot! This ain’t Clarendon, ya know!
Plus, it’s in Westover — so grab some Toby’s ice cream, have a beer at the Beer Garden… it’s such a cool village (not a strip mall!!)
I know I’m leaving out many other attributes, but I hope this will persuade some of you to check it out… grab a grilled cheese tomato and bacon on rye… fries and gravy… ok, now I’m hungry!
I’m a townie — I love the Forest Inn… thanks for reading this!
(and I’m not being reimbursed for promoting this joint, trust me!!!)
~Dee

What is this «Townie» Crap? Where are you from? «Love Story?»
If you ever wondered if there are real locals in Arlington, go to the Forrest Inn. It is not fancy. It is a Dive. Beer and drinks are cheap. Food is simple but good. Always a friendly bar.

After much prodding, I coaxed the gf into accompanying me here for breakfast. This place is definitely for townies as Dick D pointed out but since I live nearby I guess I am a townie. Regardless, the restaurant is kind of hidden within the strip mall and you probably wouldn’t know it was there unless you were standing on top of it. The place is pretty straightforward. They have food and booze. They used to have smoking but the VA Indoor Ban took care of that. The mantra of beer is for breakfast serves true here.
On to the food. The menu is pretty simple. Eggs, pancakes, omelette’s, etc. I opted for 2 eggs scrambled, bacon, potatoes, and toast. My gf for the western omelet, potatoes, and toast.
The eggs, and huge chunks of potatoes (not home fries) were good. The bacon was really good. Light, crispy, and salty.
The omelet had onions, green peppers, sliced ham (not cubed), mushrooms, and cheese. It was good too and even elicited a «this is good» response from the gf.
The server/​bartender was friendly and quick.
The tally for the meal including a coffee and tip was $ 14.50.
The one strange thing I noticed was our table seemed too small for our booth. Like if I leaned, there was an exuberant amount of space between me and the table.
All in all a good quick meal on the cheap.

Not to be a hater, but fellow reviewer Richard D. got what he experienced. The Forrest Inn, or Black Forrest Inn as we «townies» used to know it by was once a larger and more invigorated restaurant in the Westover area of Arlington. In the same little strip as the post office, Ayers five and dime, and the market, the FI was part of a quaint throw back to yester year when you lived in your neighborhood, not just passed through. Today however, townies know (or Native Arlingtonian as we like to call ourself) that the Forrest Inn is an old school dive of the drunk variety.
Around 5pm each night the parking lot behind the mall, where you will find the Forrest Inn begins to fill up with regulars to the restaurant, who park their battered biscaynes and waddle on in for a drink. Or two, or three, or four. The smell of cheap booze and beer mixes with the stale sweat of cigarette smoke (hey VA is smoke free now… so they are outside on the street catching a drag) and wafts across the loud conversations.
I am sure that for the locals who come in to commiserate about how bad the president is, or to share off colour jokes with the other weathered patrons it is a good time. This good time can be confirmed by the wobbling pedestrians headed to said biscaynes later in the evening, and the occasional shouting match/​shove fest that occurs outside its door.
I can’t speak the quality of the food, or what is on the TV… but I can salute this place for still being here serving their patrons and making them happy. From the outside it is a bright and cheery place. For the adventurous I am sure it is inside too. When the smoke settles with time I am sure it will be a place worth visiting. As a «townie» I look forward to that, but until then I will head over to Lost Dog for my pint at dinner time.

If you want lots of cheap liqour in large quantities this is your place. If you want to have an iron lung when you get older this is also your place. I’m shocked the smoke doesn’t smell the neighborhood up.
I could see going back more often when the no smoking ban kicks in

Ok. I can’t really rate this joint.
But I walked in this place seeing that they serve breakfast. It’s almost hard to find if you didn’t walk by. The signage is pretty crappy, and it is definitely a place for the townies.
As soon as I walked through the door, the stank smell of cigarettes hit me like a mack truck. I almost suffocated walking in there. I turned around and walked back out.
This place is like a throwback of an old school diner. If you like to smoke, come here. Like the nearby Ayers hardware, its like it hasnt changed at all ever since they opened.
I’m not a smoker, and it will be a shame once VA passes the no smoking law. This truly is the free market at work, if you don’t wanna smoke, don’t come here. Its one of the reasons I don’t go out in VA, but take the trip into DC.
If you smoke, you might love it. The clientele here didn’t seem like active Unilocalers, and I didn’t see the «People Love Us on Unilocal Sticker» on the door either.
Once the smoking is gone, I might give it another shot and an updated review.