Northside Diner

This is a great little diner in the downtown of Chesterton. The staff is always really friendly and always makes you feel welcome. I love to get their pancakes. There is always extra to take home. ;)

Food was pretty good. Price was ok. Liked the diner atmosphere. Lots of fried stuff. Fries were a bit bland but the shrimp was good.

This place is awesome!!! It doesn’t look like much from the outside, or from the inside for that matter. They did recently renovate the place, which is much needed since they went from smoking to non-​smoking. But I come here for the food! The food quality is high, and the prices are extremely low, making for 5-​star value. I personally recommend the eggs Benedict or an omelet. The portions are massive, the coffee is never-​ending, and the servers are always kind, polite, and friendly. They also accept credit cards now! I like finding little places like this, tucked away where fewer people find it. There may be a wait on a Sunday morning, but it usually isn’t too long. I would recommend for breakfast if you want something simple, cheap, and hearty.

Great place, great people. The new remodel makes the place look better, it was much needed.

First of all, the coffee was the worst coffee I’ve ever had (you could see through it), the scrambled eggs, while refreshingly not from a box of liquid eggs, weren’t scrambled well, had lots of white areas and were flat and over cooked. Bacon was tasty but undercooked, potatoes were heavily soaked in butter and the sausage gravy was lacking in flavor and coagulated. Service was average. Not sure how it got such high Unilocal ratings… maybe for the Jukebox and nostalgic décor which is why I gave it three stars instead of two.

I enjoy seeking out great breakfast places, with great atmosphere in out of the way places. Tack on great food and you’ve hit a home run! The Northside Diner in Chesterton Indiana is just one of those places.
Greeted as we came in, super friendly service and our breakfast was served fast and hot! Pancakes were about 12″ across! We also enjoyed the layered «nests» which combine all of your breakfast favorites together into a bowl of delicious comfort.
We travel often between Chicago and Ohio… and we found a favorite for sure!

You get what you expect. They don’t advertise anything more — just a nice greasy breakfast at this whole in the wall breakfast joint.

Amazing place for breakfast either with the family or for a hang over recovery. Amazing biscuits and gravy, pancakes, and omelets. Big portions so you won’t leave hungry. Great old time diner feel by far out beats any chain restaurant.

This was my first visit to the diner but my husband’s third or fourth. Friendly staff without smothering you. Delicious breakfast food that was not greasy. In addition to our breakfast we shared one chocolate chip pancake. How do you spell yummmm?
Fun décor with the top 40’s song list that I remember getting every Friday from WLS.
Economical, delicious and great service.

We stopped here with our friends and their kids on our way to New Buffalo per some great Unilocal reviews! Holla Unilocalersss!!!
We pulled up to the place around 8:45 AM and it was pretty much exactly what I was expecting, a small little quirky looking place RIGHT next to a train track. I mean, I loved it before we even walked in!
When we walked in, we were brought over to a table that still needed to be wiped down a bit, but whatever, at least the four of us could get our FOUR kids situated in this tiny space! The waitress was pretty quick to come take our orders but then the food came out in a very unconventional way for a diner, it came out as it was ready. So, for example, I had my food sitting in front of me for a good 3 minutes before the next person got theirs and it, for the most part was coming out one plate at a time! Which I found extremely awkward since I don’t like to start eating until everyone at the table is served. So that was a major downfall but since the food was THAT good, they still scored 4 stars!
Around the table we had a corned beef hash skillet-​type plate, biscuits and gravy, breakfast sandwich with steak (I think?), pancakes and I had the breakfast BLT which was a normal BLT, mayo and all, but with a fried egg on top. OMG… can you say AMAZINGGGG!!! It was fantastic… I don’t know why they don’t have that on the menu everywhere! It was everything you could want in a breakfast sandwich, oh, and it came with tater tots! Holy shitballs were those things fried perfectly! I also tried some of the biscuits and gravy which were just, okay, they needed more sausage in the gravy for my taste. But those pancakes… man…those pancakes… they were ridiculously good! I ended up eating like HALF… after I ate my sandwich. Can you say Fatty McFat Fat?! But they were too good to pass up!
Overall, I would DEFFF go back here on my way up to my beloved New Buffalo! The food service needs to be more normal but you really can’t get past how delicious the food is that you almost forget how you got it in front of you. So… basically…you should effing try it. Mmmkk?!

A wonderful place, with super friendly service and great, fresh-​tasting diner brunch food!!! I went with a group of my friends while visiting the dunes, everyone loved it. The portions were nice and big, we even had left-​overs. We all needed lots of coffee and that is exactly what we got! (good too) The owner of the diner spoke with us and was just a lovely pleasure. She even told us a bit about the dunes’ history and took our photo! What an unexpectedly relaxing experience. Wish it was closer to home so I could eat there more often!

My wife and I where out on the motorcycle and wanted to eat at someplace other than a chain restaurant. This place fit the bill perfect. We got there around 1:00 and the lunch crowd was just clearing out. Plenty of open tables. If you like breakfast all day you’ll love this place. I don’t. I can’t eat breakfast food after 10:00. But the lunch menu had a lot to choose from.

Here’s the really good news… they are now a smoke-​free restaurant! I agree with the other reviews… great food, great prices, friendly service, and interesting retro diner décor. I hesitated to stop in because of the smoking issue, but when I passed by, I saw the sign saying they went smoke free on May 1.
There was a decent-​sized crowd of cheerful regulars this morning… nobody seemed to mind skipping the cigarettes, and I really enjoyed my breakfast. This is the kind of place that makes small-​town restaurants a real treat for everybody, especially city people and suburbanites like me.

Ask for Edie Raines. She is the best waitress!

Small town diner — always hits the spot!
Pros: enormous portions — easy to split. Convenient parking. Coffee is always full. Cheap!
Cons: Smoke — It really can be overwhelming at some times of the day.

Yes, in Indiana, people can still smoke in certain restaurants. I’m not a fan of this, but that’s why I’m pointing this out. In case you were wondering, both this place and Peggy Sue’s in Chesterton have smoking «areas», however, since it’s not sectioned off, that pretty much makes the entire restaurant a smoking area.
We have eaten breakfast at Round the Clock and Third Coast in Chesterton, but we wanted to be able to walk to a place one morning, so we called Northside and found out there is no smoking on Sunday.
The place has a cool mural on the side, and the inside has memorabilia featuring photos of old movie and rock stars. The tables and chairs are 50’s diner-​style, and it’s really clean.
The breakfast fare is mostly typical eggs, bacon, hash browns and lots of gravy. They make these things called nests which usually involve hash browns, eggs, meat and gravy (a combo I don’t require, but for those of you who do…). They have omelettes, including the veggie omelette, and they have «country-​fried» steak (WITH GRAVY!), and the pancakes here are huge, but I would prefer maple syrup instead of imitation maple corn syrup (the syrup was really corny).
With a 20% tip, we were able to enjoy HUGE breakfasts for $ 30 for 4 of us. I thought it was very fair pricing.
The coffee was fine diner coffee, and it was served in tea cups, and was refilled for me like 5 times. It’s cool, but you know, they could probably save some time with some bigger cups.
I’m of the opinion that it’s hard to screw up breakfast, but Northside is better than average. Get some maple syrup, and it would be a 5-​star place for sure.
Limited seating, booths and tables, and they have a 4 or 5-​seat counter to sit at.

We stopped here one morning on our way to Detroit. We were looking for a small town diner and totally fit the bill. It doesn’t look like much from the street, but as soon as you pull into the parking lot, you’re greeted with a huge colorful mural. The food was delicious and the service was great. It had a sort of retro vibe going on with the décor. There was counter seating plus booths and tables. We would definitely return if we’re in the area again.