The Grateful Dedham Diner on Phantom Gourmet

Johnny Fortin and his wife Mel Stefanides have a lot to be grateful for.

“I love the action. I love the people. I love the creativity. I love food. See familiar faces, make friends. Work with kitchen with my kitchen team on specials.  The customers, the faces, the returning faces, and seeing regulars and just catching up with everyone. It doesn’t even seem like it’s a job anymore. It just seems like it’s a fun lifestyle.  We couldn’t be more grateful for the opportunities that we have.”

And you’ll be be grateful as well, when you visit the Grateful Dedham Diner.

Located in Dedham Square, the Grateful Dedham Diner is a laid back breakfast and lunch spot where the key ingredient in every dish is love.

“Grateful Dedham Diner is a family owned diner where we specialize in homecooking and scratch cooking and everything done with care and love.”

And more than breakfast, Johnny and Mel enjoy a good pun which proved to be a challenge when naming their new Dedham spot.

“I’m full of dad jokes and bad puns and awkward humor. So trying to come up with a pun, using the word Dedham, was a challenge, you know, ham is in there, but that’s not really a nice word. And dead you know, at first I was thinking of it’s not a heck of a lot to work with there.”

But when the name name came upon Johnny, it all made sense.

“The more I thought about the more I liked the aspect of being grateful for people make the decision to pass a bunch of other restaurants and come joining us here

Grateful for our regulars are coming in more than once and we get to know them and their families.  It’s awesome. We love it here. We’re grateful to be a part of this community and, and outside of all that we love a good pun. And I love classic rock so it’s stuck.”

One visit to the Grateful Dedham Diner and you’ll be stuck on all of their tasty plates. Especially if you try the corned beef hash.

“We slow roast corned beef brisket full ones each night.   It basically falls apart at that point.  And we add potatoes and peppers, onions, and chop that thing up really finely.   Then that gets tossed onto the grill eggs as you’d like them over the top, home fries and locally big toast. I’s absolutely out of this world delicious. And it’s definitely one of our most popular breakfasts.”

And vegetarians will want to hit the hippie van hash.

“The Hippie Van Hash is kind of like a good yet hearty tree hugger hash. All right, that’s sweet potatoes, black beans, corn, arugula, smoked gouda cheese.  From there we take it. We serve two eggs over home fries on the side. It’s delicious, filling, healthy and and you know, unique and you know, it’s got a cool name, hippie van hash.”

For something handheld, you can kick your day off with a breakfast sandwich.  With options like the “One heck of a breakfast sandwich” piled up with fresh mozzarella, bacon, egg and tomato on grilled brioche.  And then there’s the “Breakfast Sandwich to Remember”.

“Breakfast sandwich to remember is the perfect sweet and savory combination in the form of an unforgettable breakfast sandwich. We take fig preserves, spread those on grill brioche with crispy bacon, Brie cheese and a cage free egg.

It’s served with our crispy bliss home fries. And the whole thing works though to be definitely a breakfast sandwich to remember.”

If you’re looking for something sweet, there’s the Cannoli French Toast topped with sweet ricotta, chocolate chips and crumbled cannoli shells.

Or the “Chocolate Much?” Pancakes.   

“The chocolate much pancakes are definitely for the chocolate lovers out there.  We start with chocolate chip pancakes. And then we do a generous drizzle of Nutella and top that off with chocolate sprinkles. If you really want to go for it, definitely ask for whipped cream.  It’s a winner.”

And what would breakfast be without toast, and at the Grateful Dedham Diner, a must try is their ‘Far out Figgy Toast’, topped goat cheese, arugula, honey and eggs with a house made fig jam.   

“First of all, you could just pretty much live on the bacon jam.   It’s sweet and savory. It’s the perfect salty sweet match. We’re putting that over our locally baked toast. So that combo with a goat cheese and arugula which brings in a nice texture factor. The eggs you know kind of bring it back to breakfast, and then that little balsamic honey drizzle just ties it all together.”

And if you will ‘benefit oh so much’ if you get a benny- especially the Flat Top sauced with some of the best Hollandaise you can find.

“We really take pride in our hollandaise. We make it multiple times a day often. Fluffy, creamy. Little touch a lemon in there. And that finishes off the same flat iron Benny perfectly. It’s a nice, big, hearty meal. That’s definitely fit for a king.  It’s out of this world.”

The diner classics continue right through lunch, with big beefy burgers piled high with cheddar, bacon and onion rings.

And a good ol’ Grilled Rachel.

“Grilled Rachel is our take on a old school diner classic nice, thin slice brisket, rye toast, Swiss cheese that goes all into a sandwich with coleslaw, Russian dressing. It’s classic, it’s delicious. You cannot go wrong with a grilled Rachel.   It’s a good one.”

And who doesn’t love a BLT with avocado?

“Everybody loves avocados and everybody loves BLT. So we put those together.  This thing makes a great awesome summer sandwich. that one is a can’t miss.”

And with the majority of the menu coming in under twelve bucks, your stomach and wallet will be FULL, when you dine at the GrateFUL Dedham Diner.