The Best Things To Order When Visiting Waffle House For The First Time

Whether it's 3 a.m. and you're craving breakfast food or you're just looking to get your diner food fix on a road trip, Waffle House is the place to be. Most locations of the Southern chain are open 24 hours a day, seven days a week, so indulging in Waffle House is always an option. Some may complain that the food is too greasy, that the patrons are too inebriated, or that the jukebox too often plays the same song on repeat, but those people simply can't appreciate what Waffle House truly is: a bastion of late-night and early-morning deliciousness for waffle lovers everywhere.

Haven't been to Waffle House before? You're in for a treat. But before you go, you should get a better idea of what's on the menu — and what's worth ordering. We chose these Waffle House menu items as representative of the chain's menu as a whole, focusing on the best flavor and textural combos according to online reviews and our own personal experiences. Give these dishes a try the first time you go to Waffle House, and you, too, are destined to become a fan. Then, check out the dishes you shouldn't order from Waffle House.

The most classic Waffle House meal of them all is the All-Star Special, which many reviewers from around the internet say is their go-to. There's a good reason for this: You get a lot of food when you order the All-Star Special. It comes with eggs, cooked to your preference, along with toast and jelly, both of which are available in various varieties. Then, you have some choices to make: For your side, you can choose grits, hash browns, or sliced tomatoes. The grits are a Southern classic, so they're absolutely worth a try. Think about whether you want ham, sausage, or bacon, and then consider the flavor of your waffle. Go for a plain waffle if you want to keep things classic, or add peanut butter chips or blueberry nougat to make things more interesting.

This is such a great option for Waffle House first-timers because it allows you to try a little bit of everything on the breakfast menu. The next time you go, then, you'll know what to order if you want a more reasonably sized breakfast (but you'll probably end up getting the All-Star Special again anyway).

Because Waffle House is literally named after its signature dish, it only makes sense that you would want to order a waffle the first time you visit the chain. A classic, original waffle may seem like a good bet if you really want to taste what WaHo is all about, but if you ask us, it's not actually the best waffle on the menu (and the one we order every time we go). If you're looking for something a bit sweeter and more indulgent, you should order the chocolate chip waffle instead.

Those chocolate chips melt perfectly into the hot crevices of the waffle, making for a gooey but fluffy textural experience that's hard not to love. Of course, it tastes even better when you spread your chocolate chip waffle with the salty whipped butter they put on your table. That salty-sweet flavor combo makes every bite worth savoring. (Can't make it to Waffle House? Try our sweet and savory waffle recipes instead.) Waffles are basically desserts anyway, so you might as well lean into it by adding some chocolate to the mix.

Love potatoes and looking for a hearty, savory dish that will have you feeling full and satisfied within a few bites? Look no further than Waffle House's signature hash brown bowls. There are five different bowls you can order, all with slightly different toppings. What they all have in common, though, is the base of crispy, shredded hash browns that create a pleasant textural experience without detracting from the flavor of any of the other ingredients in the mix.

All of these hash brown bowls contain cheese and scrambled eggs, but after that, you'll have to decide if you want to opt for more of a breakfast meat — like sausage, bacon, or ham — or make your dish more of a lunch or dinner item with the inclusion of cheesesteak or chopped chicken chunks. Although we're more partial to the breakfast-focused hash brown bowls, they're all worth a try. Don't forget to ask for some hot sauce to add a spicy, acidic zing to the dish.

Of course, not everyone is into hash browns. If you're not much of a potato person and really want to lean into an even more aggressively Southern-style breakfast, then try a grits bowl instead. Although there are three different grits bowls to choose from, we think that the sausage, egg, and cheese bowl is the absolute best. The sausage is nice and hearty, with a greasiness that makes every bite of the grits richer, and it pairs well with the melted slice of cheese they add to the mix as well. The scrambled eggs pull the dish together, making it a complete breakfast.

If you've only ever tried grits in the form of shrimp and grits before, this is your chance to give them a try in more of a breakfast context. Want to get a better sense of what grits taste like before you order them at Waffle House? Try making this recipe for classic creamy grits at home.

If there's one classic Southern-style breakfast you absolutely have to try, it's biscuits and gravy. This seemingly humble meal is deeply decadent and is going to be a hit amongst anyone who loves beige foods (as we do). The grilled biscuits and gravy at Waffle House are especially tasty, largely thanks to the texture of the biscuits. Since they're grilled, they have a nice, subtle crispness to them. That means they don't collapse under the weight of the thick, sausage-studded gravy, an umami-salty sludge that may not look appealing but that packs a surprising amount of flavor.

If you've never had Waffle House's grilled biscuits and gravy before, you may assume that they're not worth your time, considering that they're not one of the more elaborate items on the menu. But Waffle House reviewers absolutely love the gravy, which should tell you that it's worth trying for yourself. This is another dish that we think is best served with a generous drizzle of hot sauce for a touch of acidity. If you like your biscuits and gravy with some added sweetness, though, try our recipe for maple biscuits and gravy.

Who said you couldn't have steak for breakfast? Certainly not Waffle House, considering that you can order a Delmonico steak and eggs off the diner chain's menu. If you wake up feeling super hungry — and super in need of a generous hunk of meat — then this is the order for you. That Delmonico steak is served with a side of eggs, cooked to your choosing, toast with jelly, and your choice of hash browns or sliced tomatoes. What sets this order apart from other breakfast menu items is the fact that you're going to get a lot more meat than you would with, say, a few pieces of bacon or ham.

Waffle House goers say that the steak is tender and flavorful, but keep in mind that it can be somewhat fatty. Considering that breakfast meat generally is pretty fatty, though, it seems like this steak belongs alongside eggs and toast.

We've already endorsed one waffle selection here, but we have to provide an alternative in case you're not a chocolate person, and you don't want to go with the classic, unadorned option. Another top-notch waffle option at Waffle House is the blueberry waffle. It's nothing wild, nothing out of the ordinary: just a fluffy waffle dotted with subtly sweet blueberries. This waffle has a much milder sweetness to it than the chocolate version, so we recommend drizzling on some syrup in addition to that salty whipped butter (which you can make in your own kitchen) to add even more flavor to the dish.

Order the blueberry waffle as a dessert after whatever else you're eating, or make it the star of the show alongside some sausage or bacon for a salty-sweet combo that you'll want to go back to again and again. If you're experiencing Waffle House's waffles for the first time, though, this is a must-try order.

We chose these menu items because we believed they were representative of the chain's menu offerings, identifying both sweet and savory, as well as breakfast and lunch (or dinner) options. Our criteria for this list included both Reddit reviews and personal experience, the latter of which focused on texture and flavor balance in each individual dish. 

Texture-wise, we thought about crispness where appropriate (like with hash browns, biscuits, and the exteriors of waffles), and flavor-wise, we prioritized dishes that had a pleasurable combo of sweet, salty, and umami flavors that melded well together. We've tried most of these dishes multiple times at various Waffle Houses around the Atlanta metro area to get a better sense of how they taste at different locations.