Guy Fieri has made more than 20 stops at San Diego restaurants with the popular Food Network show “Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives.”
Over the past two decades, the crew behind the Food Network show “Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives,” or Triple D, as it’s sometimes referred to by fans and host Guy Fieri, has highlighted hundreds of small, independently-run restaurants that all have one thing in common: They serve up pretty great food.
That’s certainly the case for some of the restaurants in San Diego. From old-school Mexican restaurants with incredible histories to more recent additions to the city’s culinary scene, like a restaurant and bar that themes its cocktails after metal bands, or a food truck that sets itself apart with the quality products it uses, there are amazing eats throughout the city that have been showcased on the Food Network program.
Over the years, the show has featured more than 20 restaurants in San Diego, but some of them have since closed. Thankfully, a majority of them are still open, ready to welcome locals, visitors, and fans of Triple D. Here are 18 restaurants throughout San Diego that have been featured on “Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives.”
1. El Indio Mexican Restaurant
3695 India St., San Diego
Featured in episode: Season 2 Episode 9—“Family Owned”
In 1940, El Indio Mexican Restaurant was founded as a tortilla factory, where handmade corn tortillas were produced. Its production expanded during World War II, when customers began asking if the factory, owned by Ralph Pesqueria Sr., could start making ready-to-eat lunches. Pesqueria utilized his tortillas and began making arguably one of the earliest versions of the taquito.
From there, El Indio Mexican Restaurant became one of the most well-known Mexican restaurants in the city. Today, the restaurant still serves taquitos, served with cheese, guacamole, salsa, and lettuce. It also has an expansive menu filled with other Mexican favorites, like tacos, burritos, and tamales.
2. Studio Diner
4701 Ruffin Road, San Diego
Featured in episode: Season 2 Episode 10–“Open 24/7”
When the “Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives” crew showed up at Studio Diner to film for the second season of the Food Network show, staff and customers were already used to the cameras. That’s because Studio Diner isn’t just a fun-sounding name. The diner was originally used as a film set and built next to the Stu Segall Productions facility, where shows like “Veronica Mars” and movies like “Bring It On” were filmed.
Eventually, the restaurant set was transformed into a real, working restaurant and found itself serving a lot of film crews, in addition to San Diego residents and visitors. It serves classic diner fare, with dishes named after movies and TV shows, like the Good Burger, or the Zorba, a Greek omelet filled with feta cheese, spinach, tomatoes, and onions.
3. Crazee Burger
3993 30th St., San Diego
Featured in episode: Season 4 Episode 11—“Grabbin’ A Sandwich”
Any restaurant can call itself crazy, or in the case of San Diego’s Crazee Burger, “crazee,” but the restaurant based in the city’s North Park neighborhood has proved that it really is. While the burger restaurant has a lengthy selection of beef (or Beyond Burgers for vegetarians), there is another section of the menu that’s for adventurous diners.
Customers can order a burger made from an assortment of more unusual meats, including wild boar, buffalo, water buffalo, alligator, elk, camel, antelope, venison, and ostrich. When Fieri visited the San Diego restaurant for a Season 4 episode of “Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives,” he sampled one of Crazee Burger’s alligator burgers.
4. Pizzeria Luigi
1137 25th St., San Diego
Featured in episode: Season 5 Episode 2—“Real Deal Italian”
New York is pretty far from San Diego, but New York pizza slices are easily attainable in the city thanks to pizza shops like Pizzeria Luigi. The restaurant first opened its doors in San Diego’s Golden Hill neighborhood in 2004, serving up New York-style slices, whole pies, and other Italian dishes.
Altogether, Pizzeria Luigi has four locations: in San Diego’s Ocean Beach, Golden Hill, and North Park neighborhoods, as well as one in Imperial Beach, Calif.
5. Hob Nob Hill
2271 1st Ave., San Diego
Featured in episode: Season 5 Episode 8—“Just Like Yesterday”
Hob Nob Hill is the epitome of a family-run business. From its opening day in 1944 until the ’90s, it was owned by Harold and Dorothy Hoersch, who saw their small restaurant grow from a 14-seat counter to the location it’s in today. Then, it was sold to Tania Warchol, who owned Hob Nob Hill for nearly 30 years, before selling to Doug and Lara Hamm, its third set of owners in 82 years.
The restaurant, which is open from 8 a.m. until 8 p.m. every day, has an extensive breakfast, lunch, and dinner menu, as well as numerous cocktail options.
6. OB Noodle House
2218 Cable St., San Diego
Featured in episode: Season 17 Episode 11—“All San Diego, All the Time”
Siblings Steven and Kyle Tran opened OB Noodle House as a way to share dishes inspired by their Chinese heritage. The restaurant, which opened in 2004, became extremely popular in San Diego’s Ocean Beach neighborhood, offering up a variety of Asian cuisine-inspired noodle dishes, from bowls of steaming pho to vermicelli dishes.
The restaurant is so popular that the brothers opened another location to help keep up with the demand. OB Noodle House currently has two locations, both in the Ocean Beach neighborhood, less than a mile apart.
7. Crest Cafe
425 Robinson Ave., San Diego
Featured in episode: Season 18 Episode 1—“Neighborhood Knockouts”
When Crest Cafe was featured on a Season 18 episode of “Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives,” it was on an episode that highlighted restaurants that went above and beyond for their local neighborhoods. If there is any place in San Diego’s Hillcrest neighborhood that is constantly serving the community, it’s the Crest Cafe. The family-owned, LGBTQ+-friendly restaurant is open every day, from 7 a.m. until 10 p.m.
While filming, Fieri sampled the restaurant’s butter burger, which has herb butter stuffed into the patty, resulting in a juicier burger. Crest Cafe also has a lengthy breakfast menu with everything from breakfast burritos and quesadillas to creative French toast dishes.
8. Blue Water Seafood Market
3667 India St., San Diego
Featured in episode: Season 26 special—“All Stacked Up”
With San Diego located right on the Pacific Ocean, it only makes sense that the city has some pretty great seafood restaurants, like the Blue Water Seafood Market. The restaurant has everything you’d expect from a fresh seafood joint, even down to the appetizers, including hearty seafood soup, which is made fresh daily, fried calamari, and seaweed salad.
It also offers seafood cocktails, fish and shrimp tacos, and plates of freshly-caught fish. The restaurant has two locations in San Diego, one in Mission Hills and the other in Ocean Beach.
9. Grand Ole BBQ y Asado
3302 32nd St., San Diego
Featured in episode: Season 30 Episode 2—“A World of Barbecue”
At Petco Park, the home of the San Diego Padres, the city’s Major League Baseball team, it’s not just peanuts, Cracker Jacks, and hot dogs that are on the menu. The standard baseball fare is accompanied by some of the city’s best dining options, including Grand Ole BBQ y Asado.
The restaurant, which makes Texas-style barbecue dishes, was visited by Fieri during a Season 30 episode of “Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives,” where the television host sampled the restaurant’s el borracho beef rib, covered in queso and frito serrano relish. In addition to the ballpark location, Grand Ole BBQ y Asado has two more brick-and-mortar restaurants in San Diego, in the city’s North Park neighborhood and Flinn Springs.
10. Tahini
9119 Clairemont Mesa Blvd. Suite H, San Diego
Featured in episode: Season 30 Episode 3—“Sausage, Shawarma and Scaloppini”
Tahini co-owners Osama Shabaik and Mahmoud Barkawi always loved food, but they didn’t always plan on working in the restaurant industry. Actually, their plans couldn’t have been farther from it. Barkawi pursued a career in law enforcement, while Shabaik earned a law degree from Harvard University, but the two friends gave up their careers to open Tahini, a restaurant specializing in Middle Eastern street food.
The restaurant wasn’t always the brick-and-mortar joint that it is now, though. In 2013, when the two friends first started working together, they operated out of a tent on the side of a gas station. Now, Tahini has three locations, including one on the campus of the University of California-San Diego.
11. Chuy’s Taco Shop
6663 El Cajon Blvd. G, San Diego
Featured in episode: Season 30 Episode 4—“British, Hawaiian and Mexican”
San Diego is so close to Mexico, it’s less than 20 miles to get from the city to Tijuana, so it’s no surprise that the California city is home to some pretty great Mexican food. Even with all of the competition, one of the top options is Chuy’s Taco Shop, a laid-back taqueria where the food is always made with fresh ingredients.
In addition to its taco selections, Chuy’s Taco Shop also offers some pretty massive burritos, filled with a choice of meat, rice, beans, and salsa, among other toppings.
12. Alforon
5965 El Cajon Blvd., San Diego
Featured in episode: Season 30 Episode 7—“International Infusion”
At Alforon, a Lebanese restaurant in San Diego’s El Cerrito neighborhood, it’s important that all of the restaurant’s menu items are prepared in-house with fresh ingredients. It’s the high-quality, fresh ingredients that make the menu’s dishes shine, including the ouzi lamb, which Fieri sampled when “Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives” visited the restaurant in a Season 30 episode.
During the episode, Fieri learned how to prepare the lamb dish, which features an oven-baked leg of lamb that has been deboned, spread over ouzi rice and topped with roasted almonds and a side of yogurt.
13. Jo’s Diner
807 West Washington St., San Diego
Featured in episode: Season 30 Episode 8—“Beef Bonanza”
When it opened in 2017, Jo’s Diner, in San Diego’s Mission Hills neighborhood, had a lofty goal: making food that could be loved by anyone and everyone. They’ve done that by crafting a menu jam-packed with scratch-made, elevated comfort food items.
From its chilaquiles topped with short ribs, house red salsa, two sunny-side-up eggs, sour cream, pecorino cheese, and green onions to the restaurant’s freshly-made lumpia, served with a soy garlic sauce, the food at Jo’s Diner is classic and casual, but made with a lot of care.
14. Kindred
1503 30th St., San Diego
Featured in episode: Season 36 Episode 6—“Not-Your-Everyday, All Day”
Combining a love of vegan food and death metal, Kory Stetina opened Kindred in San Diego’s South Park neighborhood in 2015. The combination bar and restaurant has an extensive death metal-themed cocktail menu, offering libations like the Spinal Tap, which has rhubarb-infused gin, strawberry, lime, ginger, and tiki bitters.
Kindred offers a weekend brunch, serving buttermilk pancakes, breakfast scrambles, and, of course, a few cocktail options. Some of the bar and restaurant’s brunch cocktail offerings include bloody marys, micheladas, mimosas, and espresso martinis.
15. Shawarma Guys Food Truck
3012 Grape St., San Diego
Featured in episode: Season 36 Episode 7—“Culinary Adventure”
When the Shawarma Guys food truck opened, owner Bryan Zeto didn’t want to sell just any shawarma. Instead, he wanted to offer top-quality wagyu beef. Shawarma Guys imports Australian wagyu that has been fed a grain-and-hay diet, offering a rich flavor profile.
It’s not just the beef option that sets Shawarma Guys apart, but also its abundance of options. Unlike many shawarma restaurants, the food truck offers vegan shawarma, as well as protein choices like chicken and falafel. Shawarma Guys has two brick-and-mortar locations, in addition to the food truck, one in San Diego’s Mira Mesa neighborhood, and another in La Mesa, Calif.
16. Sovereign Modern Thai Cuisine
1460 J St., San Diego
Featured in episode: Season 36 Episode 8—“Thai, Pie and Fries”
Born in Thailand and raised in a large Chinese-Thai family, siblings Jumi Pitiwartarlai and Uthan Dejcomrunkul opened Sovereign Modern Thai Cuisine together to share Pitiwartarlai’s love of cooking and their beloved family recipes. The restaurant specializes in Isaan cuisine, which comes from northeastern Thailand, near Laos and Cambodia.
The cuisine is known for its strong flavors and aromatic ingredients, which are showcased in Sovereign Modern Thai Cuisine’s extensive menu. In the 36th season of “Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives,” Fieri sampled the restaurant’s fried rockfish, marinated in a sweet-and-sour coconut sauce.
17. Nutmeg Bakery and Cafe
12640 Sabre Springs Parkway #107, San Diego
Featured in episode: Season 36 Episode 9—“West Coast Wonders”
When Nutmeg Bakery and Cafe opened, one of its goals was to be inclusive of all of its customers’ dietary needs, ensuring that the bakery regularly had vegetarian, vegan, gluten-free, dairy-free, and pescatarian items available. Its attention to detail and care for its customers led to the bakery and cafe being anonymously nominated by customers for “Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives,” and then being hand-selected by Fieri.
One of the dishes that Fieri sampled during the episode is Nutmeg Bakery and Cafe’s bananas foster French toast—French toast topped with bananas that have been flambéed with rum and caramel sauce. The bakery and cafe has two locations—one in San Diego and another in Poway, Calif.
18. NOLA on 5th
3683 5th Ave., San Diego
Featured in episode: Season 36 Episode 9—“West Coast Wonders”
Just because NOLA on 5th is more than 1,800 miles away from New Orleans doesn’t mean that the San Diego restaurant can’t bring a bit of the Louisiana city’s cuisine and culture to California. The mission of NOLA on 5th is to bring the flavor of New Orleans cuisine to San Diego, and the restaurant does that through chef Andrew Boyer, a New Orleans native.
When “Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives” visited the restaurant as part of the show’s 36th season, Fieri sampled the New Orleans trio: a dish that comes with the customer’s choice of three cups of either jambalaya, shrimp and andouille gumbo, shrimp etouffee, or red beans and rice. The restaurant also offers Louisiana-style crawfish boils when it is seasonally appropriate.
