On a lunch visit last summer the hostess started to seat us at a nice booth when another hostess (just coming on duty?) appeared and rudely said she’d promised that booth to someone else. She moved us to a table along the back wall. It was over 5 minutes before the couple she’d promised it to appeared. Although food was okay, the overall service on that visit was poor.

Because a close friend raves about Diner 248, we gave it another chance last winter. This time service was fine. I think they have a few bad apples among the staff since it seems so hit-and-miss on service.

I do agree the food is a bit overpriced. Breakfast in the Valley Allentown restaurants

Seem to cost too much.
Food ok, but overated.
Belittled their staff in front of me.

First impressions, they had re-used the space that once was Jack Creek, well. The setup was not over crowded. The staff did seem a bit stand offish as was reported in another patron.

Our order. We both selected the Hot Roast Beef Sandwich on white bread, as well as a crock of French Onion soup.

You can tell a good French Onion soup by the darkness and clarity of the both. This one was cloudy and a light brown. Upon tasting the soup we concluded that the lack of clarity was the result of pepper and i believe tarragon. Half way through the soup we both decided that the overwhelming amount of pepper was added as an indicator to stop the consumer from eating all of their soup.

When our Hot Roast Beef sandwiches with mashed potatoes and gravy arrived it was a very generous portion. Digging into the mashed potatoes it was easy to see that these were made from real potatoes and not from a box. They had the taste of real mashed potatoes that were made a day or so before and have been stored in fridge. This would explain the clumpy texture instead of smooth creamy potatoes.

We also noticed something else very familiar about the potatoes, the same zest for pepper that had been present in the French Onion soup. No amount of gravy was going to hide that much pepper.

The roast beef was cooked medium to just slightly medium well. It was a bit tough, probably due to the way it had been cut. Both my son and i decided not to eat the bloody white bread that was on the bottom. I have never had a hot roast beef sandwich like this at any other diner, hopefully we won’t in the future.

This Diner was one we will visit twice. First, and last time. Eater be ware.