Fat Al's in Southend-on-Sea

On an October evening there was not much open on southend front. We were peckish and after some quick feeding, fat also caught our eye. Interesting American dinner theme. Food was good, service was friendly and quick and the milkshakes were great.

Nice 50's style diner. Food cooked fresh. Varied menu. Honeycomb milkshake was delicious. Located right opposite seafront and near entrance to Southend Pier. Staff friendly and welcoming.

We popped in for 'brunch' on the last day of our holiday - I really wish we'd kept walking past! The place was empty - this was our first sign, the badly finished decor the second - and the fact it didn't feel clean third!! But hunger overruled sensible judgement. We ordered a big breakfast and a double bacon cheese burger and 2 mugs of coffee. My coffee was served in a chipped mug and my double cheese burger with egg and bacon turned into a single burger with egg and bacon. My meal was tasteless - I could taste the cheese in the burger, but absolutely nothing else... Really surreal! Even the cheap runny ketchup didn't add taste. Nobody seemed surprised to be carrying 3/4s of a meal back to the kitchen (hopefully for disposal). The breakfast looked plastic with the ability to glow in the dark... we shared the toast. If Al really is Fat - he hasn't been eating here!! Worst food experience in Southend! I wish we'd checked the reviews before wasting our time/money here! Move on and get some decent grub elsewhere!!

Based on the price of food we were expecting low quality, but quick and convenient food, especially as the little girl in our group wanted a burger but lost energy to walk further! You get what you pay for. Chicken burger is a small frozen piece of breaded chicken, deep fat fried and served in a burger bun...no salad. Simple. Burger was griddle cooked but thin and cheap. Stairs to toilet is littered with boxes. Toilet unappealing. Wouldn't recommend. Won't win any awards.

Ordered from here on Friday off just eat and can not fault them. Not only did they deliver in horrendous conditions they were on time and the food was hot. The burgers were huge, tasty and great value for money.

My boyfriend and I are absolutely disgusted! At 7:30pm we ordered 2 cheeseburgers and 2 chips and we was told this would be delivered at 8:55pm (which is already a long wait!) we pre-paid and sat and waited. We were keeping track of our order and at 9pm the restaurant via the the Just Eat app stated it had been delivered to us when it hadn’t. By 9:30pm we were getting very worried! And the restaurant closed at 9pm, we tried to call numerous times but it was either engaged or rung for ages. In the end we took a drive down to the restaurant itself because we wanted our £17 back and they were closed. We resulted in ringing Just Eat themselves where we spoke to a very helpful man after being number 19 in a hold queue! While on hold and on the drive back a family member text us to say the food had arrived (it was 10pm) and they just gave the food and didn’t apologise at all! And to top it all off, the food was absolutely disgusting! Cold chips, hard top burger bun, mushy/ soggy bottom bun! Anybody reading this review, DO NOT WASTE YOUR MONEY! You’re better off going to Mac Donald’s!!!!! Just had a call back from the Just Eat guy who says the owner of Fat Al’s doesn’t agree with giving us a refund, of course he doesn’t! He offered is a free dessert for next time we go in there and we said no don’t bother, we are never going there again I can assure you! Disgraceful!!!!

Ordered a take away from here and we have just thrown over half of it in the bin! The hot dog was completely inedible. A rock hard bun with dirty brown lettuce so that had to be immediately thrown, and a very chewy frankfurter which tasted really weird. One bite each and we chucked it, I wouldn’t even feed it to a dog. My boyfriend said his blue cheese burger was ‘edible’. I ate less than half of my burger, the meat tasted horrible. Onion rings were soggy mushy, we ate one each then threw the rest. The chips were ok at most, but I found a hair and a thread of cotton in the cheesy chips which just completely put us off. It was also a 2 hour wait, and 45mins later than the confirmed time yet they didn’t contact to say it would be late or apologise. Cannot believe they get away with charging that much for what they serve. Absolutely disgusting.

Group of 7, we were the only customers, service good, large portions, Triple Burger too large to finish. Reasonable prices. Not gourmet, but a good lunchtime choice.

Looks like a family business very clean very polite & frienly.Fish & chips is cooked to order. Lovely crispy fresh fish & chips cooked to perfection. Had a takeaway. Definitely going back to have fish & chips from them​ next time I go to Southend On Sea.

We walked the whole sea front in search of somewhere to eat, and having rejected several other places on account of their stupid prices (£9.75 for quarter pounder and chips?) we settled on Fat Al's. Drawn in by the "two for £10" offer we had two New Yorker hot dogs with chips, a chocolate milkshake and a cup of tea. The food was all freshly prepared to order, served quickly (but slow enough for us to see it was cooked from fresh, not just reheated like some places) and very filling. The chips are the second best we've ever had in 35 years of such cafes and restaurants. All in all the food and drinks were very good. The only negative is that the milkshake was a little small, and not as good value as other high street restaurants that offer milkshakes.

I visited this place with my partner, her son and her niece.. we went in here as it didn't look busy. We sat down looked through the menu and ordered our order was taking in a reasonable amount of time.. When the food turned up the quality did not look that good but tried the food.. after getting half way through the me and my partner could not eat anymore of out meal as it was probably one of the worst burgers I ever had! We complained to the manager who seemed more interested in arguing with us and proving us wrong which made everyone at the table feel quite uncomfortable we got up and left the restaurant. Would avoid this place at all costs never returning!

it was a hot summers day and unlike other chip shops there was no long queue outside so when we got inside and had only one group in front of us who had just been served we was impressed and ordered our 2 large chips. About 35 minutes later we was still waiting for the chips and was less than impressed. turns out there is a ticket number system which surprised us as much as a few others because we wasnt given tickets there was only about 6 booths inside so as to what took 35 minutes for a takeaway i have no idea. a guy at the takeaway window had to eventually shout to be served after ten minutes of being ignored. considering how many walk away due to waiting for no reason im surprised they are still open for buisness. maybe they need to invest in more fryers and actually give this strange thing called customer service or just make a chips only ordering at the window with a fryer just for that to ease the load. pretty awful service. total waste of time. If they dont want to serve you or make you wait ages then they dont deserve your buisness

Ordered from Fat Al's at 6:53pm, confirmed delivery for 7:50 which was pushed forward to 8:10, called at 8:30 to be told it's being packed now and 9PM still no food . Called again to be told it's just getting ready to leave! Food finally arrived at 9:20. Burger was surprisingly warm considering, the onion rings were tiny and soggy. Communication is awful. Burger was good, will not be ordering again.

Popped in here as didn't look to busy seated and order taken promptly, It was a bit pricey for the portion size but expected to pay more as its a seafront cafe. Food could of been a bit hotter but it didn't stay on the plates long enough to get cold.

Looked okay from the outside. Only small portions and paid way too much for what we got. Didn't accept cards so had to leave my 8-year old while i hunted down a cash machine that worked. Won't go again

We haven't been to Southend for a while and normally i would shop till i drop so before we did this we would always get a bite to eat. The previous cafe we use to go to was no longer on the Southend strip so we decided to walk up further until we found something. We cam across Fat Al's and decided to give it a go. By this time we were so hungry we could have eaten a horse. The family who i believe were either the owners or just worked there were really friendly and took our order straight away. Food was provided just as we had asked it to be cooked (either well done or slightly done for the eggs) and it didn't take long for the food to be eaten.