Bob’s Big Boy (Los Angeles)

Bob’s Big Boy (https://bobs.net/) is a legendary diner in Burbank, California, a Los Angeles suburb near the Warner Brothers and Disney studios.  First opened in 1949, Bob’s Big Boy is an iconic building designed by architect Wayne McAllister in the retro-futuristic “Googie” style that is virtually unknown here in Florida, but so popular in mid-20th Century L.A. diners, coffee shops, and gas stations.  Think of The Jetsons, or anything referred to as “space-age” or “atomic age,” back when the future seemed bright and exciting, guided by trust in science and faith in exploration.  I love that style for its timeless quality, while simultaneously being totally of its time (and of course before my time).

Bob’s Big Boy is named for its founder, Bob Wian, and for Richard Woodruff, a six-year-old boy who did odd jobs around the diner, who Bob called “Big Boy.”  The familiar restaurant mascot was inspired by Woodruff — a friendly corporate logo based on a heartwarming tale of child labor.

Inside, it looks like a classic mid-century coffee shop with a long counter surrounding the open kitchen, plus plenty of cushy booths along the side and in the back.  They have kept the restaurant looking clean and welcoming over the decades, which isn’t always the case at some of these old-school L.A. eateries.   

The Burbank location was the first of what would become a nationwide chain, but now there are random, assorted Big Boy restaurants scattered around the country.  My wife assures me there even used to be one in Orlando, but I was never aware of any in Miami, growing up down there in the ’80s.

But you can’t eat architecture or vibes, so what brought me way out of my way to this old-timey diner on my most recent work trip to L.A., a city renowned for excellent restaurants of all styles and price points?  I was paying homage to one of my all-time favorite creative individuals, the late, great filmmaker/writer/actor/musician/visual artist David Lynch, who passed away on January 16, 2025, four days shy of his 79th birthday.

Lynch might be best known as the co-creator of the beloved television series Twin Peaks, which ran for two seasons from 1990 to 1991, got a bizarre movie prequel (Twin Peaks: Fire Walk With Me) in 1992, and then returned in 2017 for a magnificent third season in 2017, reintroducing the surviving cast members, all of whom had aged considerably in the intervening years, alongside the man who dreamed it all up.  Twin Peaks, which combines a quirky small-town dramedy and a dark, twisty murder mystery is not for everyone, but it is near and dear to my heart.  He also wrote and directed the films Eraserhead, The Elephant Man, Dune (the first one, natch), Blue Velvet, Wild at Heart (an underrated classic with one of the greatest Nicolas Cage performances), The Straight Story (a rare G-rated Lynch movie that you can watch with your entire family), Lost Highway, Mulholland Drive (another one of my all-time favorite movies), and Inland Empire.

For many years, Lynch was a regular at the Bob’s Big Boy in Burbank, and he did so much writing over black coffee, chocolate milkshakes, and plates of fries.  The Bob’s Big Boy website even has a special Hall of Fame page for David Lynch, detailing his typical lunch order and explaining that as a creature of habit, he always liked to eat right at 2:30.  It quotes his book Catching the Big Fish: “I used to go to Bob’s Big Boy restaurant just about every day from the mid-seventies until the early eighties.  I’d have a milk shake and sit and think.  There’s a safety in thinking in a diner.  You can have your coffee or your milk shake, and you can go off into strange dark areas, and always come back to the safety of the diner.”

This was my first work trip to L.A. since Lynch had passed away, and I wanted to see where the magic had happened, to enjoy a meal in this humble diner he loved so much, that fueled his nonstop (and often nightmarish) creativity — maybe to feel a bit of the inspiration he felt.  Bob’s Big Boy was my last stop before going to the airport and heading home, and thanks to some lucky timing, I was able to have my lunch at 2:30 as well.

Unfortunately, I didn’t order Lynch’s lunch.  I am not a coffee drinker — it usually hits me hard, hours after drinking it, with a wave of intense acid reflux and the feeling of my heart wanting to jackhammer its way out of my body through my ribcage and fly around the room.  It is not a pleasant feeling, and that was the last thing I needed before a red-eye flight home.  Instead, I got a strawberry lemonade that was light and refreshing, with plenty of freshly sliced strawberries and that good kind of crushed ice.

A few things on the menu tempted me, but since this was my first visit to Bob’s Big Boy, and possibly my only visit ever, I went with a classic order: the “Original” Big Boy combo: their original Double-Deck hamburger with fries and a side salad.  The salad came out first.  My very kind server Rachael told me they are famous for their bleu cheese and ranch dressings, so I went with bleu cheese, a dressing I almost never get on a salad.  The salad was fine (iceberg lettuce, cucumbers, finely shredded cheddar cheese, and really firm croutons), but the bleu cheese dressing elevated it to something better than the sum of its parts.

I knew what to expect from the Original Double-Deck burger, but I was still a little surprised when it came out.  It had two burger patties with top, middle, and bottom sesame seed buns, cheese, lettuce, mayo and “special red relish.”  If that sounds mostly familiar, it’s because most of us have eaten a McDonald’s Big Mac at some point in our lives, or at least seen one or heard about them.  I did a bit of research, and it turns out the Big Mac was introduced by a McDonald’s franchisee in Pittsburgh in 1967 and became a nationwide product in 1968.  The franchisee, Michael James “Jim” Delligatti, used to manage a Big Boy, and that three-bun wonder surely made an impression on him, enough to rip it off.

That said, the red relish was delightfully tangy and zippy — kind of similar to Wickles Spicy Red Sandwich Spread (which includes jalapeño peppers and cucumbers), but not as spicy.  I probably would have preferred a chili cheeseburger (which old-school L.A. restaurants call a chili size), but I had to try the original, and it was what it was.

I know David Lynch appreciated his fries, especially at Bob’s Big Boy, but I can never settle for fries when onion rings are an option.  RING THE ALARM!  For a slight upcharge, I got onion rings in my combo, and they were okay.  These are breaded, and I always prefer battered onion rings.  But luckily for me and my readers (and unluckily for my body), I had better onion rings at two different restaurants on this same L.A. trip.

Rachael was sweet and kind enough to bring me little dipping cups of bleu cheese and ranch dressing to dip my onion rings, and the ranch was as good as the bleu cheese, if not better.  I never get ranch as a salad dressing or a dip, but maybe I would if all ranch was this good!  If you live out west, they actually sell Bob’s salad dressings at supermarkets, you lucky ducks.

Usually I like ketchup on burgers and onion rings, but I never even touched the ketchup at this meal, wanting to sample everything in its purest form.

Even though David Lynch favored chocolate milkshakes at Bob’s Big Boy, I know he was also very fond of pie.  The Double R Diner on Twin Peaks was famous for its cherry pie (and its gorgeous waitresses, always beset by dangerous, desperate men), but I noticed that fresh strawberry pie is a seasonal special on the Bob’s menu, and that sounded too good to pass up.  It was pretty much what you would expect a classic strawberry pie to be — not as good as Evette Rahman’s National Pie Championship-winning strawberry cheese pie at Sister Honey’s Bakery in Orlando, but nothing is.  Still, it hit the spot, and it was a generous serving.

Yes, there is some pie crust under there!

I admit that I ate pretty quickly because I had to grab a Lyft and make it from Burbank to LAX against unknowable afternoon traffic, but I got to my gate two hours before boarding, so all was well.  I had a good feeling I would be okay.  While I have eaten better, more memorable meals in Los Angeles — even on this same trip, which I will write about eventually — I have no regrets about making a pilgrimage to Bob’s Big Boy, to enjoy a tiny taste of classic Americana and retrace the steps of a weirdly wholesome creative genius who brought so much entertainment to my life.

I should have researched which booth David Lynch liked to sit in, but ultimately, that doesn’t matter.  The fact that he did so much writing at Bob’s Big Boy, leading to so many unforgettable movies and hours of television, was enough to get me in the door, and I’m so relieved I got that experience.  Even though I know he was recently buried in the Hollywood Forever Cemetery with a simple, mysterious grave marker that reads “Night Blooming Jasmine,” I would not have been surprised to see the man himself in a nearby booth, his gray pompadour gone white, his dress shirt buttoned all the way up to his neck, scribbling notes on a napkin.  I would have given him a thumbs-up like his Twin Peaks protagonist, Special Agent Dale Cooper, and he might have raised his cup of black coffee to me and said something charmingly cryptic to me in that great old-timey newsman-sounding voice of his, like “Keep your eye on the donut, not the hole.”