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- Hours:
Mon-Sun. 9:00 a.m. - 11:00 p.m.
- Good for Groups:
- No
- Accepts Credit Cards:
- Yes
- Parking:
- Street
- Attire:
- Casual
- Price Range:
-
$$
- Good for Kids:
- Yes
- Takes Reservations:
- No
- Delivery:
- No
- Take-out:
- Yes
- Waiter Service:
- Yes
- Wheelchair Accessible:
- No
- Outdoor Seating:
- Yes
- Good for:
- Lunch
- Alcohol:
- None
21 reviews for Johnny Rockets
Johnny Rockets raised their price. Now they have fries with the burgers or sandwiches. It's an all you can eat fries. I used to order their Egg Salad sandwich for about $4.5, now it's $7 with fries. :-(
Their new Philly cheese steak was delicious! bell peppers and onions are $1.29 extra!
Other then the complain about the price, the food was good. They were busy! but after it slowed down, the waiters and cooks were dancing and the lights went off and on, off and on, so it was so cool! A great entertainment to enjoy with the food!
This location is small and very busy locating on the boardwalk of the 3rd street promenade. They have patio seatings with heaters so you can enjoy people watching.. :-O
This was a bad place to eat onion rings :( I opted this day to be my junk food day and spoiled it by eating here.They were too crispy and i couldn't taste the onions.awww..but my friend ordered the chocolate milkshake..omg!!it was great,and yeah i did get a sugar rush after 2 sips.But its a great thing to have once in a while.And looks like a great p lace to grab something to eat late nights after a good night out.Thus,this place deserves three stars,and i am sure their burgers are good and greasy :)
-Smriti
Last late afternoon the wife and i went for a jog at SM beach, and came back through 3rd Street and walked by Johnny Rockets and turned back around to eat dinner.
We ordered a grilled chicken bacon club sandwich with a salad, and an order of chili fries. The sandwich was great to split, since it was split already, and chili fries (thanks to Austin S.'s chili fry tour) were good as long as you didn't look it straight in the eyes. They look like something that one of the passing dogs left in the back alley, but then again i've never seen pretty chili fries any how.
Right now (3/25/09) they're offering unlimited fries with every burger dish, so go get your fries on.
Service a bit slow, because i think there was only one server handling the entire restaurant, but from what i remember its always slightly slow. The guy was really nice and did his best to attend to us. Sitting outside provides perfect people watching location, but can get a little cramped.
Johnny Rockets is know for its large juicy burgers, the friendly staff, the retro style/music, and their malts and shakes.
I went to this location after going to the beach and walking around with some friends from out of town on the promenade. We were seated outside next to all the hustle and bustle, but that was alright since it was a nice summer day. The seating was a little cramped because we were seated between one large family and the railing.
I proceeded to order the Route 66 burger with an order of fries.
The fries at Johnny Rockets in general are delicious. They're large cuts and very crispy, yet not over-fried or very oily at all.
The ROUTE 66 is my favorite burger of them all at this place. It's filled with mushrooms and onions over a nice large patty and fried buns. Although the price per burger is more expensive than your local fast food joint, it's not even by that much and very well worth it.
It's a great place to go and hang out with your friends after a long day of shopping and walking.
We were so hungry after shopping on third street so we decided to hit up this place for lunch. The wait wasn't long but we got the bar seats.....well the bar that was facing the mirror, not the other bar, which was ehh i didn't like that much.
We ordered four rocket burgers and the rocket wings and an egg sandwich.
The egg sandwich that my friend ordered looked like you'll pass a lot of gas if you eat it hahaha. Anyway the burgers tasted like in&out burgers, but i really like the wings though, wish there was more of it cuz the portion was really small!
Oh and the workers were singing and dancing which was pretty exciting *clap clap*
The line was slightly confusing but soon it was our turn. The guy in charge of the line asked if we wanted to sit at the bar and we asked how long the wait was for a table. He said 15-20 minutes so we got a bar seat but it was really tiny and faced the mirror. Also the music was really loud. After sitting down for 2 minutes a table outside had freed up so we switched tables. My friend ordered a 6 dollar hot dog which was totally not worth it. I ordered a 9 dollar burger with a side salad. The burger was kind of dry. The food came out pretty fast though.
So yesterday i went to hang out with my vegetarian homie skip.
after drinking half a bottle of Bacardi 151 between the two of us we became quite hungry.
i respect his vegetarian ness so we were in search for a bomb veggie burger. who has a bomb veggie burger? fat burger
incident # 1- Fatburger in culver city. ran out of veggie
incident # 2- Fatburger in santa monica. ran out of veggie
incident # 3- frustrated, we head out to the car and see JR on the way back. veggie burgers on the menu? yes
... they were out of them shits as well.
--
so i said fuck it im getting meat and he'd get a grilled cheese
---
the burger, although not bad at all is messy as hell. i picked it up and that shit fell apart not just that, the patty was poorly made, chunks of it came off, turning my burger into a salad which i effing hate.
---
it bothers me such a big chain would run out of food.
ran out of soda half way through the meal and no one came to refill. bad times!
The Pluses:
Love the 50's music; cool old-school diner uniforms; busy open kitchen; lively staff; yummy malts and sundaes; large servings enough to share.
The Minuses:
It didn't feel clean; crowded; strange stench of garbage lingering in the air; took much longer than expected for a malt and a sundae (15 minutes).
Will I come back? Sure, why not? Everyone craves a malt or milkshake now and then. It's even better when you put two straws and share it with someone you're crushing on. Of course, let's not forget to wear a pink cardigan, saddle shoes, bell skirt, bobby socks, and a high ponytail with a matching pink bow. Hee-hee! I'm a sucker for anything with themes!
Ew. ew ew ew. never again. All these competing "Original Burger" chains are so silly to me. How can you ALL be the original burger? It's like when my dad used to tell me he was the top of his class throughout college, and then a friend of mine told me her dad said the same thing .... and our dads were classmates. you can't both be at the top! It just doesn't work that way.
Anyway, I honestly don't know why we chose Johnny Rockets over the hundreds of other (and tastier, I'm sure) options on the promenade. But let's just say it was tourist curiosity. And we weren't the only tourists there; about half the other diners looked like visitors. The other half were middle school students. [what is up with that?? maybe high and middle school students should sign up to show tourists around as an after school program.]
The burgers weren't great, the shake wasn't worth getting sick for (if you're lactarded like me), the music made me homicidal, and the waitress took forever squeezing ketchup smiley faces (you are not Rembrandt! get over it and gimme my ketchupy goodness!) Not worth it, and too pricey.
Couple things for tourists:
- the restrooms at this location are weird. I've never been in another JR so I don't know if they're all the same, but you gotta put in a quarter, except you can get tokens from the waitress. there are no obvious signs for this. we saw a tiny, grammatically incorrect sign only after we'd put in a quarter. Thanks, Johnny Rockets, home of the Original Tourist Trap.
- ew.
Johnny rockets is pretty good. I eat here every once in a while after a long day at the promenade with friends.
The chicken tenders, onion rings, and fries are really good. The burgers and milkshakes are alright, but it's nothing like "WOW IM CRAVING THIS"
All in all it's pretty tasty, the way it's designed is cool, the service is pretty quick, and the bathroom is almost always clean.
This place does blow. The "Ew. ew ew ew. never again" would be the same sentiment.
It surprises me to see this place get packed on a weekend evening. Yes it does pull in the tourist because they don't know any better. The nostalgic factor always bring them in. Let's be honest, you do not want to eat the oldie stuff. It's simple back then, but that's just it... even the taste is simple.
I was lulled in because my buddy who wanted to get something quick to eat before heading off to the theaters. He's a FOB... I would've told him, but I was too nice. We ordered burgers that was just too plain and it actually induced me into a bi-hourly trip to the restroom. It was just nasty.
The fries was not to die for, it's not worth it to die for this. The service for a Saturday evening was just a little haywire. I think our waitress actually forgot which table she was assigned to. *sigh*
The price of our meal definitely fits the present time. This was the only thing I was hoping to be in the nostalgic sake of the old past. Alas it was more expensive than the $8 burger from Carl's.
As in the claims of being the "Original Hamburger", I think I had the very first one served back in 1986 as my restroom trips can attest. And how can they invent the first hamburger if their chain didn't exist until 1986. Woo...1986..the year when the burger was invented.
Yeah right.
I don't know if you are like me, but I go to certain places when I am in the mood for certain things. I admit it, I live the simple life. When I find what I like and I stick with it.
Given this, I do not visit Johnny for his burgers, but instead his Tuna Fish Sandwich. Kind of funny that I go to a burger place to have a sandwich, but that is what I do and I like it.
I like sitting at the counter to enjoy watching the cooks do their thing. It is a synchronized ordeal that is fun to watch. I order the chili cheese fries, grilled onions on the side, a drink and a tuna fish sandwich on sourdough toast.
A perfect start to a movie night on the promenade.
Okay. I hate the whole singing/dancing/let's pretend like we are in the 50's business. BUUUUTTttt...I love the veggie burger, or "streamliner" as they call it. it is a boca burger placed messily on a bun with all the burger good stuff you would expect. But something about it falling all over the place and getting all over your hands makes you love it.
5 stars for the veggie burger, 2 stars for the ambiance.
This place is disgusting! Don't go there. My husband, daughter, and I went here and it smelled awful. Although we had already sat down, I asked my husband if we could leave. We ended up staying. He had a sandwich and I had a burger. He liked his sandwich, but I did not like my burger. It was gross. It smelled like a WET DOG inside the restaurant. I wasn't the only one who thought that. There were 3 other people who complained to the manager that it smelled awful inside. I thought maybe it was their bathroom, so I went to check it out, but their bathroom was actually clean. I don't know what is going on in their kitchen but it was disgusting.
OK, this isn't really a review for Johnny Rockets because honestly, a Yelper's not going to go here expecting the best burgers ever. This is actually sort of a tale that will hopefully warm your heart, after plunging you into the depths of a short-lived depression:
When we first moved to LA, we were basically starting from scratch and we were pretty darn broke. Our basic philosophy was to never buy anything that might force us to pay interest, so the lean times were LEAN. Sometime during the Christmas season, I took my then 3 year-old daughter to her swimming lesson, then we walked down to the Promenade to watch the street performers and shoppers. She was cold and hungry, and a Johnny Rockets had just opened up. Drawn by the bright colors and retro look, Rosie wanted to go in, so we went in to warm up. I realized after we sat down that I had no money. I had a pocket full of change, though, and added up all together, I figured that we could buy a plate of fries and with two glasses of water, hoping that would serve as a satisfactory diner experience. Rosie coveted the milk shakes and hamburgers that floated by us, and I told her next time, we'd get those. We talked about the different kinds of food we'd buy the next time we came, and after a while, we were done with our fries. Our waiter got a microscopic tip and a note of apology written on the back of our bill, and we left.
I was bummed.
I'd been broke many times before, but never had I experienced how low it felt not to be able to buy your kid something, and even though it was a little thing, I felt pretty pathetic.
Flash forward about twelve years: We never went back to Johnny Rockets - not because I associated it with depression and poverty, only because it just didn't seem THAT good (though the fries went pretty fast, I have to admit). Walking by there, Rosie started waxing rhapsodic: "Remember that time we came here when I was a little girl and we had ALL THAT GOOD FOOD? It was sooooo goooood!" I didn't say anything as I tried to remember if there was ANOTHER time we went there, but I came up empty. Sharon told me, "She always tells me that, every time we see this place." Somehow, in Rosie's memory, the fantasy had become the reality.
I make it a practice to try to always tell the truth to Rosie. This one, however, I think I'll keep to myself.
And that's your Christmas story for today.
Johnny Rockets is not the ideal place for cultivating romance, as I discovered years ago during the worst blind date of my life.
She wanted to go here. We strolled in from the nearby Barnes N' Noble, neither of us as attractive as our online photos, and squeezed ourselves into short seats protruding from the wall, on either side of a narrow candy-red table. I thought I might fall off. The stark bright light was unflattering as she ordered the chili cheese fries then ate them in clumps, brown goop landing on her pale chest.
Unlike a happier Johnny Rockets in Sacramento, the waiters did not burst into song on the hour and perform the B-52s "Love Shack." (I swear this happened at another franchise.) Instead I was left with my date, a USC creative writing instructor who wanted to discuss her phobia of Mexicans as well as thesis binding techniques and her strong support for the death penalty.
In addition to endorsing death, she had riffed on it in a "funny" short story of hers about a serial killer named Gordy and how funny it is that he kills and also goes to Heaven to meet Death and Death is a real person. Having been a crime reporter for a newspaper, I offered an alternative take on death, which was that as opposed to being wacky it was in fact sort of distressing and horrible to be around. I told her about the time someone buried their murdered mother in the backyard, who was dug up some months later by the Modesto Police Department.
Alarmed, she cut our date short and made for the nearby convenient parking facilities provided by the City of Santa Monica -- one reason I'm giving this two stars rather than one. It's well lit outside, so that if you've imagined your journalist date is a stalker, you can make a beeline for your car without the risk of real criminals mugging you in dark alleys.
Tries way too hard.
I agree with a previous review about so many chains claiming to be the "original burger" chain.
Why so many chains claim the "original burger", when none of them serve very good burgers, I don't know. Seems very silly. People can see right through it. The place may be crowded, but the promenade is packed with tourists, every place is crowded.
These 50's burger places (I'm thinking of Rubys also), they try so hard to be hip, and cool, and 50's-ish. It sort of goes flat. Sitting on the patio of the promenade, with vendors, and street performers, muscians, etc 20 or 30 feet from you, very hard to get that 50's feel.
Cafe Santa Monica on Santa Monica Blvd is much more authentic and "real". But this is sort of, glorified McDonalds, 2, 2 1/2 stars. Can't think of anything they really excel at.
Decent if you want something quick to eat. I wouldn't go out of my way for it. Fatburger burgers are much better up the street.
pretty good. not when you come here on the weekends. but weeks days its not crowded and people are nice service is good. and the food is hot when it comes out. tuna fish, grill cheese or chicken strips. chili fries...or half and half.. yum..................
the food is no better then mcDonalds.
Johnny Rockets is extremely upsetting to my digestion system... much like MCDONALDS, which makes me wonder about the quality of the food. A good quality burger and fries doesn't halt business like Johnny Rockets does. But at least Johnny Rockets tastes good, unlike McDonalds. Service friendly and efficient, always crowded because it's cheap, tasty, and easy. Yet if it was my own decision i'd never come here... there's much better of the same stuff for not much more
while their food isnt that great, im a sucker for the things they can do with ketchup. the last time i went, the server wrote "sweetheart" and though it definitely won him points, the slow service and mediocre boca burger still makes this a 2-star place.
