The 5 Homiest Diners In Northern California Will Always Make You Feel Like A Local

The Historic Hiouchi Café is located at 2095 Highway 199. Serving what they have deemed the "Best Breakfast In The County." The café is a Crescent City area favorite open for breakfast and lunch Sundays through Thursdays, adding additional hours for dinner on Friday and Saturday nights.

You’ll find delectable comfort food staples like your typical scrambled eggs with bacon and toast, biscuits smothered in country gravy (and we do mean smothered!), eggs benedict with hash browns, a variety of omelets, and get this – pancakes including a 16-inch size! And one honorable mention: the banana French toast will blow you away! Burgers, sandwiches, steaks, and the like are offered for lunch and dinner.

Welcoming you like family includes offering bag lunches to-go for fishermen and folks passing through. Learn more on their website and drool over delicious food pics on their Facebook page.

The Grubstake Diner is located at 1525 Pine St. in San Francisco’s Polk-Gulch neighborhood. Unlike most diners, they don’t even open until 6:30 p.m., but they’re open all night and into the wee (as in 3-4:00 a.m.) hours. And everyone knows that sometimes you’ve just gotta get your late-night/really early-morning diner food fix!

Imagine digging your teeth into this Portuguesa dish – a sizeable New York steak fried in bacon fat and served with a runny egg, potatoes, and steamed veggies. Other favs here include the chicken fingers, potato skins, patty melts, grilled buffalo wings, what they call their "World Famous Burgers," French dip sandwich, and of course, milkshakes. Breakfast, served anytime, features linguica and eggs, French toast, and pancakes. And if there’s room, don’t forget dessert: Georgia Peach Pie, Maui Pineapple Crisp, or their famous apple pie, just to name a few.

If you want to watch the city’s local color, opt to sit on their outdoor patio. Check out their website to see more of why they were featured on the Food Network, and take a look at the Facebook page for more taste-tempting pics.

The Pancake Circus is located at 2101 Broadway and is only open for breakfast and lunch. Although the current name wasn’t adopted until the late 70s or early 80s, the vibe here is definitely 1960s, which is when the structure was built, including those classic diner counter seats and oversized booths.

But they also have more sumptuous dishes like steak and eggs or pork chop and eggs, biscuits and country gravy, and several varieties of benedicts. Many of the dishes, including the omelets, are served with three pancakes or country potatoes and toast. The lunch menu features a Reuben sandwich, Philly cheesesteak, hot roast beef sandwich, meatball sandwich, lots of burgers, and salads, just to name a few. And all of the portions are HUGE, "big top size" if you will, so you definitely won’t leave hungry!

Learn more about this long-standing homey diner on their website and Facebook page.

Kathrin's Biergarten is located at 4810 Granite Dr. It is a popular family-run biergarten, restaurant, and brew pub serving authentic German home-style cooked meals and traditional Bavarian beer and beverages.

Other menu items include the ubiquitous schnitzel sandwich, links (pork) and mash, sauerbraten, and roulade, just to name a few. Pictured above is one of their eye-popping weekend specials: Kalbsvögerl (Little Veal Birds) - three veal loins pounded, stuffed, and rolled with sausage and seasoned with parsley, marjoram, green onions, and thyme and plated up beautifully with Spätzle, an outstanding juniper berry pan gravy, and fresh veggies.

You may want to accompany your meal with a German imported draft beer or one of their robust in-house brews. Feast your eyes on their website and Facebook page.

The Sacramento 49er Diner is located at 2828 El Centro Road as part of the Sacramento 49er Travel Plaza off Interstate 80 between the Sacramento River and Interstate 5. Not your average truck/travel stop joint, this diner has quite a following. It has been open 24/7, 365 days a year for breakfast, lunch, and dinner since it first opened in 1972!

Menu items run the gamut from corned beef hash to ribs, omelets, country fried steak, breakfast and lunch burritos, roasted chicken, meatloaf, pancakes, and pulled pork, with sides like country biscuits, cornbread, refried beans, mashed potatoes with gravy, coleslaw, and corn, among numerous other offerings.

If you’re passing through, at the Plaza you’ll also find a general store, HD TV room, hot showers, an RV dump station, motel rooms, a pet wash, laundry room, and more for all your on-the-road needs. Learn more about the diner on its website and about the plaza on the official Facebook page.