Great local spot in a cozy setting. Great food and drinks, did a good sidecar even though they didn't have it on the menu. I'll be back!

Like the atmosphere of this unpretentious restaurant and bar. Good homely cooking food, but a little pricey.

A dive bar. Pretty self explanatory, however this dive bar comes with a twist.....TOP NOTCH FOOD!!!! The bar is cramped, dark and a bit loud when it fills up (which it does) but this hole in the wall sailor looking dark dank place has great customer service and even better food. The salmon I had was absolutely amazing and melt in your mouth good. The alcohol was decent and good priced. All in all a four star experience. It's guaranteed we'll be going back there again!!! read more

Great place with lots of dive bar ambiance. Bartender-waiter did a great job all by himself. The Pepper steak with bacon was made special from dinner menu even though we were having lunch. Port and Stilton burger was relish. Located on Ocean Ave. read more

It's my b day. And I always wanted to eat at the legendary Chez Jay, known for many reasons, but for me, especially because it's the inspiration of the Regal Beagle on TV's Three's Company. That means something for an entire generation. But forget about that. The vibe is the real deal, and my steak was delicious, and everybody who helped us was super nice. AND, they gave me some cake with a candle for my b day!!! AWESOME! I can't wait to go back. What a way to end a beach day. read more

I've been there before, but never as bad as last night. Sat at booth for at least 30min without any attention from waitress, flagged her down and her first question was 'Do you have reservations?' (we did not) The place was crowded, no problem, but this is no excuse for the very bad, unfriendly and neglectful service from the waitress, After waiting the food was terrible (sand dabs and steaks) read more

Great place to be with locals and have basic good food. Always enjoy our time there, not fancy digs - but a great steak!

Can anyone give me the names of draft beers from there? I went there Couple of weeks ago, tried one beer and can't remember the name? Thanks

There were rumors that Chez Jay would be rebuilt as part of the Tongva Park development in Santa Monica. Thankfully there are no detectible changes! Chez Jay remains its wonderful self. Jay himself sailed off to the Big Isthmus about 2008, but a legend never dies. read more

Old Santa Monica charm. Good food, great service and decent prices. The servers said they have all been there for decades. It is small so get there early. They have a patio in the back but it isn't open during the week for dinner. It would be perfect if it was available for evening dining. read more

Screwed us on a dinner reservation that was given directly to the owner. We tried to call to confirm on multiple occasions at different times of the day but no one answered the phone. We decided to go and arrived only to find out that there was a private party taking place and somehow our reservation had been moved to 12:00 PM. We were there at 6:00 PM for dinner. We'd left our phone number for them to contact us should there be any changes but never heard a word from them. They are living on their reputation which won't last long if they are this unorganized. read more

It never changes and that's what makes it so cool. It's not really about the food it's about the experience. EVERYTHING in L.A. is overpriced. But where else do you get peanut shells on the floor? read more

Great steaks and one of my very favoritest places in all of Los Angeles. You're sitting in history here, folks. I had an amazing time there on Thanskgiving day with a new gf after our earlier plans kind of fell through. Met some locals, made some new friends, had a great steak, threw peanuts on the floor. Great folks, great juke, great location... ...what more could you ask! If you're a poser, they'll smell it at the door (both the people who work there and the local inhabitants within). Just sayin'! read more

I love this place. What a cool bar and casual place to grab a few drinks and chow down on some good eats. Met a few of the Rat Pack there in the 70's. I have been a regular since then. N read more

Hi big John here ,I was in the immediate area and said hey its been a little while so ,I met my clients at the world renowned Chez Jay. I have been frequenting this high class dive /beach bar for about 12 years . Very little has changed especially the attitude ,I love it. Had the usual stiff belts after the clients took off ,with my chaser of Guinness . Had a burger ,with some more stiff belts and said heluva job, time to call the wife. I love coming here for the beakfast ,the best in town. and the best prices. read more

Fun environment, friendly staff and good food! Accommodating and good selections. Low light for a nice intimate experience.

Love this place. Hadn't been in several years because the service and food quality had slipped, but this time out, the service was amazing and the food was very good. Unfortunately, my steak came out medium, rather than medium-rare, and while the waitress apologized and had a new one cooked for me, the next came out rare! The quality of the meat was excellent, however, so I might just have to be more specific about it the next time I order it. And I will come back. This is a wonderful place, and I'm glad to have it back in my rotation of regular restaurants in my neighborhood. BTW - Tracy is one hardworking dude, but really, everyone hustled on the staff. It was impressive! read more

Who are the numb nuts a holes who give Chez Jay 1-2 stars? THE VIBE is perfect if you like beachy dives. The food isn't "gourmet" just really really good. Steak a poive is my favorite -- but the salmon is a huge portion for the money. It's 1963-4 -- a throwback. Killer scalloped potatoes. The owner (Jay) passed away several years ago but he'd be happy with how great the place has stayed. IF you have issues with claustrophobia -- go early on weekends - because the place is packed. I don't mind knocking elbows now an again with fellow travelers.I've liked Chez Jay since the time (15 years ago) a coward was slapping his ex wife in the parking lot and I stepped in to grab the jerk .My date got Jay and he came out and 86-ed the bully for life -- then sent drinks over to my table. LOVE CHEZ JAY. read more

The atmosphere here is awesome. Very cozy and quaint. The stakes are very good, and they have a full bar. Don't order the mashed potatoes though. They are disgusting. I think they put sugar in them. read more

Major service meltdown on a recent Saturday night. Understaffed and overwhelmed. Sand dabs are still a traditional winner and hard to find elsewhere. But getting a table, getting served anything and getting a bill -- all were challenges. Killed the vibe. read more

While from the outside it looks like a hole-in-the-wall, the decor inside will completely surprise you. Casual rustic Italian restaurant decor, more reminiscent of NE restaurants. The menu is not extensive, but what they do - they do well. Along with the usual crusty slices of bread, we were offered complimentary fresh veggies (carrots, celery, and spring onions), which were very fresh and a pleasant change from the norm. I had tilapia in a white wine reduction sauce, which was wonderful. My husband had the chicken marsala, which was flavorful and very tender. The portions are good but not too big - just right. The service was great and the restaurant also has a large wines selection. Worth the try. If we lived in Santa Monica, this could easily have become one of our regular stops. read more

This is simply a great spot, funky but cool. Fresh Fish too!!!! Seems odd to mention but so many places in SM sell frozen fish rather than fresh!!! Odd considering we are talking about a coastal town!!! Chez Jay is a terrific find it has a cozy bar and as I said earlier fresh food!! GO read more

Was just 'meh.' They need to get better quality meat, and it would make a world of difference. Loved the casual vibe, though.

While on vacation in Santa Monica a friend who lives in LA recommended Chez Jay. We loved the old school atmosphere and history of the place. The food was good and the service was spot on! When we left there was a line of people waiting to get in for dinner...so glad we were able to experience this iconic restaurant in Santa Monica. read more

$29 Rib Eye special was paper thin and fatty. Scalloped potatoes were rubbery. Veggie was 3 tiny Brussels Sprouts. We felt severely ripped off. Service was good though. read more

We are locals and we love this place. We had Dinner there, which was very good. The history of this Bar is WOW..... Go on Sunday's. There is Bartender, her name is Mary, she is the Best. We love u Marion and Michael read more

Food was better than I expected. The butter steak was very good with a distinctive flavor and the Halibut was nice. No AC, so even a late dinner became uncomfortably hot and stuffy. read more

I wanted to go here for so long, and I couldn't have been more disappointed. My girlfriend and I went for Valentines Day, and we both got the filet mignon and lobster. Both were tasteless and rubbery! To make matters worse, it's a day later, and I've been sick to my stomach ever since we got home. read more

It was a great experience to eat there! Its very dark and its like a real diner. I ve had a delicious stake NY. It was very big and the taste greate! My father had a fist with lemon sauce. it was also very good!! the service was very friendly and very organized For the price you really get good meals. read more

We rolled in with 6 girls & 3 guys on a Sunday evening. Our group was just getting our drink order together when the female bartender (the only one working) told another one of our guests to go drink over at the Lobster. Huh? She was frazzled & completely incompetent of serving us a drink. I was embarrassed that I even recommended we go here in the first place. After several insults from the bartender we walked over to The Galley on Main St & we happily greeted & served without issue. Smarten up Chez Jay. Your a dive-bar. Act like one. read more

Excellent little dive bar where everyone seems to know each other and welcomes you with open arms. Be sure to throw your peanut shells on the floor! read more

Yummy clams! but they took forever to see that we were done and wanted the bill.

The sides were great, we had the Creamed Spinach, and it was the best I had ever had. I ordered the Headless Horseman drink...really good! For desert, I had Baked Alaska and it was great, one of the manager with me had Cheesecake. I tasted it and it was incredible and HUGE, I mean a HUGE slice. Two people could easily share it. The sevice was the best I had experienced in a long time, my water glass was always filled and the food was timed perfec read more

As a new move to Ocean Park from NYC (6 months), I was excited to have found Chez Jay because it seemed like a great new spot with an interesting crowd. Unfortunately there was a very rude and aggressive host with crutches who made it his mission to not stop talking to me and would not leave me and my friends alone. I was having a great time but this man absolutely ruined it, it was just weird and my friends and I had to leave. read more

so this place gets 1 star for ambiance and location. otherwise I wouldn't have given it any for the simple fact that the rudest bartender ever works here. after i came home I read another post on here about mary the rude bartender. so I called to confirm that it was indeed the same horrible, personalityless, grumpy bartender whose better days of bartending are behind her. on saturday my girlfriend and a few friends went to the wine fest on the pier. on the way there we walked by chez jay and poked our head in. it looked really cool and old school on the inside so we decided we'd stop there after the festival. on our way back around 845pm we stopped back in and waited for two other friends to show. the door host was really nice and friendly, welcomed us in, and even asked a guy at the bar to scoot over a bit so my girl could sit down. that's where the good service ended. to be clear, I'm not one of those high maintenance people that expect to be waited on hand and foot when in a restaurant. in fact i worked as a bartender for almost 20 years. i have worked every position in the restaurant from busboy to GM. if it is one thing i know, it's both sides of the business. i understand that customers can be annoying at times and even rude, but i also place a high price on good customer service. this woman had zero. so the bar at this place is tiny, it has about 10-12 seats total. the bar was full except for 2 seats and most people had their food and were already eating. i stood and waited for a few minutes when mary noticed me and came over. no "hi", just a "what can i getcha?". i ordered 2 coors light and she looked at me and said, "that's going to be $10." now i thought it was a bit weird and a little rude that she was telling me how much i owed her before even bringing me my drinks but hey, i figured she was just trying to save steps. i had no idea that she was actually just rude and had zero concept of customer service. she brought the beers over and grabbed my ten off the bar. (no thanks or anything) i left her 2 bucks (20% for opening 2 bottles and pretty much doing nothing. i would have given her $3 if she had been nice because when you work in the industry you tend to over tip.) so my two friends show up and one of them sits in the vacated seat. after being ignored by the bartender for way too long for how busy it was (she was washing a few glasses and ignoring us.) my girlfriend (also a bartender) raises her hand to get her attention. now mary has time to stop washing and come over to condescendly tell my girlfriend that she'll be with us in a moment because she was busy and "had a lot going on down there." pointing to the other end of the bar just three feet away. so this kind of pissed us off but dang it, mary the rude bartender did finally make it over after my friends waited for about 10 minutes sitting without a drink. good for her! she begrudgenly took their drink and app order with the least amount of personality she could. (actually quite impressive how lifeless her personality was.) my buddy pete then proceeds to throw about 10 bucks in the old juke from 1982 (also added character to the bar.) a good song comes on and my friend and i start singing along. this is where it gets awesome. keep in mind that the place is loud and crowded with the music playing from the juke. everyone in the place is laughing and talking and conversing loudly. if you have ever been here you know it's not fine dining. so mary the rude bartender comes over to us and tells us to stop singing!!!! what?!?!?! she said...and i quote, "guys, people are still eating. you need to quiet down. it's still dinner time. after 10 you can sing." WTF?!?!?! none of us could believe it. she then walks away and continues to do dishes. not one person was even looking at us wierd or seemed to be bothered by our singing. keep in mind we were tucked in the corner next to the juke. the people eating were talking louder than our singing. not one person complained. but yet mary the rude bartender felt the need to say something for one simple reason...it bothered her. well mary the rude bartender, we are paying customers. you obviously don't have any business being behind the bar if you can't handle someone singing along to the music. we were all just pissed so my friends and i finished our drinks and i called mary the rude bartender over. i let her know that i would never come there again because she was a horrible bartender and very rude . she actually acted surprised! what? here is a tip mary the rude bartender, and this comes from 20 years experience in the business...treat your customers like you are hosting a party and you invited them. that is essentially what a bar is. you are the host and they are the guests. until the managers fire you i'm never going there again. read more

This place has turned into a joke. We usually come here once a month but after last night do not think we will ever be back. I am not usually one to waste my time writing reviews but thought I needed to. We had a reservation for 7. We were seated promptly. We ordered our usual Grey Goose dirty martinis. They were out of Grey Goose so we had Kettle One. We all ordered our meals and salads. It was here that we started to realize that our waiter May have been intoxicated. Not a single salad came out with the right dressing. There was another gentlemen that had to step in and help out. Next came out a Lobster. No one ordered lobster. Next came out chicken. No one ordered chicken. Our waiter was lost. We ordered another round of dirty martinis. They came out regular. I had to take them to the bar myself. A coke was delivered to the table. No one ordered a coke. The waiter just told us it was on the house. Our meals finally came out. Food was good as usual. It was a birthday so we got a piece of cheesecake. The bill finally came. We got charged for a coke, two extra glasses of wine and for 2 Grey Goose martinis and 2 Kettle One martinis. They were out of Grey Goose as I mentioned earlier and we got charged an extra 8bucks. I pointed this out to the drunk server. He left the coke on and brought us another piece of cake. He kept the drinks the same and took off a glass of wine. At this point we just wanted to get out of there. We were splitting the bill between 4 credit cards. We wrote down the amounts and the last four digits of each card. I had to physically help the waiter swipe each card. We included tip on the card charges. One of members in our party also added ten bucks on their credit card slip. We all left and went outside. The waiter then followed us out and complained that we only tipped ten bucks. I showed him the credit card receipts and how they all added up to more than the bill. He started to explain that the extra money will go to the house and not him. I just about lost it and explained that he needed to figure that out and that our experience was terrible. I told him that he is usually on top of his service but tonight he was a mess. He had no response. Overall, the restaurant felt like it was out of control, with absolutely no managerial presence. As I said at the beginning of this review, this place usually has it together. I'm hoping this is just a horrible one off. It would be great if a manager could get back to me with some sort of explanation. read more

After waiting 30 minutes to be seated despite having a reservation, my fiance and I sat down to an overpriced and bad dinner. It was clear that the garlic bread and veggies were prepackaged and heated up from frozen, and the salad likely came from a pre packaged bag also. The steak was ok but the sand dabs were inedible and just nasty. All that for 30 bucks a meal which is a ripoff. Moreover, the prices in the restaurant are all higher than what they advertise on their website/opentable which to me is dishonest. The manager was a rude old guy who did weird things like tap on our table as he walked by and crack unfunny and uncomfortable jokes. He was clearly buzzed or drunk and we saw him drinking on the job. Also we noticed that one of the waitresses brought prescription pills to diners at another table. I don't know what that was all about. Overall this place was overpriced, cramped, and uncomfortable with poor food. We won't be rushing back. read more

Boy has this place gone bad. Came here for dinner and the prices went up $5 - $7 per entree. Their website has lower prices and they wouldnt honor them. Second im not a large person at all and I barely fit in the booth. Our hispanic waiter was very rude and unattentive. We had to ask for bread even though the butter was out for ten minutes. I ordered the Angus steak medium, it came out very tough and overly peppered. The scalloped potatoes had a banana taste to them which was weird. For $27 I expected way more. I will never come back here again. Don't waste your time and money! read more

I am mad at myself for having lived in Los Angeles for 23 years and never having gone to Chez Jay. Yes, it's a hole in the wall. Yes, they serve you peanuts whose shells you are expected to throw on the floor. Yes, it's super tiny and the booths and tables are small and tight. Yes, they ran out of martini glasses after we ordered our drinks and served mine in a wine glass. Yes, it was very crowded and loud. And yes, I LOVED IT! I had the Steak au Poivre and it was spectacular. IT was cooked to perfection (I like my meat rare) and the crunchy bacon on top was such a great addition. The sea bass was also cooked to perfection and seasoned excellently. The filet and New York steaks were, again, cooked perfectly. We enjoyed all of our entrees thoroughly. The salads that accompany the entrees are merely adequate (just some mixed greens with a splash of dressing) and it took a little (only a little) too long for our waitress to first greet us and get us our drinks, but overall this is a great LA hole-in-the-wall institution that serves great food at great prices in fun, relaxed atmosphere. Los Angeles needs more places like Chez Jay! read more

We went here after seeing it on US of Bacon. I was not very impressed. $5 fee for parking my own car; sign at the entrance said they are open until 11, but at 9:30 the "valet" said we need to hurry because they're closing soon. We were seated right beside the kitchen in this very small dining room. The "chef" came out yelling over the loud music that his kitchen is closing soon and asking if everyone was in the door. They were out of their soup of the day so my daughter changed her order to salad with Ranch dressing. The server even repeated it back. He then brought a salad with Italian dressing. We called him back to say we got the wrong dressing. He said they don't have Ranch! What restaurant doesn't have Ranch?? I ordered Canadian Club - they don't have that. They were out of both potato options and only had rice. The bacon crusted pepper steak we went for was only average and it is so dimly lit that you can't see to trim your steak. The server was very happy and apologetic but didn't make up for the over priced average food in a less than pleasant atmosphere. read more