Megan C.
Yelp
If you need to eat and you've just landed at Terminal 4 at JFK, stay inside the post-security area, where there are myriad options and wonderful choices at that. Once you exit the secured area and find yourself in the baggage claim/passenger pickup chaos, Central Diner appears to be your only sit-down choice, and they're certainly not working hard to keep up appearances beyond their kitschy-cute diner facade.
There's not a lot of room for your "extra baggage" here, literally and figuratively. Don't expect nods of understanding as you wield your large checked bag around the bar stool area, as I had to do. Seating my lone self at the bar seemed like the best way to get quick service, but the waitress wanted to take my order without me even having a menu, and then was obviously agitated that I didn't know what I wanted. Hilarious.
I ordered a Peppermint Patty milkshake, which was featured on their specials board, but the waitress told me that I "couldn't have one because people think it's gross." Hilarious again; I ordered one anyway. Should have listened to the waitress on that one; it was one teaspoon short of being 100% Sysco Food Supply Peppermint Extract, 0% milk/ice cream.
An "excruciating" 2 minutes of looking over the menu while the waitress hovered over me like a buzzard waiting its next carcass, I decided on the breakfast burrito, as I needed something I could escape with and eat on the run. I ended up with a breakfast burrito shoved into a too-small to-go container, with grease permeating every surface, sad scrambled eggs, and mushy crinkle fries stuffed inside the tortilla. I picked out what was edible and threw away the rest (along with that God-awful milkshake)...and $21.
I get the "attitude" that comes along with NYC...but also what normally comes along with NYC is good eats. This is an airport, not NYC, and the eats were no good. Stay inside the terminal!