Green’s Dictionary of Slang

a cheap café or restaurant; also attrib.

1866		N.Y. Times 26 Feb. 8: Last evening, at about 10 ½ o’clock, Officer OATES, of the Fourth Precinct, discovered a fire bursting out through the window of the second floor of the two-story frame building [...] formerly enjoying the name of ‘The Dirty Spoon,’ but latterly occupied by TIERNAN & CO., dealer in cottons.
1879		N.Y. Times 23 May 8: Capt. Petty and a squad of his officers had early in the morning raided a low lodging-house [...] known as ‘The Dirty Spoon.’.
1899		in Wash. Post 16 Apr. 24: After the show I walks down t’ th’ Dirty Spoon restaurant.
1902		Nebraska State Journal 20 May 10/3: Peter Christiansen, who rooms at the ‘Rusty Shovel’ on North Sixteenth street and who said he took his meals at the ‘Greasy Spoon,’ in the same locality, ....
[1908		B. Fisher A. Mutt in Blackbeard Compilation (1977) 33: Signor Paprico Confetti, proprietor of the dirty fork cafe].
1912		Atlanta Constitution 21 Jan. 3B?/2: No matter what the time of day, be it morn or eve or noon / You can gently lead him by the hand, to the ‘sign of the greasy spoon,’ / And he’ll face a meal of onions, beef steak, and hay and cream / And a hundred Mamie-Taylor’s to the scandal of Joe Bean.
1916		O.O. McIntyre New York Day By Day 21 Oct. [synd. col.] In the famnous Dirty Spoon Cafe — that is its real name — on the Bowery the 2-cent dishes are now 4 cents.
1919		C.S. Montanye ‘The Man Who Never Forgot’ in Detective Story 17 Dec. 🌐 A West Street restaurant known familiarly as the ‘Dirty Spoon’.
1925		O.O. McIntyre New York Day by Day 23 Sept. [synd. col.] He began life as a dishwasher in one of the dirty spoon restaurants.
1929		T. Wolfe Look Homeward, Angel (1930) 178: Come on [...] let’s go over to the Greasy Spoon.
1933		J. Spenser Limey 219: She got a job in a ‘greasy spoon’ (cheap eating-house).
1942		J. Mitchell ‘Professor Sea Gull’ in Joe Gould’s Secret (1996) 13: Gould haunted the all-night greasy spoons.
1957		H. Simmons Corner Boy 513: A dingy, cramped restaurant christened Molly’s but called the Greasy Spoon by the customers.
1969		‘Iceberg Slim’ Mama Black Widow 73: He [...] started across the road to a greasy spoon for coffee.
1979		F. Norman Too Many Crooks Spoil the Caper 105: Alec Spicer stood behind the counter in his greasy spoon.
1986		L. Heinemann Paco’s Story (1987) 92: Kitty-corner across the street is a greasy-spoon restaurant called the Texas Lunch.
1999		N. Cohn Yes We Have No 316: We pile into a greasy spoon.
2005		L. Gasparini Broken World 53: Gus the Greek is a short-order cook in a greasy spoon on Bloor Street.
2010		K. Richards Life 207: One greasy-spoon caff wouldn’t serve us.
2011		F. Bill ‘Penance of Scoot McCutchen’ in Crimes in Southern Indiana [ebook] Flipped burgers at greasy-spoon diners.
2015		Mail & Guardian 8 Oct. 🌐 On the corner [...] once stood the greasiest of greasy spoons, the Bus Stop Coffee.
2018		G. Gilmore Base Nature [ebook] [A] greasy spoon two streets behind Crossley police station.
2022		J. Hannaham Didn’t Nobody Give a Shit 27: The skankiest greasy-spoon joint in Chinatown.