On “Seinfeld,” Jerry and his friends regularly meet at the fictional coffee shop called Monk’s Café.
Monk’s is the group’s familiar gathering place, with Jerry, Elaine, George, and Kramer usually occupying one of the first booths or sitting at the counter. Many conversations about dating, work, money, and minor social grievances begin there, making the café one of the show’s most important recurring locations.
The exterior used for Monk’s is actually Tom’s Restaurant, located at West 112th Street and Broadway near Columbia University in New York City. The interior scenes were filmed on a soundstage, so the recognizable outside façade and the diner interior do not belong to the same physical restaurant.
The name “Monk’s Café” reportedly came from a poster of jazz pianist and composer Thelonious Monk in the office where Jerry Seinfeld and Larry David were writing. Viewers sometimes answer “Tom’s Restaurant” because that is the real building shown on screen, but the question asks for the in-show name. “Reggie’s” is a rival café described as Monk’s opposite, not the regular meeting place.