Telly Savalas gives star-struck Vera a thrill when he stops by the diner while she's working there alone. When no one believes her story, she quits in a huff.

Alice's sour reaction to Tommy's matchmaking efforts threatens Mel's new promotional gimmick which is free meals to customers if his waitresses don't smile.

Mel gives a big engagement ring to his girlfriend Marie, but the sparkle quickly fades when he insists that she sign a premarital agreement.

Just one dance lesson and Tommy falls head over heels for his instructor, Vera.

Mel is convinced that his chief competitor is romancing Flo just to get the recipe for Mel's Texas-style chili, rated by a food critic as being ""the best in the West.""

Vera's boyfriend objects to her sketching nude males in art class.

The return of Mel's domineering mother does nothing for his ego because after his back goes out, the customers flock in, for his mother's cooking.

Things get hotter than Mel's chili when Dinah Shore invites Mel to prepare his recipe on her show and bring along one, but only one waitress.

Mel, his girlfriend and the waitresses spend the weekend packed like sardines in a fishing cabin.

Vera asks Art Carney, a sixth cousin on her father's side, to endorse Mel's chili, so it can be marketed frozen as Chili con Carney.

A yule tale (with a touch of O. Henry's ""The Gift of the Magi"") finds the girls pooling their meager resources to celebrate Christmas at the diner.

Flo takes the wheel herself when she learns that her trucker beau has a female partner.

Tommy stirs up trouble by candidly discussing his elders on a TV talk show.

Mel installs a time clock which prompts the waitresses to demand overtime for the Sunday cleanup they used to do for nothing.

Mel is delighted that his mother is planning to remarry until he meets his prospective stepfather.

Tommy has his heart set on taking his girl to a formal Valentine's dance and he needs a tuxedo.

Mel plays host to a buddy whose wife has just left him.

A wealthy Houston restaurateur offers Flo a job she finds hard to refuse.

Mel hires Belle, a Mississippi belle who rings Mel's chimes as ""one of the best waitresses I've ever had."" However, Belle is now aiming for lusher pastures as a country-music writer.

The new waitress Belle is making big points with her old boss Mel, but she's scoring zero with Alice and Vera.

Heartbroken over her boy friend's sudden lack of attention, Vera begs Belle to transform her into a sex goddess.

Mel signs a profit-sharing agreement with the girls just before learning he'll get a tidy sum for letting the city condemn his property.

Mel is receptive to an infatuated tour guide, as long as she keeps steering tourists into his diner.

Alice allows Tommy to stay with Mel, prompting a wager between Alice and Mel, she bets that he will kick Tommy out and Mel bets that Alice will snoop on her son.

An automated bank teller accidentally spews out $24,675 to an astonished but delighted Mel.

After his safe is stolen, Mel rents the services of two very efficient guard dogs.

Robert Goulet makes an appearance when Vera wins a free trip to Las Vegas and Alice, Mel and Belle tag along to try their luck.

Mel may get his diner back if Belle can get Robert Goulet to perform for a Las Vegas casino owner but when it seems she can't get him, Alice steps in and impersonates him.

Vera's Aunt Agatha, a freewheeling sexagenarian, makes a pit stop in Phoenix while motorcycling to Mexico. This prompts Vera to make a life altering decision, whether or not to ride off into the sunset with her aunt.

Against Alce's expressed wishes, Mel secretly teaches Tommy how to take care of a school bully.

The sparsely attended funeral of a buddy persuade Mel to become Mr. Nice Guy and ensure a decent turnout at his own burial.

Mel's mother is singing the blues because her husband of six months has just left her.

Henry's convinced that his wife of 20 years is suddenly being nice because she's having an affair, so he tells her he's having one too, with Alice.

As the new manager of her apartment building, Alice has the unenviable task of locking out a delinquent fellow tenant, Belle.

Vera goes out on a limb to save a century old tree in front of the diner from being cut down for a road-widening project.

The waitresses cut up a huge fish they find in the refrigerator, unaware that singer Jerry Reed had left it there until he could have it stuffed.

Mel gets into a nose-to-beak yelling match with Vera's new pet parrot.

Tommy is cutting classes to pursue a singing career and his first job is singing at a juice saloon.

During a visit, Carrie plans to help out at the diner and cook but a fed up Mel kicks her out and she goes to work for a competitor.

When, Mel recounts the story of the little old lady who mugged him, the old lady becomes four thugs.

A trucker chooses Mel's Diner as the place to tell her amorous driving partner to hit the road.

Alice thinks she has found her main chance when she lands a gig singing at a big banquet with a 1940's theme and an influential audience of restaurant owners.

Mel suddenly takes a romantic interest in Vera, who doesn't realize it's just a ploy to make his girlfriend, Marie, jealous.

Vera refuses to give up the baby girl someone left in her pile of wash at the laundromat.