Customer service was next level and very accommodating of food allergies; the waiter went out of their way to ask the kitchen about an ingredient before we ate it- kitchen of course already altered it for our food preferences. Impeccable wine list, highly recommend the pairing. Food was exquisite. Best meal we have had in a long time. The experience is what set this meal apart from any other restaurant. Very cool stuff. Looking forward to coming back.
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Such a spectacular place.
Our server Cheer was absolutely amazing. Food was tasty, and the ambiance was great. Definitely check this place out!!
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Have been here several times.
Always in hopes of the elusive Fried Chicken Dinner. Well, we were finally in the right place at the right time! The fried chicken was life changing! So damn good and crispy and hot and flavorful! Every time we have been here (other than for the fried chicken) the food and service are just beyond great!
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Ad hoc has a phenomenal staff with great food.
The menu is ever changing and vibe is welcoming. Robert is a true town legend and will make you want to stay even for a glass of wine and sample the menu at the bar. Great and consistent over the years I've dined here. Where is the 10 star option?
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This review is way overdue.
One of our favorites when in Napa. Their tasting menu is created daily and served family style. Ad Hoc is one of Chef Thomas Kellers restaurants but more affordable. They serve farm to table dishes that is fresh and delicious. The ambiance is very nice, comfortable, a bit eclectic and the service is wonderful. Overall a great place to check out while in Napa. Can't wait to go back.
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One of the best restaurants I've eaten in my life.
only giving four stars because even with a reservation we had to wait an extra 45 minutes after checking in.
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Great food, great service, not snobby like RH! Pri fixe
Great food, great service, not snobby like RH! Pri fixe menu makes it easy to just sit back & receive all the offerings decided for you from top notch chefs! I hear they use the same fresh farm to table as French Laundry but more affordable.
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Finally made it here when visiting Napa! Made reservations
Finally made it here when visiting Napa! Made reservations a couple weeks in advance just to make sure we'd had a spot- plenty of timings opening at that point. Parking lot in back of restaurant. We came on a sunday for brunch around opening time so we could get the fried chicken. The brunch sets are $48 pp and to add on the chicken is $30. We only needed one order of chicken because it comes with 5 pieces and it's honestly an entree in itself. The brunch set that day was Caesar salad, huevos rancheros, and bread pudding. They use real anchovies, but you can ask for them on the side or not at all. The croutons were amazing on this salad- not overly crispy, but not soggy either and perfectly flavor. The huevos rancheros was good, but a bit too heavy with the fried chicken. Also, not sure but it just didn't quite hit the mark for me. The fried chicken- this was AMAZING. so crispy, yet light and not overly salty. Chicken was perfectly cooked inside. I'm not a huge fried chicken person, but these truly lived up to the hype. The bread pudding was also really really good. I wasn't sure if I was gonna be hungry for something sweet, but the bread was perfectly caramelized and crispy at the top, unlike how some are too mushy. Really good.We also got 2 bloody mary's ($16 each), I really liked it. My boyfriend didn't think it was spicy enough, but still good! Overall, good experience and lots of food. Would definitely want to come back in the summer when addendum is open.
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I will be dreaming about the lunch I had here for a while
I will be dreaming about the lunch I had here for a while now. Full of flavor bombs throughout the courses. So delicious! Can't wait to go back!
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Back for the famous fried chicken
Three years after my daughter and I first visited, my husband and I returned with friends for a memorable wine trip which of course included dinner at Ad Hoc. With fingers crossed that our visit would be for the famous fried chicken day, we snagged a reservation. Success! The evening of our visit the menu was of course fried chicken (with a lovely crab cake add on), baked beans and wilted greens. Salad, a cheese course and dessert were also part of the meal but after the friend chicken we all just couldn’t do it. Perhaps there was some overeating involved…. Service is speedy and friendly….perhaps because the tables are in high demand. Of Thomas Keller’s restaurants this is the most relaxed. If you’re looking for a high end, upscale experience this one is not it. Food is served family style for your table and the atmosphere is loud…..in warmer months when windows can be opened it is likely less noticeable. The menu is fixed and you can subscribe to the daily menu emails (I love them). It’s not inexpensive (you’re getting a LOT of food and it’s good) but you can take your leftovers home….or do what we did and hand the bag to kids working at our hotel - they were thrilled. We can’t wait to return and try another night’s menu. I’m lucky enough to have the cookbook containing the fried chicken recipe. Friends have made it and it is NOT simple….making us appreciate our experience all the more.
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My sister, date and I all enjoyed a tasty 3pm lunch menu
My sister, date and I all enjoyed a tasty 3pm lunch menu after two winery stops. We had a delightful romaine salad with garlic dressing, fried chicken supplement, chicken main with harissa sauce, and chai pudding finish. So so delightful! We will be back.
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Just left here and the drinks were fantastic but the
Just left here and the drinks were fantastic but the hostess definitely made it tough to want to even give it a chance. My family is visiting my husband and I so we are a group of 6 and just wanted to sit at the bar and order drinks as we already ate before. The hostess was not accommodating at all and had an attitude to the point that my family actually didn't want to even give this place a chance. I ended up convincing them to have at least one drink so we went to the bar and the bartenders were so sweet and friendly. They made it worth it. Jessica was so great and I didn't get the man's name but he was great as well. Unfortunately, we won't be back again so we won't have to deal with the poor service from the hostess.
Extremely loud,. Despite having good hearing, I could barely hear across the table . Living with a half full glass optimism’, we trudged on and ordered. It is a set menu with add-ons, such as fried chicken, caviar, and wine, pairings,. We added the fried chicken and vegetarian option instead of meatballs. The vegetarian was advertised as shiitake mushrooms, and cabbage. However, we could barely find the mushrooms.. The wine pours are barely 3 ounces . The server said the wine pairing would be about 2 glasses. I should of asked how many ounces they consider to be a glass. Overall it was a disappointment. Thomas Keller , this is a downturn for your namesake.
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Trashy, save your money and go anywhere else.
Thomas Keller should be ashamed of having this atrocity of a restaurant attached to his name. It was a very trashy experience, I’ve had classier meals at a flea market for a lot less money. Even as we walked in at 4:30pm, being the 3rd party to enter the restaurant, the air was stuffy, I figured maybe they had boiled some cauliflower? It only got worse as the restaurant filled up and all the windows were shot. We had a very rude and disruptive family of 5 sit next to us that kept eating while standing up and bouncing around our backs with a 2 year old baby and just being rude in general, our bottles of water and wine got brushed by their jackets several times as they stud up and down constantly and did not respect our space. My boyfriend’s brand new jacket got plenty robed by the kid’s shoes as the mother kept bouncing around behind him. The manager did a very poor job at handling the situation. We spent a good amount of money for 3 nights in a hotel in Yountville and had 3 wonderful dinners planned. AD Hoc was one of the restaurants picked, I wish we had gone to another restaurant. The experience was terrible, please save yourself and pick another restaurant. Honestly I don’t just feel robed of the meal money, I mostly feel robed of my vacation time.
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Thomas Keller's McDonalds
The food was okay, the restaurant was extremely loud and the service was good. Overall, this isn't really our scene. This is a set, family style menu and you are really at the mercy of whatever the restaurant decides to serve that day. For our meal, the Marinara sauce for the chicken parmesan was extremely sweet and the we added on the clam carbonara which had shells, which is fine, but there were a few that were broken up, which we bit into causing a pretty painful bite. The kale salad was pretty good but it was not very big for two people to share. My husband referred to this as Thomas Keller's version of McDonalds. Overall, this restaurant wasn't really what we were looking for so we will probably not be back.
We really enjoyed this restaurant. The salad was nicely, not overly, dressed. The beef stew was tender and flavorful. One in our party is a vegetarian so he had a salmon dish that he also enjoyed. The olive oil cake was moist but not overly sweet. We also did the wine pairings with each course but our server completely missed bringing our pairing for the cheese course which was by far the biggest miss of the night. Service was okay. In addition to missing our wine (which he brought when we'd finished that course) with the cheese, he also seemed like he was trying to move us along at a faster pace than we were looking for. We ordered our drinks and told him at least three times within 5 minutes that we'd like to enjoy our cocktails before they started bringing out the food. We actually got tired of him asking so relented and agreed to have the food brought out before we were even close to finished with our cocktails - this meant that we then had a cocktail and a glass of wine at the same time. That was our biggest complaint of the evening and he did make up for it by buying us a round of after dinner drinks. Would definitely recommend.
If there is a Michelin list for bad restaurants, Ad Hock in Yountville, Napa, should get a very high score. Starting with a soggy lettuce salad, followed by overcooked pork chops, the highlight was something they called a cake dessert, which was left for compost use on the plate after one bite. We gave a very nice tip for the service only to find out that our waiter forgot to serve bread and butter with the salad; maybe he knew something about it and wanted to spare us.
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Great food - poor service
We recently visited Ad hoc for dinner. We enjoyed our meal- however our server “”Jarom” detracted from our experience. He was very distant he did not care to engage with us. He rarely checked in - he did not offer any coffee with dessert or any additional offerings very disappointing evening.
4/5 by
Lil16 on 10/02/2022
This was recommended as an alternative to Addendum. We had early dinner reservations. Service great. Had bbq chicken with optional lobster roll that was phenomenal. All other food was adequate. We felt it was an overpriced chicken dinner. Depending on daily menu that changes every day we would go based on options for the day.
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Expensive porkchops and potatoes
Food is ok, but there is no finesse to it. The porkchops were way to large, same with poatosalad portion. Finished off with a plain apple cake. The large portions resulted in waste of food. Saw the same at other tables near us, noone cleared their plates. With all the choices in Yountville, go somewhere else. Ad Hock is not worth the money.
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Delicious fried chicken
We went for brunch and it was yummy. Chicken fried steak was on the menu which I just don't like no matter who prepares it, but lucky for us the fried chicken was an additional option. Very moist on the inside with rosemary throughout while the outside was so crispy and delicious. Next time we will get the bucket of chicken to go and have a picnic!
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One of my all time favorite Resturants in Yountville.
I love the variety change of the menu. Every meal we've had has been perfect. The staff is so nice and attentive. We look forward to coming here at least twice a month after playing golf. You can't get a better value in Yountville! I highly recommend doing the wine pairing as it does provide a more rounded foodie experience.
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Food here is absolutely awesome!! Got a last minute
Food here is absolutely awesome!! Got a last minute reservation for late lunch on a Sunday. $45 for 3-course meal....best of all, they offered their famous fried chicken as a add-on that day which was what we really wanted! Everything was excellent!! The mixed green salad was amazing....even my husband was raving about it, and that's coming from someone who don't usually enjoy salads! The smoked beef brisket hash with eggs and potatoes was delicious, and the chocolate pudding with cherry sauce and fresh cookie crumbles and whipped cream for dessert? WOW! Everything (except dessert) was served family style which was nice. The outdoor patio seating is dog-friendly. Service from the friendly wait staff was great, always checking in and making sure we were good.Reservations are booked a month in advance and is "sold out" quickly, but check back often for cancellations. We can't wait to go back!
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Our first evening in Yountville
We had an excellent experience at this novel Chef Keller restaurant, where they provide a daily family style menu everyday. There are things that you can add to the evening menu, which we did not choose to do, but we had a wonderful roast chicken that was done beautifully. The service was great and we had a wonderful first night in Yountville.
If you do not mind paying to hear persistent shrill screaming child(ren) followed by his/her mother laughing while you are eating a pricey meal, then go to this restaurant, by all means. The food is delicious.
I was so excited to visit Ad Hoc, but the experience was somewhat disappointing. The salad appetiser was pleasant enough, fresh and well dressed but the rest of the menu was underwhelming. The cheese course lacked flavour and the dessert was mediocre at best. However the short rib was truly awful. It was served on a Spanish rice which was very over cooked and resembled oatmeal and the peppers were so overpoweringly hot that we could taste little else afterward. I have no idea why a huge portion of these were served with the rib. I like dishes with heat but this was completely the wrong vegetable side. We hope our comments to our server were relayed to the chef but given his lack of interest I doubt it.
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Worst experience at Ad Hoc.
i live in the SF Bay Area and go to Ad Hoc several times a year. Usually i get good service at the restaurant but last Saturday was the exception. I had to wait 30 minutes between the main course and the cheese course. They checked on the order only when I asked about the next course, The senior server(I think the person was) blamed it on someone who is new but shouldn't someone be checking on the table and notice nothing is served for over 30 minutes? There were a lot of employees. I started talking to the manager about the incident but he did not seem interested in listening to me and just walked away after placing the table setting on the next table. Never came to find out what I wanted to tell him. I also asked about the deep fried olive, whether it should be warm or cold. The server said she will check with the kitchen but I never heard from the server. It looked like there were a lot of new employees but they should be properly trained. I did not see any sincerity and everyone was just going through the motion. I probably will not return to this restaurant, at least for a while. There are a lot of restaurants there.The service was bad top down on 7/16.
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We were in the area and spontaneously walked-in and asked
We were in the area and spontaneously walked-in and asked if any open bar seating available.To our luck there was-- Normally, like many restaurants in Yountville , reservations are highly recommended. Vince the Bartender was attentive and concocted margaritas and martinis for our thirsty souls . We didn't order food and we didn't feel pressured to have to order. But must say the daily fix-meal-menu was very nice; Bussers/Servers passing by with the beautifully plated foods almost tempted us to fill our already full belly (from sister restaurant BOUCHON BISTRO Bastille Day Celebrations). Friendly staff, Catherine and Robert, not hesitant to spark conversations , and down-to-earth restaurant decorum made it easy to relax and just enjoy drinks. Definitely will go back for those lobster Mac & Cheese and Fried Chicken!
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This place makes itself special and prestigious because you
This place makes itself special and prestigious because you have no idea what will be served until that day. So that is a cool way to draw people in, but for us having lived in the Bay Area for along time, and very familiar with TK restaurants, we just wanted something chill and cool. And it was. Except for the part where they forgot we are all humans just eating food and they are not a god. And they should have acknowledged when there was a huge mistake. And of course, that did not happen. We had a reservation for outside, which was very cool. Our first course was a kale caesar and it was so good! And then we had the halibut. It was seared with vegetables. It was amazing, except they forgot to debone the fish. So at one point, I was literally choking on fish bones--two waiters saw me and did not come over right away. When they did I mentioned the fish had not been deboned. I understand that a couple of bones could be okay, but this was like at least 15 fish bones I was picking out of my fish. I asked for another version. We got more fish and a couple of glasses of wine (comp'd), but no actual apology for the fact that I was choking on fish bones or an actual acknowledgment of the mistake. Dessert was sundaes with different sauces, as pedestrian as it gets, but I suppose here I'm supposed to say it was the best thing ever? TK owns Yountville and he has definitely protected and keeps providing many jobs. I do appreciate that, but I am not sure how long we are supposed to keep paying these prices when everything else is not quite right.
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We didnt have a reservation so we walked in around 1pm on a
We didnt have a reservation so we walked in around 1pm on a Sunday afternoon and was told they are strictly by reservation only but we can wait if it is ok if we sit at the bar. We waited 40mins and got seated at the bar. Our bar server, Robert/Bobby was wonderful. He explained that they have a diff fixed menu everyday and have chicken and waffles every other Sunday for brunch. If you sit at the bar, you have the option to not order the whole menu and do ala carte for any of the menu items. We did the ala carte for 2 for each of the menu item to try since we have never been here - romaine salad, chicken and waffle, oatmeal muffin. The couple next to us only ordered the chicken and waffle ala carte. I really enjoyed the fried chicken and would definitely be back for this. It reminded me of country style fried chicken! The waffle was also tasty - it reminded me of sour cream and onion lays chips. LOLThank you Robert for your wonderful service.
Worth every penny. Fried chicken, mac n cheese, shrimp toast, grilled romaine caesar .... to die for. Great wine selection and cocktails.
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IMHOCame here for Sunday Brunch ($45 pre-fixe) and was
IMHOCame here for Sunday Brunch ($45 pre-fixe) and was hoping that we could add an order of fried chicken. Alas, we could not. However, our brunch of Melon salad, Brisket hash, an add-on of Lobster Eggs Benedict ($32) and Carrot cake were delicious! You can also add-on some Regiis Ova Caviar for an additional $60/$100, which we did not. We started with the ad hoc Bloody Mary and Mimosa, an add-on for $15 each. The perfect start to our meal.The Melon salad was so cool and refreshing, the melons firm and sweet!The brisket was super tender and moist, and very flavorful. The roasted red potatoes were crispy on the outside and moist on the inside! The scrambled eggs were oh-so-velvety and almost melted in my mouth! Probably the best scrambled eggs I've ever eaten!My husband loved his Lobster Eggs benedict. I opted for one bite (I'm not a shellfish eater), and it was yummy! Hubby said there was enough pieces of lobster to satisfy him. Service was impeccable and available, but not intrusive. Will we return? You bet!!!
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We literally live almost next door to Ad Hoc.
Great service & of course wonderful food!!
Fried chicken is a huge disappointment! Not meeting the reputation at all. Don't come. Most tables couldn't finish the chicken. It tells you how bad it is. Plus, they double charged the wine we ordered.
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Great food but very, very loud
4/5 by
Jim P on 06/18/2022
Had dinner here with friends. It was fixed price, fixed menu. The service was excellent. The food was served family style and it was very tasty. Unfortunately it was so loud that it was hard to enjoy the meal.
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Overall I'm happy I finally tried it -
I've wanted to try this place for years and I'm happy to have finally had the chance to eat dinner here this past Saturday night. I wished that they had had the fried chicken, but alas they didnt, so we of course went with the menu they had. And it was overall good!! A delicious wedge salad, the extra shrimp cocktail, delicious short rib, gouda, and a nice dessert. We were stuffed when we left. Service was good, cocktails good, and nice selection of wines. I was overall happy with my experience and would recommend it for others. Next time I'd like to try the chicken, so I'll try to find a date when they're serving it.
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Long wait for a dinner that didn't live up to the hype
We were eager to try out Ad Hoc, another restaurant that had been highly recommended to us. We had a 7 pm reservation, but had to wait outside till almost 8 pm to be seated. (A one hour wait is in itself not acceptable considering that we had made reservations in advance, but it was especially excruciating because it was a very cold night!). The portions were very generous (we could barely enjoy dessert because we were so full), our server, Remy, was excellent. But the fried chicken was not really a big deal. Don't get me wrong--- dinner was very good. But because of the hype and its high prices (it was just chicken, after all, and not prime rib), I had very high expectations that were ultimately not filled.
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Exceptional beef brisket
5/5 by
Ned B on 04/01/2022
The beef brisket and potato salad were both wonderful. The beef was slow cooked (20 hours according to the waitress) and unbelievably tender and good tasting. I would go back there in a second. And the $58 price tag was astonishing for a meal of that quality. Of course there was no choice--you get what they cooked for the day. Although we loved the meal, we loved Valette more--at 3 times the price. I was disappointed though that there was no outdoor seating. And the town it is in is seriously boring. We had so much more fun walking around in Calistoga and Healdsburg. Yountville has a plastic feel--as if it was transplanted from a Disney movie.
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One of our favorite Napa stops
We’ve been here multiple times and love it every time. The food is great, the service is wonderful, the atmosphere is perfect! I love coming to places like this with set menus. I find I try things I never would have ordered on my own, some I love and some I’m just glad I tried. I love AdHoc for the entire dining experience.