Palo Alto is home to some of the best restaurants in the Bay Area, in many cases rivaling the best restaurants in San Francisco. It is a favorite dinner spot for locals living throughout Silicon Valley and visiting tourists and business people from around the world.
Most of the best restaurants are relatively small and independent, and without reservations you can expect to wait up to an hour or longer, especially on weekends.
Visitors looking for familiar but quality food will find lots to choose from. Chains including The Cheesecake Factory, California Pizza Kitchen, P.F. Chang's, Max's Opera Cafe, Il Fornaio, Gordon Biersch and Buca di Beppo all have Palo Alto locations.
Restaurants are the focal point for nightlife in Palo Alto, and it's not uncommon for them to still be seating customers at 10 or 11 o'clock on weekends. A popular bar scene consisting of mostly non-local young professionals and some Stanford students keeps downtown Palo Alto going until after 1 a.m. A few restaurants and bars feature live music or DJs.
For live theater, check out TheatreWorks, a nationally-acclaimed group that draws from throughout the Peninsula and Silicon Valley. Palo Alto Players, a popular community theater group that was the Peninsula's first theater group when formed in 1931, offers a regular schedule of plays at the Lucie Stern Community Center in Palo Alto. The much-loved Palo Alto Children's Theatre has it's own dedicated stage at the community center and has ignited the acting passion of many local children. Check the calendar for other theater, music and dance offerings in Palo Alto and at Stanford.
View a PDF of a [https://www.paloaltoonline.com/special_pubs/paloalto/249/section1.pdf useful listing of restaurants published in our printed Visitors Guide.
Looking for a good place for a weekend brunch? These restaurants offer special brunch menus.
Want to limit your search to the places our readers selected as "The Best?" These restaurants, cafes and eateries were the winners in our most recent "Best of Palo Alto" contest.
This sleek, petite yogurt joint offers both fresh and frozen yogurt by the cup or bowl. Toppings include fruit, graham crackers and coconut, and with some yogurt you can also get steel-cut, whole-grain oatmeal. Blue Bottle coffee and some baked goods also on offer.
Comprehensive Japanese menu offering sushi, sashimi, teriyaki, tempura, shabu shabu and noodles. Recently remodeled interior includes a sushi bar, Western-style dining, and private tatami rooms. Reservations recommended.
Country-style restaurant with healthy California influence. Long lines for weekend breakfast.
Mayfield Bakery & Cafe, located in the Town & Country Center, serves lunch and dinner seven days per week in a contemporary whitewashed interior. The menu is imaginative and easily approachable. Especially good are appetizers, fish and rotisserie meats. Baked goods and desserts excel. The sour cherry bread pudding is par excellence. Excellent beer and wine selection at sane prices. However, the service is spotty, ranging from neglectful to overbearing.
The painted motto on the window proudly reads, "House of Protein" and it is not false advertising. Don't come here on a diet unless it's Atkins. Great ribs and beef brisket are smoked on the premises, and steak bites and burgers are the main attraction. Gilroy garlic fries were, however, in need of more garlic. There's not a bad seat in the house, as some 30 television sets make sure you don't miss a play while you eat. If the game goes into overtime, be sure to order s'mores to share.
Omelets, pancakes, sandwiches, burgers, meatloaf, chicken pot pie, famous milkshakes, beer and wine. "Happy Days" atmosphere with roomy booths.
A colorful restaurant specializing in the authentic flavors of Puebla. Though you can order familiar food, such as burritos, it's more fun to venture further into the heart of Mexico with Palo Alto Sol's exotic dishes. Be sure to order the mole sauce, which originated in Publa.
With all-you-can-eat meat at $44 a pop, Pampas feels like it was conceived in a flusher era. The space is lovely and the meat plentiful: Servers called passadors wield tall skewers of hot tri-tip, pork tenderloin, sirloin filet, turkey and other meats. A side bar includes spicy, smoky black-bean stew.
As at the other Peet's locations, there's coffee and tea aplenty, along with pastries.
Reposado serves an upscale Mexican menu including ceviche, rotisserie chicken, lamb chops and pollo en mole poblano. Desserts are excellent. The decor is stylish and minimal, yet exudes warmth. Dozens of tequilas, beers and wines. Separate bar area and mezzanine for overflow dining and private parties.
Homemade ice cream and sorbet. Featured in July 2002 Gourmet Magazine as one of the 12 best places in America to eat an ice cream cone.
Rose & Crown Pub in downtown Palo Alto specializes in hand-crafted and rare beers from around the globe. Upwards of 125 selections are available on draught, from the cask, or bottle. Food is pub-worthy, albeit mostly fried. Fish and chips, cheeseburgers, English cheeses and rarebit are the bill of fare. Beer and wine.
The new St. Michael's Alley is just around the corner from the original on Emerson Street. The ambiance is subdued, sophisticated and stylish. The cuisine matches the decorative effort. Appetizers are just that. Not too much, not too expensive, just enough to whet the appetite: vegetable cheese tarts, bruschetta, wild mushroom cake. Main courses include fish and scallops, pasta dishes, meats and risotto. Desserts are equally successful. Full bar, good wine list, fairly priced.
Siam Royal is a favorite of many Palo Altans that has gotten a little rough around the edges; much of the food falls flat and is missing the traditional Thai interplay of sour, salty, sweet and hot flavors. Still, spicy eggplant with chicken and sticky rice with fresh mango (sweetened with coconut milk) are admirable.