La Mère Michelle — Restaurant in Saratoga

La Mere Michelle hosted our wedding reception on Saturday Feb. 29th and it was an amazing night! Chef Marc, Madame Michelle, and their whole team really made this special for us.

We asked our guests to get to the restaurant at 5:30, and they already had a special room all setup for us. I had been working with Marc in the days leading up to the wedding, he was a ton of help. Helped us get the room exactly how we wanted it and was even sending videos of the setup the day before. His great communication and confidence in the success of the night really helped put our nerves at ease.

After our guests visited for a bit and had their wine served to us by a team of their staff, we started off with a delicious wedge salad. It had the perfect balance of Roquefort dressing, bacon, and bleu cheese crumbles. There was even someone going around with fresh cracked pepper offered to each guest! All the salads came out in a timely manner, with the bride and myself the groom being served first. The plates were quickly cleared when guests were done and it was on to the next course.

Each guest was given a choice of a chicken, steak, or salmon dish. What I especially appreciated was that the guests had their orders taken on the spot - none of that needing to pick your option weeks/months ahead of time! Personally I was planning on the salmon, but that night I decided to go with the chicken. These entrees were served traditionally and also came out on time, with no guests having to wait any longer than the amount of time it took to walk back from the kitchen. The wine and water was kept pouring throughout this whole time.

After dinner we were all served champagne for a nice toast and some speeches. The whole dinner, from the moment we arrived, we were waited on by at a minimum three staff. Not like they would wait other tables and come check on us when needed - they were there to help the whole dinner! They were also serving at the bar just outside the room when our guests wanted something different than beer. It was a really nice personal touch to have assistance the whole night. All the staff was nice and friendly, they were talking to us and the guests and added to the conversations but without being too much. Madame Michelle was also making her rounds, talking to the guests and giving us good marriage advice while also making sure everything was as perfect as we expected during this wedding reception.

All in all this was a great place to have our dinner at. Chef Marc handled all the Little Details and provided us some much needed stress relief. The food was delicious, the service top notch, and everything was above and beyond what we expected.

Looking forward to eating here again on our next trip...

Terrible experience!

We had a terrible experience at La Mere Michelle on Mother’s day. I had booked a table for lunch for the three of us (my wife and son). When we arrived for lunch, there was no one at the reception. After waiting a bit, an older lady came by.

It is hard for me to describe what happened next, because I have never experienced anything like this in 23 years of living in the bay area.

This lady had a permanent scowl on her face. There was no greeting, no welcome to the restaurant. Instead, we were met with a tone of voice that seemed demeaning and condescending. She almost shouted at me when she asked for my name. Because it was mother’s day, I had a camera bag with me that I had put down on the floor as I was waiting. She shoved my bag away with her feet. It was so bizarre.

We thought she was having a bad day and decided to ignore it. We got a table, and we thought things would improve from here on. However, the server we got seemed to act the same. No greeting, no welcome. She just gave us the menu. No explanation of the menu or the specials of the day. When she came back, I asked her what came with a particular dish I was interested in. She replied that all dishes came with x y and z (I don’t remember what they were) in the same condescending kind of tone. Even my wife commented to me that that just sounded so rude. From then on no one came by to ask how the food was, even though she did the same for the table next to us. The water glasses were never filled. When we finished, she came by and handed us the bill. We were thinking of getting some dessert, but this was never an option for us it seems. When we mentioned that to her, she said something like: “oh I’ll get you dessert if you want”. Of course we were never going to get any dessert at this place after this.

We have never felt so insulted at any restaurant. We have lived here for over two decades and this has never happened to us. It was so bad that for the first time in my life I refused to tip and instead wrote an explanation, on the bill, of how we felt. I can’t help but feel that somehow we were racially discriminated against.

Now that I look at other reviews on Google, I can see other mentions of...

I am horrified by the awful service we received at this place during our Mother's Day lunch experience. I think they are not even qualified for a single star. My husband took a reservation for Mother's Day at this french restaurant because we had been here before a few years back and also since I love french food, it came as a natural choice for him. We arrived promptly and were received by a frowning elderly lady, who literally yelled at us as she looked up our reservation. We ignored her behavior due to her age. Also, as it was day of celebration, we didn't want to spoil it for us. After being seated, we were received by a lady server who wasn't very happy to see us. When we asked a few questions about the menu, she rolled her eyes. I found it quite strange. Throughout the lunch, there wasn't any kind words expressed by the entire team. I saw the hostess (the elderly lady) visit all the tables around us asking about their food, but never once came to ours. The server also never came to our table after the food was served to ask if we needed anything else or to refill our drinks or water. They promptly handed us the check as our food was getting over, no mention of any desserts or anything. Basically made me feel that this Mother's Day celebration was a worthless waste of time. A beautiful day of celebration with my son and husband was crumpled by these RACIST people. I found these folks extremely unfriendly and almost felt like I was in the old segregated US. I liked their food but my pride will never let me set foot at this restaurant ever in my life again. The owners and the server were rude and impolite and I strongly think that if they continue such behavior, they are not going to survive long in this ever changing cultural Bay Area scene. Horrible...