Sur La Table - Palo Alto, California

Karen J.

Sur La Table has GREAT cooking and baking classes as well. We just attended a croissant making class with Chef Shabeen and helper John who had the 3 hours fly by with amazing preparation and instruction! PLUS we left with delicious caramelized onion & gruyere cheese croissants and pain au chocolats!

Tony T.

I scheduled a cooking class for my wife, our daughter and her boyfriend. Class was advertised to be cooking in groups of four, and we were excited for Date Night in Paris around Valentine's Day.

We arrived to discover the store and kitchen were freezing cold, with many dripping leaks from the ceiling, and a tiny kitchen, of questionable cleanliness, packed with 15 students, with some support staff constantly shuffling about and running a leaky dishwasher that made it feel like I was in a kitchen of a sketchy dive restaurant.

The class was really more of a cooking lecture, with minimal hands-on for most of the class. Unlike other cooking classes at other locations, there is really only one work surface, cooktop and stove, so while it was advertised to be cooking in groups of four, that was never going to be possible. Of the four of us in our group, only one got to do anything, which was to do a bit of stirring for perhaps a minute.

While the instructor was nice, the class was so rudimentary, with so much of the prep and cooking already complete it was a disappointing waste of time.

The food that was prepared wasn't nearly enough for the class, which was fine, as it wasn't very good, and we were all freezing.

I feel like this was badly mis-represented. At best this should have been advertised as a cooking lecture or demonstration, it is in no way a hands-on class - given the facility that simply was impossible. This should be classed a test or demo kitchen, it really should never be represented for a hands-on cooking class.

For about $100 a person, I feel swindled, but more than the $, I want our time back. For an incredibly disappointing evening, so much so that I apologized to my wife and daughter, I will never, ever, attend any cooking related activity at this location again.

Cecilia N.

These folks sad to say are the worst to deal which I've ever had the experience to know!
Their return policy I have just learned is unlike any other store that I have ever dealt with.
Last week I wanted to purchase some plain white mugs for my tea and since I have purchased many times Himalayan sea salt from the store I decided to check out their mugs.
I am not a coffee drinker so I was only going by the image I saw on their website. It made the espresso mug look like the same size as an average size mug so I was going by the picture.
I had been feeling stressed since my daughter's home in LA has been surrounded by those terrible fires and perhaps if I was more focused I would not have missed seeing the size of it if I had seen the drop-down description.
After ordering the mugs for same day delivery & I paid the $5.99 delivery charge I was surprised when I opened up the bag to see the size of the mugs was not what I had expected.
Right away I called Sur La table and their representative told me he could not issue me a refund label as it was too soon and for me to call back in a few days.
I called Sur La table back this morning and kept being put on hold at such a length it was frustrating to say the least. Finally the gentleman told me that in order to issue me a return label they would have to charge me half the cost of my order! I was shocked! I reminded him that I had already paid $5.99 delivery fee and now I learned I was going to be charged $12.99 just to return this item which in fact was delivered to me in a bag so that would mean I'd also have to pay for a box in order to return these five little espresso mugs! There is no way that UPS would charge that much on something that small and that lightweight! That is what I call price gauging on behalf of Sur La Table!
They again told me that my only alternative would be to drive to their store and return it in person! I explained yet again that I was partially disabled and had difficulty driving long distances. Their closest store to me is three cities over! They simply didn't care and stated, "no exceptions !"
I have never experienced this with any other store that I've shopped online with such as Amazon, Walmart, Target, Shein, and Nordstrom! These other stores always work well with their customers! Perhaps that's why most of the Sur La table stores that used to be in my location are gone! They just have terrible customer service practices! Shame on them!
P.S. I responded an emailed them as requested but they never got back to me!

Mo L.

Never order anything from this place. Previous customer before me couldn’t get a water heater refunded because they tried cleaning it with water since it had metal flakes.

I also couldn’t refund an order fee because they don’t do that here apparently. I made an order and was told it wasn’t in their system and then made another order bc the rep told me to. Then, charged for both order and couldn’t get full refund amount.

Also the in store reps were incredibly rude, and took my phone away from me and treating me like a child who didn’t know what I was saying. Never had that experience before. Never felt so humiliated as a 30 year old

Alicia D.

Had so much fun taking a cooking class here with Andrea. The other students didn’t show so it ended up being a private class for my mom and I. You get 10% off in the store on the day of the class.

Mickey M.

We had so much fun learning French cooking with Chef Andrea and her team. I came with a small group as an experiential gift and it was more than we could have asked for. Not only was she very funny, we learned some quick, but fancy recipes and had a great meal! I’m using my new knife skills to this day! I highly recommend a Sur La Table cooking class as a GREAT gift idea and if you can get ANDREA, well, that’s a bonus!

Felicia S.

I had a cooking class with Elaine and she was amazing! She created an educational class that also allowed us to be really hands on—from prepping ingredients to letting us tweak the recipe to fit our palettes. Although, I do wish there were more advanced classes for those that already know the basics but just want to learn new techniques or more complicated recipes. All in all, I would definitely recommend taking a class with Elaine.

Rodrigo R.

This store has a good selection. Many of their all clad sets were cheaper than Amazon or other online retailers. Staff was helpful and friendly.