SINGLETHREAD

The dinner was nice but I want to touch upon how disrespectful the hotel staff and front desk is by sharing my experience. The check-out was at 11.00am and I requested to use their study room for my Zoom meetings. After an hour, they blasted the music to intentionally kick me out even though they initially said it was okay. When I was going to the front desk to tell them about this, I heard them gossiping and making fun about my age and nationality. This experience was my birthday present and I was super upset and did not know what to do after hearing their conversation, so I got out of the hotel as soon as possible. I believe this is an unacceptable and utterly rude behavior from a Relais-Chateux line hotel. I hope this message gets to the right person and the issue does not persist to young international individuals like myself.

This is another amazing 3- Michelin-star experience in the Bay Area. It is quite impressive that a lot of the ingredients are seasonal and from their farm. The menu is heavily influenced by Japanese cuisines, so there are a lot of high quality fresh fish and vegetables. Their "first course" was the best for me. It consisted of 12 mini appetizers that were insanely delicious. The mushroom rice before desserts was another highlight as well. Service and ambiance are top-notch. Single Thread is well worth a trip to Healdsburg.

If I were judging SingleThread solely by the flavor of the food, it would be a 3.5 or 4. The dishes clearly had thought put into its presentation and in its constituent elements, although more often than not was just overly fussy.

The most disappointing dish, the "Wagyu" whose name is an insult to actual Wagyu, lacked any of the juiciness found in the real deal, and was instead incredibly tough and had to be sawed at with a knife. The small sliver of beef was surrounded by distracting small side dishes, culminating in a panoply of ephemera whose minuteness loses any ability to savor or appreciate the flavors of the meat, the presumed center of the dish (spoiler: it was bland and TOUGH). This dish exemplified my main issue with the menu, that most of the dishes felt like a proof of concept, rather than a part of a meal. A flourish that wanted to be loved for its alleged technical expertise, but nothing that would sit on the palate of memory. Status, rather than substance.

But perhaps wanting more of the food isn't really an insult. After all, most of the dishes were quite good and quite well done, and the initial "Summer in Sonoma" course was certainly dazzling in presentation. Unfortunately, a "dining experience" must be defined by more than the food, and here I found two main failings.

First, the menu wasn't provided and the litany of ingredients in each dish required a sense of mental acuity far more than what I was capable of. Having the menu at the outset would have allowed me to understand and appreciate the flavors, rather than being distracted by the task of identification, like trying to figure out who an actor is in a movie rather than paying attention to the movie.

Second, the price. Simply put, it's not worth the $600+/head (with tax and tip). For that price, I could have had ~10-15 meals at other restaurants that are no less thoughtful and perhaps with a bit less of an ego towards itself. At least one of those restaurants probably knows how to cook a steak, too! If this were half the cost, I'd maybe look back and say it was a fun experience, but as its price, I just have major buyer's remorse.

So far not accommodation. Waiting for my table just a bit early

Outstanding dining experience. Amazing food and service. All the things you would expect from a Michelin star restaurant. When our server sat us and asked our preference of water , he discretely signaled a colleague and our glasses were instantly filled. In another example, he picked up an empty glass , discretely put it behind his back while he spoke to us and another server wisked it away almost unnoticed. It's the details that matter.