Crown Room at The Fairmont Hotel

I’m glad we overlooked these very low reviews, most from 2012 and 2013! We researched extensively before making Christmas Day brunch reservations, everywhere from Danville to San Francisco. Most of the family wanted turkey but we were surprised to find that many buffets leave turkey to Thanksgiving. None of us eat roast beef; two of us are vegetarian so buffet is definitely the way to go. Yes it is expensive but we looked forward to more than the food — a new family experience.
From the minute we stepped out of the car at the Fairmont entrance we knew this would be special. Entering the beautiful lobby with the grand, elegant Christmas tree, all the staircases and balconies trimmed and twinkling, and the magical life-​size edible Gingerbread House — well, we were enchanted. After soaking all that in for a while we made our way to the Crown Room on the 24^th Floor, where we paused to appreciate the views before we were graciously welcomed and escorted to a lovely table near the very talented trio playing a light mix of holiday music. The next two hours were divine, to use an old-​fashioned term that suits this swanky room from a timeless era of elegant San Francisco. It was about 3 in the afternoon and everything in the extensive buffet was fresh and beautifully prepared. Our very well travelled and particular family members proclaimed this to be the best buffet ever, in particular the best turkey ever. (The only buffet as nice as this I can recall is on the Queen Mary in Long Beach. Or possibly the Hotel Del Coronado, but it has been a long time so I can’t say.) My only negative comment would be the desserts. The bread pudding was fabulous, but the other assorted items were barely ok or less.
The staff was nice and everywhere and everything spotless.
We enjoyed our experience so much our family was already planning next year. I think it helps that we look forward to new experiences and are not the least bit jaded — one can easily get caught up in nitpicking rather than finding delight and gratitude.

Beautiful room and the service is great! This Fairmont is perfect for San Francisco! It represent all the glamour of the city!

Food was good. Nice presentation. Service was good. I was not blown away, but everything was nice enough, pretty enough, and tasty enough.

I have explored all over San Francisco, but when I stepped foot into the Crown Room to help plan a work event, I knew I was seeing the best view of San Francisco that I had ever had the pleasure of enjoying. If you want to wow your wedding guests, or your travel companions who come to San Francisco for a work event, this is the place.

Enjoyed my stay here… Room was excellent and the staff was on point. Recommendation for meal was on point and clearly the hotel staff has influence on area restaurants.

Where do I start? How about with what a disappointment my experience was at the Crown Room this past Thanksgiving. My family decided to splurge this year and treat ourselves to a fancy buffet on Thanksgiving Day instead of cooking. WHAT A MISTAKE AND NEVER AGAIN! I’ve had better buffet’s in Vegas for $ 10.99 per person, and I am not being sarcastic here. To start, the food was a huge disappointment. Everything that was supposed to be hot was lukewarm at best and in particular, my belgium waffle was floppy and I’d swear microwaved. Gross. They had a lot of seafood and my sister reported that she became very ill after eating the shrimp and crab. She actually threw up when she got home. There were also visible icicles on the seafood. It get’s better though. The kid’s buffet was laughable with old sandwich slices of grilled cheese and I think PBJ. OK. My boyfriend (who’s idea this was in the first place) said his food was ok. He had no choice or he would have gotten lynched by the other 11 members in our party.
But really here is the best part… our bill was $ 1900. Ok, that is for twelve peeps (10 adults and 2 children) and they of course added a 22% gratuity (no waiters keep in mind, self service buffet here). Also this included 4 bloody mary’s at $ 20 a pop. These were necessary to make the awful food and anticipated bill more bearable.
Being that there were so many of us, we split up the bill and paid cash. We placed almost 2k in the folder and the «server» picked it up and scampered off. She returned minutes later, with the manager! Why? Because apparently we were $ 35 dollars short in our math. We were all still seated and finishing our disappointment of a meal when she came back and in an accusatory way (again with suited man accompanying her who was either security or management) informing us of our being short $ 35. Obviously an oversight/​miscalculation right? Why would we pay over $ 1800 and then try to skip out on the $ 35? We promptly apologized and provided the additional $ 35…but how insulting? Was it really necessary to come back to the table with her manager?
I almost never give bad Unilocal reviews. This is the real deal. I will never return and will forever have a terrible (literally) taste in my mouth over the whole event.

Besides having a beautiful wedding at St. Dominic’s Catholic Church, best friend and fellow Unilocaler Bianca L. had an even more beautiful wedding reception here in the Crown Room at the famous Fairmont Hotel.
The Crown Room has great views with large windows to see the city of San Francisco from. There’s a hard wood floor in the middle for dancing since, you know, people tend to dance at weddings. It’s the traditional main source of entertainment.
I have to mention the impeccable and friendly waitstaff, especially the gentleman who snuck me an extra appetizer because I wanted to try both the duck and crab cake. Thanks for hooking a hungry bridesmaid up yo!
Honestly most of the food is a blur due to sheer exhaustion from the day’s festivities (and not alcohol like most of you probably believe as I was turned off by alcohol the night before so there!) but I do remember what my main meal was. I chose the meat entrée which was lamb chops with risotto. The lamb could have been a little pinker HOWEVER the meat was so moist and flavorful I will overlook it. I wish I had finished them now… actually I wish I could eat them now. My stomach is growling.
I think the bride chose very well in terms of groom and venue!

Nice place, super expensive — therefore, I would expect perfection. Not. The food is way better across the street at the Stanford hotel. The veggie wrap had way too much balsamic on it. The breakfast buffet was just ok. I liked the crepes tho. Service was excellent but the food was below par.

Before I went here, I read the Unilocal reviews of The Fairmont Hotel which are pretty good but I somehow missed all these negative reviews of the Crown Room. What a disconnect for the hotel to be apparently so great and the restaurant so damn poor.
I was so excited to attend their Easter brunch. But, was INCREDIBLY DISAPPOINTED for several reasons:
1) While the view is nice, the room’s décor looks like it hasn’t been updated in 20 years. The carpets alone were enough to make me gag.
2) No waiters, just busers. And, I saw them sneezing, wiping their noses, coughing, fooling around.
3) The food was GROSS! The quality of the food and the food handling was just poor. Especially, the seafood (crab legs and shrimp) weren’t on enough ice. So much so that I got very sick after brunch.
4) Before writing this bad review, I called them to let them know that I got very sick after eating there (I think the crab and shrimp were bad; note, I do not have an allergy to these foods). Instead of being understanding and sympathetic, the Exec Chef and the Manager questioned me, tried to discredit my complaint and attempted to even diagnose me like a doctor would over the course of several phone calls with different people for about a week (claiming this was all a part of the process but they obviously weren’t communicating with each other).
5) It was expensive. $ 315/​two people. They refused to refund my portion of the meal. They did offer me to come back for dinner… why, so I can get sick again?!
GO TO THE FOUR SEASONS INSTEAD!

Bear with me, I’m having a Christmas flash back.
Myself and my husbands entire extended family made a reservation here for Christmas dinner. Roughly 12 people.
Now being that this is The Fairmont Hotel, it’s fancy, it’s pricey, it’s one of my favorite places on the planet. However this buffet sucked so bad.
I hate to bad mouth anything that’s associated with my beloved Fairmont. This was a truly wasted Christmas dinner.
There was plenty to choose from. Seafood, meat stations, pastas, veggies, salads, and even sushi.
I didn’t touch the sushi. I actually didn’t go to the meat stations. I stuck with salads and veggies. Crab & fennel salad was nicely light. I even had an interesting soup made from some type of chestnut or something. I enjoyed that at least. I wanted the Brussels sprouts but when opened the lid to the serving tray there were only 4 left.
Sea Bass was good but the cream sauce it came in was flavorless. I had a pile of Smoked Salmon and onions. I was a hot breathy date for my husband I bet.
My husband hated everything and was so disappointed.
There was a separate kids buffet. Lil John had PB&J, Chicken Leg and a Slider. Then he picked at most of our plates too.
Here’s the worst part. The dessert table… while piled high with many types of sweets. They were all pretty flavorless. Everything tasted the same. Chocolate tasted like lemon tart. How is that possible?
Oh and when I ordered after dinner Coffee it was cold.
I will say that the service was very good. The waiters still exemplified the signature Fairmont service.
Overall not impressed and my husband said he hated it. That’s never a good sign.
My standards for Fairmont were not met. They really need to call any hotel buffet in Vegas and get some pointers.

We tried to get in here last minute for Christmas day dinner and succeeded. I don’t know if it was the best dinner I had but it wasn’t all bad. My favorite tables were the seafood table and the salad table. I descended on that seafood table like Captain Morgan. There were raw oysters, boiled shrimp, smoked salmon, mussels, and sturgeon which I had never tasted before but was really good. I did go back again. When it was gone it was gone. I think some of my table didn’t get seconds. (sorry!) I never do well at buffets because I fill up fast. I even skipped lunch in preparation. The bathroom was nice and one of the stalls is huge with an enormous window in it. You can literally sit down, look out, and feel on top of the world! Ha! I know TMI. The views from the dining room weren’t bad. They had a coat check which was also nice. Our waiters kept our glasses filled and we had good service over all and we were one of the last tables to leave. We were having some fun at the table and looked up and almost everyone was gone.

Had Christmas day dinner buffet here last night and it was the worst x’mas dinner i’ve ever had. It is a total rip off, costs over $ 100 per person. Their food display was good but dry in appearance and unappetizing. Our group was disappointed with the staff’s disinterest in refills right away. Hence, could not try out a lot of items…