Palais Royale

Remember when you first started drinking? I don’t mean your first legal drink, I mean when you had your first beer. Do you remember the atmosphere that probably surrounded you? Was it in your friend’s garage/​house-​party? Was it perhaps in your friend’s dad’s den, complete with old rear-​projected giant screened TV from the early 90’s that he refused to throw away because «it still works»? If that sounds about right, prepare to walk down memory lane, because that’s the atmosphere at Palais Royale.
Palais is a combination of Elk’s Lodge, Garage bar, and man cave. And it’s FREAKIN’ AWESOME! It’s a great place for darts, pool or a game of Pac-​Man. It’s a great place to just hangout with your friends, and make new ones too. The drinks are priced fair.
Get the chicken wings, you won’t regret it! Everybody likes to talk about another area (former) dive bar for their wings and blue-​cheese sauce, but Palais deserves an honorable mention. They stop serving food around 2am.
BTW, if you played by the rules and didn’t enjoy a beer before you turned 21, you probably won’t like Palais

Definitely a «dive» type of a bar. Happy hour is all week $ 3 draught beers from 3−7pm. The neighborhood is surprisingly quiet. The bar also appreciates it when patrons «keep it down» for the sake if their neighbors, which I think is very cool. Definitely worth checking out if you’re in the mood for a cheap happy hour. Enjoy!!!

Very sweet dive bar. It’s dark, gloomy, and seems like some weird stuff has gone down there. It’s everything I want in my dive bar. This is the place for the hippest of the Albany hipsters to go and complain about the last show they went to in someone’s basement. There’s also a little mix of older dudes who definitely ride motorcycles and think they’re in a biker gang.
Cool crowd, great prices, and overall a good time.

The Good:
— Best nights: Sunday night, Walking Dead. Great for a first date, because talking is prohibited. Monday, no one is there. Tuesday, no one there.
— Always open
The Bad:
— Juke box only music
The Verdict:
You may or may not be pleased with the Palais. If your looking for a dive bar that serves cocktails with fresh mint muddled into a sugar cube, look elsewhere. There is nothing fresh about this place.

So, I was looking for a good dive bar when I was in Albany for New Years, and from the reviews, I really was expecting a bit better.
I walked in and instantly felt out of place, the bar was empty, and the faint smell of pee filled up the entire place. It had décor you’d expect from your average dive bar, old knick knacks and the like. There was no music, and the bartender seemed more into her cell phone than engaging customers.
We ordered the wings, which were pretty average, and the drinks we got were strong and cheap, which was the saving grace of this place.
I assume a lot of this bad experience came from being here during off peak hours, so I might come here again on a Friday or Saturday night if I ever was back in town.

The difference between yogurt and Albany is that yogurt has an active culture.
Oh, how I wish I could take credit for coming up with that one.
Still, though, if you were to sprinkle a few more Palais Royales– grimy dive bars tucked inconspicuously off the beaten path, away from the scary bro bars where the old popular kids from my high school congregate to listen to popular music– around Albany, it’d be on its way to being more yogurt-​like. Here’s the Palais scoop: Deliciously divey ambience? Check. Unnecessary tchotchke collection? Check. Pool tables and jukebox? Check. Seedy locals? This is Albany, duh! (Check.)
I deduct a star only because there’s something a little too forced «hipster» about this place, and maybe that’s because it used to be a legendary dive before it closed and re-​opened as a fresh version of itself. Our bartenders were neither friendly nor unpleasant, but maybe that’s because it was New Year’s Eve and the place was pretty busy. Anyway, you can’t paint on the grime that (in my opinion) makes a bar a great bar– it comes with time. So hopefully this place will continue to just improve with age.

Oh, Palais. What an amazing dive bar. It has reasonable prices and a surprisingly good selection of booze. The drinks are not entirely consistent, but that’s part of the charm. So are the perky boob mugs that hold just the tips.
I don’t know what it is about them but the chicken fingers are unbelievably good, especially tossed in garlic parm wing sauce. The empanadas are hit or miss. Jiffy pop is available but no longer can you watch it get popped at the end of the bar.
The crowd can be rather diverse. It really depends on the night. The only issue with this place is that being there late also means the neighborhood drunkards might be there too. There’s nothing wrong with that unless one gets grumpy or wants to chat you up. A rare occurrence for sure. That’s what pulls this down from 5-​stars other than the parking.
Parking can be difficult. You’ll likely find something at the end of the block or around the corner by the park/​plaza. Just be sure to check street signs for parking rules.

Owner is a total asshole, unfriendly and cold, I’m a bklyn court officer for 25 yes used to run into his type everybody

I was a total jerk last night but the owner was cool. I apologize for my actions for what it’s worth, nice place unless you’re being a confused whiny jerk like I am, but it was my fault not the establishment. Nice dive bar where you can chill with your friends in a relaxed environment. Though like most environments it can get a little hostile if you stir the pot in a negative way. Which reminds me of a story where one time I had to stir Sunday sauce but when you’re young you don’t realize how vital stirring is to the actual taste of stuff. So I just abandoned my duty of pot stirrer and played videogames and ruined the sauce. So I was a jerk when I was younger and I’m still a jerk. Great place though.

If God told you to spend one last night at one bar within the 518 area code, this should be among your top choices.
Supreme value for drinks and atmosphere is that of a cozy cabin on a cold Minnesota winter morning.

Have done three, I think, consecutive weeks at their brunch. They seemed to have lost a bartender but now Shaun; Cook, Bartender, Busboy picks up the slack. Its odd. You don’t wait for your drinks, your meals never cold, and Shaun always has a witty comeback or quip to say while you wait for your delights to be ready in the kitchen. I want empanadas from here everyday and soon I will be able to have a new one everyday for most of the month, as rumor has it, there is soon to be 20 varieties.
I originally said this place was pricey for what it is. It isn’t. It’s very affordable food and generous portions, I was just being a douche and ordering Rare Vos with breakfast. Be a champion with a heavy wallet, and get the can beer with your empanadas. Bad ass.
4 stars for food, 5 stars for brunch service. 5 stars, because.

Love it! The closest thing to a «hipster bar» you can find in Albany (meaning, the people there aren’t «real» hipsters in the pretentious sense of the word — which is a good thing). Though, I went there on a seedy late-​night rendezvous once and there were people juggling fire in the street. So, that’s kinda hip. Or unusual, anyway.
Make sure to order the Jiffy Pop made with the vintage 80’s popcorn jiggling machine!

Just wanted to add an update here. Went to brunch again, again was very happy with it. But what I wanted to add is that they might just have the best empanadas in Albany. We were speaking to the chef, and he was telling us that he was hoping to have 20 varieties in the near future. All the varieties I’ve tried have been excellent, so I look forward to trying all 20. It’s worth popping in here just to try them. Also, more people need to start going to Sunday brunch! It’s been worryingly slow, and I don’t want them to stop doing this.

Although Rocky and Annie are no longer there, it still has a cool vibe. Hopefully it doesn’t go to far on the loungy side and lose the dive bar feel. The mix of neighborhood folks and other is what Albany is about. Long live the palais royale.

You’re going to read reviews from people who remember the so-​called Old Palais, which was run by a very short fellow named Rocky, and evidently this was a time when magic was possible and unicorns roamed freely along Jefferson Street.
That’s all very well, but what we have now is the present-​day Palais, and, judged on its own terms, I can say this is a true dive rock n roll bar, unlike any in town.
There are poseurs and punkers and pretty people here alike, some freaks and some friendly people, too. This is the kind of place where you expect the bartender to be surly, and sometimes they are, but that’s only because some Siena boy has hogged the pool table.
This is a great bar. If you like great dive bars, go. If you like overpriced IPAs in the company of knob jobs, don’t. We won’t miss you.

Located a few blocks away from the center of activity, Palais Royale tends to stay relatively quiet for the most part. This is a good thing. Because there’s no pumping music or big crowds, this is one of the few places in my neighborhood where I can sit down and get liquored up on the cheap while having an actual conversation with my friends and/​or the unique cast of characters. As others have pointed out, the tag team of co-​barmaids is a definite highlight.
Yes, Palais is dirty, it’s shabby, and it’s definitely not about great beer or great food, but it’s about as comfortable for a marathon drinking session as my living room couch.

I understand the concept of «dive bars» but this is a dirty bar. Who would pay $ 12 for wings while drinking a $ 3 PBR? The owner’s Juan Sr and Juan Jr are both rude and have the worst customer service I’ve ever experienced. The bathrooms smell and I wouldn’t eat anything out of the kitchen if you paid my Emergency Room bill. The few «highlights» are the pool table, bartenders Sarah and Pam.

A good place to stumble into when you just need that last drink before drifting home in a wind of Alzheimer’s.
Bonus to other Unilocalers if you also play «how many drinks before getting kicked out» game. Zero. Bonus star for Palais.

I went to the Palais Royale during a friend’s going away pub crawl. The bar is set off the main drag, so I wasn’t surprised that I never heard of this place before. The décor is quite dated and could use a facelift, but I suppose that is part of the charm. They do however, have a friendly group of barkeeps as well as an ample selection of beer. Also, the Palais Royale is certainly not as crowded as the nearby Lark Street scene, which was also refreshing.

The environment is nice and the people are fine. It’s in the middle of nowhere and it’s a bit dirty. I will come back here. I feel good here.