CALIFORNIA
The Best Restaurants in San Francisco Right Now: 16 Must-Try Spots
Benu
By Mei Chen | April 27, 2025
I grew up just outside San Francisco, back when the city meant $3 burritos the size of your forearm and Japantown noodle shops you had to know someone to find.
A lot of that’s gone now, paved over by tech money and $9 oat milk lattes. But San Francisco never completely lost the thing that made it great: an obsession with eating, cooking, and chasing whatever’s next. You just have to look harder, and maybe spend a little more, to find it.
Here are the 15 places that still make it worth the hunt.
1. 7 Adams
1963 Sutter St | Website | Instagram
7 Adams is what happens when two chefs walk away from a Michelin star and build something better—and then win another star in the process. David and Serena Chow Fisher left Marlena and opened this snug, modern spot on Sutter Street, where their affordably priced $87 five-course tasting menu feels like a masterclass in restraint and precision. Expect dishes like kabocha squash caramelle with chanterelles, black cod with sunchoke confit, and a milk bread roll so good it should come with a warning label. They earned a Michelin star in 2024, then celebrated with In-N-Out, which tells you everything you need to know.
2. Kiln
149 Fell St | Website | Instagram
Kiln feels like the sort of place that would rather torch its own tables than serve you a boring plate of pasta. Chef John Wesley built a Michelin-starred tasting menu out of feral ingredients—venison tallow, beef tendon, dishes that sound like dares but end up heartbreakingly good. It’s tiny, dark, a little haunted-looking, and absolutely worth the minor identity crisis it’ll give you. And while it’s still relatively new, Kiln’s $285 tasting menu begins with meticulously built dishes and continues unabated through about 20 courses that proves a simple truth: Kiln is San Francisco’s best restaurant.
3. Benu
22 Hawthorne St | Website | Instagram
If you haven’t been to Benu yet, you’ve either recently arrived from Mars or you hate joy. First opened in 2010, Corey Lee’s three-star Michelin spot feels like what would happen if NASA ran a dim sum restaurant: perfect soup dumplings, lobster coral custard, edible architecture. Bring a second mortgage and a willingness to cry at a dumpling.
4. Dalida
101 Montgomery St | Website | Instagram
Dalida could easily coast on location alone—it’s right by the Palace of Fine Arts—but instead it chooses violence in the best way. Chefs Laura and Sayat Ozyilmaz drop Eastern Mediterranean feasts so layered and lush you’ll forget your own name. It’s one of those places where every bite feels both inevitable and completely surprising, like a great plot twist you should’ve seen coming.
5. Four Kings
710 Commercial St | Website | Instagram
Four Kings is what happens when two chefs ditch the playbook and start remixing Cantonese-American classics with no supervision. Franky Ho and Michael Long’s char siu shows up lacquered like a sports car, and the soy sauce chicken is basically emotional warfare. They were named one of Bon Appétit's Best New Restaurants of 2024, but you probably knew that already from the line outside.
6. The Wild
201 Spear St | Website | Instagram
The Wild cooks over open flame like it’s auditioning for a Viking reboot. Chef Marc Zimmerman leans into primal flavors without turning it into a cosplay exercise: ember-roasted carrots, wood-fired duck, smoked cocktails that might actually be necessary. It’s raw and elegant at the same time, which is harder than it sounds.
7. Bon Délire
Pier 3 | Website | Instagram
You might miss Bon Délire if you blink—it’s tucked into a weird little waterfront spot that feels one broken lease away from becoming a vape shop. But Vernon Morales is cooking French bistro food like he’s got something to prove: chicken croquettes that taste like they were invented by wizards, a croque madame that could make you write poetry. It’s scrappy, sly, and way better than it has any right to be.
8. Causwells
2346 Chestnut St | Website | Instagram
Causwells is the kind of place that makes you reconsider your stance on the Marina. Chef Adam Rosenblum's Americana burger is like a refined In-N-Out Double-Double, with char-grilled patties, melted cheese, and house-made pickles . The restaurant's revamped interior and inventive cocktails, like the Girl Scout cookie-inspired drinks, add to its charm.
9. Elena’s Mexican Restaurant
255 W Portal Ave | Website | Instagram
Every time I go to Elena’s, I leave questioning my life choices for not living closer to West Portal. Elena and John Duggan’s mole enchiladas land with the gravity of a family secret, and the carnitas might actually cure minor illnesses. You’ll wait for a table because everyone else figured this out too, but it's a fair trade for a little happiness.
10. Omakase
665 Townsend St | Website | Instagram
At Omakase, after they hand you 12 pieces of sushi, they also deliver a bill roughly equivalent to your first car—and yet it all seems entirely perfect. Chef Jackson Yu specializes in Edomae-style fish flown in daily from Japan, each piece somehow humbler and more devastating than the last. You’ll swear you’re being ripped off until the first bite hits and you forget how capitalism works.
11. Verjus
550 Washington St | Website | Instagram
Verjus is that rare natural wine bar that doesn’t seem hellbent on punishing you. The food’s sharp (think rabbit pâté and anchovy toasts), the wine list could start fights, and the crowd looks like the casting call for a moody indie movie. It’s technically a bar, but you’ll end up eating three meals by accident.
12. Outta Sight Pizza
422 Larkin St | Website | Instagram
The pizza scene couldn’t be hotter these days in San Francisco, but Outta Sight stands out by nailing not just its thin crust but granny-style square slices topped with all kinds of fire. The butter chicken granny slice is a full-body experience, and the pepperoni hits with the force of an oncoming Muni train. Bonus: the vibes in both the Tenderloin and Chinatown locations are all busted leather booths and slightly-too-loud hip-hop, like your best bad idea in college.
13. Osito
2875 18th St | Website | Instagram
Osito has the chaotic energy of a pioneer camp where everyone happens to have a Michelin star. Chef Seth Stowaway (yes, real name) cooks live-fire tasting menus that feel almost aggressively personal: one menu, one seating, $295 if you dare. The dishes change regularly, but expect house-made breads that just might steal the show, like these flaky biscuits with the world’s most perfect butter and jam.
14. Copra
1700 Fillmore St | Website | Instagram
South Indian food, aggressively pretty interior, and a chutney flight that you must start with. The Thattukada fried chicken is what you order if you want to understand why she called it a perfect date spot. From Srijith Gopinathan and Ayesha Thapar, Copra is a restaurant designed for people who think dinner should also double as content, and to be fair, it earns the camera time.
15. Prik Hom
3226 Geary Blvd | Website | Instagram
Prik Hom opened quietly in late 2023 and almost instantly exploded, earning a spot on Eater’s Best New Restaurants list. Chef Lalita Souksamlane (who also runs Osha Thai) serves Northern Thai dishes that are fierce, complicated, and worth the sweat. You’ll want the sai ua sausage platter, and yes, you’ll be too full to move afterward.
16. Routier
2801 California St | Website | Instagram
Routier is what happens when an actual Frenchman (Mathieu Rondeau) and two smart Americans decide to make a neighborhood restaurant that cooks circles around everyone else. It’s technically a brasserie, but good luck fitting it into any category after you try the beef cheek bourguignon or the duck liver mousse. One of the few places where sitting at the bar alone with a bottle of wine feels like a flex, not a tragedy.
Mei Chen has worked for nearly a dozen start-ups in as many years, taking her to several California cities, from L.A. to San Francisco. She can tell you the best Baja tacos just about anywhere. While she’s sure her current day job is permanent, she also has her eye on Carmel.
