Restaurants in California
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A
Blake's Steakhouse
Blake's serves seafood, chops, prime rib and classic cuts of top-shelf steak.
reviewed
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B
Caffe Amici
Amici serves excellent coffee in hand-painted Italian cups, and draws hearts in cappuccino foam, warming the spirits of Downtown office workers.
reviewed
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C
Caffe diBartolo
Grab a sidewalk table or head for the back courtyard at this smart café. You can enjoy hot panini sandwiches or just wake up with a strong coffee.
reviewed
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Red Tractor Cafe
More family friendly and down-home is this cheery and aromatic eatery serving affordable comfort food such as roast turkey and meatloaf (a meatless version is also available).
reviewed
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D
Beckett's Irish Pub
The cozy but spacious and beautifully restored French-provincial building that houses Beckett's puts it way above your average fake-Irish pub. It serves hearty Irish meals and a decent Guinness.
reviewed
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E
Downtown
Smack in downtown, this is an ideal spot to start an evening. While the California fare is solidly good, it’s not particularly innovative, but the bar makes great cocktails and the tasty appetizers appeal to peckish eaters who don’t want to fill up before a performance.
reviewed
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F
Dragonfly
You’d think this place was high-end from the sunken dining room, garlic noodles with lavish heapings of Dungeness crab, and shaking beef that threatens to steal the crown from Slanted Door’s version – but prices and service are plenty friendly. Desserts and starter pâté aren’t standouts, so load up on mains served family-style.
reviewed
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G
Café Asia
Rest those museum legs on the sunny outdoor balcony, and let your tastebuds do the trekking. You might pause at the green-tea soba-noodle base camp, or head for the spicy Korean pork sandwich. Adventurous eaters attack hearty Tibetan lamb and lentil stew, nibblers chill out with Thai green papaya salad, and dawdlers refresh with green tea and Pocky.
reviewed
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H
Jardinière
Her formidable reputation as Iron Chef, Top Chef Master and James Beard Award winner precedes her, but star chef Traci Des Jardins is better known at her namesake restaurant Jardinière as a champion of sustainable, salacious California cuisine. She has a way with California's organic vegetables, free-range meats and sustainably caught seafood that's probably illegal in other states, lavishing braised oxtail ravioli with summer truffles and stuffing crispy pork belly with salami and fig. Go Mondays, when $45 scores three decadent courses with wine pairings.
reviewed
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I
Tropisueño
Last time you enjoyed casual Mexican dining this much, there were probably balmy ocean breezes and hammocks involved. Instead, you're steps away from SFMOMA, savoring an al pastor (marinated pork) burrito with mesquite salsa and grilled pineapple and sipping a margarita with a chili-salted rim. The organic rustic decor and the location are upscale, but the prices are about what you'd pay in the Mission, give or take a buck and a BART ride.
reviewed
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J
Lone Eagle Grille
For dinner at Diamond Peak ski resort, treat your taste buds to a meal at the exquisite Lone Eagle Grille, which overlooks the hotel's private beach. If it's full, sample the ambience over a drink in the bar.
reviewed
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K
Ad Hoc
Don't ask for a menu at Thomas Keller's most innovative restaurant since French Laundry: chef Dave Cruz dreams up his four-course, $48 market menu daily. No substitutions (except for dietary restrictions), but none needed – every dish is comforting, fresh and spot-on.
reviewed
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L
Benu
SF has refined fusion cuisine over 150 years, but no one rocks it quite like chef/owner Corey Lee (formerly of Napa's French Laundry), who remixes local, sustainable fine-dining staples and Pacific Rim flavors with a SoMa DJ's finesse. Velvety Sonoma foie gras with tangy, woodsy yuzu-sake glaze makes taste buds bust wild moves, while Dungeness crab and black truffle custard bring such outsize flavor to faux-shark's fin soup, you'll swear there's Jaws in there. The tasting menu is steep ($160) and beverage pairings add $110, but you won't want to miss star sommelier Yoon Ha's flights of fancy – including a rare 1968 Madeira with your soup.
reviewed
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Big Sur Lodge Restaurant
reviewed
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M
Brenda's French Soul Food
Chef-owner Brenda Buenviaje blends New Orleans–style Creole cooking with French technique to create 'French soul food.' Expect updated classics like red beans and rice, serious biscuits and grits, amazing Hangtown fry (eggs scrambled with salt pork and fried oysters), good shrimp-stuffed po' boys, and fried chicken served with collard greens and hot-pepper jelly. Take the fire off the spicy cooking with sweet-watermelon tea.
reviewed
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Cafe 1134
This cool coffee shop on Coronado's main drag offers more than your morning fix: think delicious Greek-style egg scramblers, grilled panini, spinach salads, high-end teas, and a wine and beer list. Prices are slashed as part of the 'Money Wise Menu' on Sunday, Monday and Tuesday evenings.
reviewed
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N
Café 222
Downtown's favorite breakfast place for pumpkin waffles, orange-pecan or granola pancakes, and farm-fresh eggs Benedict. The French toast stuffed with peanut butter and bananas was featured on the Food Network.
reviewed
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Carmel Belle
Fresh, often organic ingredients flow from Carmel Valley farms onto tables at this charcuterie, cheese and wine shop hidden in a mini mall.
reviewed
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Catal Restaurant & Uva Bar
Looking for something more sophisticated without having to move the car from the Disneyland parking lot? Your best bet is the Mediterranean-inspired cuisine and cocktail menu at Catal; reserve ahead for balcony seating.
reviewed
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C'est La Vie
reviewed
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O
Chilango
Upgrade from taqueria to sit-down restaurant at this casual Mexican spot that uses all-organic ingredients in its Mexico City–derived cooking. Meals are served at tile-top tables with Frida Kahlo images embedded within. Everything is made to order, including guacamole and tortillas. Favorite dishes: filet-mignon tacos, duck flautas (deep-fried flour tortilla with filling) and succulent carnitas (roast pork).
reviewed
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C Level
The bay views are stunning from this airy, elegant eatery on Harbor Island, west of downtown; well-prepared seafood dishes include the popular seared Hawaiian 'ahi tuna, lobster truffle mac 'n' cheese and Japanese-style sesame salmon. The Social Hour (3:30pm to 5:30pm Monday to Friday) offers $5 'bites and libations.'
reviewed
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Coi
Chef Daniel Patterson's wild tasting menu featuring foraged morels, wildflowers and Pacific seafood is like licking the California coastline. Black and green noodles are made from clams and Pacific seaweed, and purple ice-plant petals are strewn atop Sonoma duck's tongue, wild-caught abalone and just-picked arugula. Only-in-California flavors and intriguing wine pairings ($95; pours generous enough for two to share) will keep you California dreaming for a while afterwards.
reviewed
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Commonwealth
California's most imaginative farm-to-table dining isn't in some quaint barn, but the converted cinderblock Mission dive where chef Jason Fox serves crispy hen with toybox carrots cooked in hay (yes, hay), and sea urchin floating on a bed of farm egg and organic asparagus that looks like a tide pool and tastes like a dream. Savor the $65 prix-fixe knowing $10 is donated to charity.
reviewed
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P
Commonwealth
California's most imaginative farm-to-table dining isn't in some quaint barn, but the converted cinderblock Mission dive where chef Jason Fox serves crispy hen with toybox carrots cooked in hay (yes, hay), and sea urchin floating on a bed of farm egg and organic asparagus that looks like a tide pool and tastes like a dream. Savor the $65 prix-fixe knowing $10 is donated to charity.
reviewed