The Hidden Chinatown of San Francisco

Today Food, a small unassuming shop at the corner of Sacramento and Kearny, is a surprisingly good dumpling shop that's open for early brunch. Half of the store is taken up by the counter leaving only about 8 seats separated into 2 small tables and 1 medium table.  The menu is simple: dumpling can be served with soup, without soup, pan fried. Dumplings themselves can be had with various fillings, such as pork, chicken, shrimp, or veggie.  They have a couple other things, but dumplings are their primary offerings, so I ordered that.  It is interesting they serve everything in to-go containers and disposable utensils. Portion sizes are relatively small. The dumplings are size of a wonton, not jiaozhi, so a dozen of them would fit in a medium bowl.  On top are some bits of cilantro and seawood, but the seaweed needs to soak in the broth first. If you try to eat them dry they're too chewy. The soup is a bit savory and good, however, they give you those cheap shallow plas...

New Woey Loy Goey (NLG from now on) is one of three "basement" restaurants left in Chinatown (the other 2 are "Cloud and Spice" ex-Chef Hung's, and Kam Lok). This one is an old restaurant that still has the "bachelor bar" setup on the left as you enter, a lot like New Tin Lung Cafe (reviewed earlier).  Went in for lunch, asked the waitress to recommend a rice plate for lunch. She made an unusual choice: beef stir fried with winter melon, over rice. Winter melon, also known as bitter melon, is often stir-fried with beef and thick gravy so you can serve it over (or next to) rice, but it's an... Adventurous suggestion, something very... Oldskool. I accepted the choice, added a Diet Coke (which they don't have and I accepted the substitute, Coke Zero Sugar).  They served the house soup (low-fuo-tong) which actually came in a generous large bowl, not the normal rice bowl. It has lotus roots, daikon, and carrots, plus peanuts and pork bits. It is qui...

New Fortune is a bit of "hole in the wall" restaurant with a tiny kitchen turning out familiar plates for locals and a few adventurous tourists. There are only a dozen seats as you're sitting almost elbow to elbow with others. Most people order to go here, and just stand near the door to wait. And business is still brisk as they are next to the bus stop, being across the street from Cafe New Honolulu (previously reviewed).  Pretty average restaurant with slightly below average prices, IMHO. I've ordered the standard "beef chow fun" (gone-chow-au-haw) and it's pretty good, but again, not amazing.  3/5

Taqueria Mana is technically not in Chinatown, being on the OTHER side (the Union Square side) of the Stockton tunnel from Chinatown, at 439 Stockton (next to the Boba Guys). However, it is a proper Mexican restaurant, one of the few near Chinatown (which also includes Taqueria Zorro and El Farolito North Beach) Ordered tamales meal and horchata lunch combo to go. Price is over $20, as expected. It's pretty good, but not like amazing good. Tamales feels a little dry, and there's not quite enough salsa to offset that. Still it's pretty flavorful.  3.5/5

Right on the corner of Ross Alley and Washington, San Sun Restaurant is basically a "tea restaurant" that caters to everybody with a HUGE menu. However, it does have a few offering that are rather unique in Chinatown that could make it worth a visit.   I went in for lunch and was one of the few early birds (it's right at noon) and asked the waitress what she'd recommend. She said "Satay Beef Rice Noodles (with Chinese Brocolli), but it's spicy." I am not exactly a heat-eater, and my tolerance is pretty much Shin Ramen, but I'm willing to give it a try, so I said "make it medium spicy?"   After a few minutes, I got a plate that's almost uniformly dark. The beef is dark, the gai-lan (Chinese brocolli) was a dark leafy veg, and the rice noodle was darkened with soy sauce. So it's a dark mass (mess?). While the taste isn't bad, and the spice level is fine, Chines Brocolli is slightly bitter, and doesn't fit with the other tastes...

Food Express, nestled between The Wok Shop and Snow Garden Restaurant on the 700 block of Grant in Chinatown, serves cafeteria style to-go food. However, I would recommend you skip this place.  I tried it one afternoon, hoping to find some fast food to go as I was in a hurry and I don't want a sit-down meal.  I went in, tried to order, was told they are out of rice, please give her a few minutes while she go get some. And indeed, a few minutes later she's back with some rice. Unfortunately, the rice is pretty much room temp by the time I get to consume it.  I tried picking out a few entrees on the cafeteria style steel basins, but these are even worse than Panda Express items. At least those are relatively fresh and plentiful. Here, they look like leftover scraps that's been kept lukewarm by the hot water bath under the basin for too long. Beef and broccoli turned into almost unchewable mess. Veggies have lost their texture. Rice is clumpy. Even reheating in microwave did...

Everybody knows who Jet Li was, but few people remember his video game, Rise to Honor, that came out on PS/2 in 2004.  Even fewer people knew that a promo photo for the game was shot in Chinatown back then, probably 2003. Now, the only reminder is this photo archived on Mobygames .  The location, at least for those who lived in Chinatown for a while, is very obvious: 100 block of Waverly pl, an alley in Chinatown. Utopia Cafe is clearly visible.  This was what Utopia Cafe looked like circa 2002 Utopia Cafe is still there, albeit, rebranded with a completely different sign and awning. 

J&M A-1 Restaurant is a pretty typical oldskool Chinese restaurant in Chinatown, offering all the tpical stuff catering to both local Chinese and tourist tastes. Nothing really stands out.  Typical of Chinese restaurants in Chinatown, the restaurant goes by a couple different names. While the official name is J&M A-1 Restaurant, you can just call it A-1. It could not decide it's a cafe, or a restaurant, so the sign says both! "A-1 Cafe Restaurant" over the door, A-1 Restaurant on the door, A-1 Chinese Restaurant on the sign, then a different sign says J&M A-1 Chinese Restaurant. And the Chinese name is yet different... 華記小館 (hua-ji-xiao-guan, which can be rendered as Hua brand Small Eatery) I ordered beef chow fun (beef stir-fried with rice noodles dry style, or gone-chow-au-ho) and the item came within a few minutes, nice and full of hot wok-hei. The only nitpick was there were a LOT of bean sprouts, but it's not a huge distraction. It's a little grea...

Snow Garden Restaurant is a thoroughly average restaurant in the middle of Chinatown. Being on the famous Grant Ave, it is where tourists walk by by the hundreds daily, yet its service is slow, selection limited, and quality merely average. It is not even open for dinner, being a strictly lunch restaurant.  I visited on a weekday for lunch. Other than entrees and "XXX over rice" lunch plates, the only thing they seem to offer is fried rice and fried noodles (chow fan and chow mien). They don't even offer rice noodles, as I typically order "beef and fried rice noodles" or gone-chow-au-ho as a test.  I ended up ordering beef chow mien. And the orders took 10-15 minutes to arrive, which is forever in Chinatown, where entrees are typically par-cooked separately then when ready to service, ingredients are combined then wok-fried to finish cooking and serve. There is also this soy-sauce-y liquid at the bottom of the plate after I finished most of the noodles.     Pric...

Utopia Cafe was an old restaurant in Chinatown... Only by name. It's been sold multiple times but kept the English name. It's current incarnation goes by the Chinese name 牛麵王 King of Beef Noodles.  I ordered their standard beef stew and egg  noodle soup,but they have a lot of variations in noodle, protein, and combinations thereof. With or without soup, with or without wonton, with egg noodles or rice noodles, beef stew over rice... etc. etc.  The prices are below average at between 10 to 12 bucks, but it reflects the reduced portion size. I checked the prices as it had risen 25% just in the past 2 years, according old menus via Google search. Still, the portion size is decent.  All in all, I'd give this place 4 out of 5 for good but not great price for quality and quantity of food. I may go back to try some of their other stuff.  Trivia: the entire Waverly Pl including a previous incarnation of this restaurant appeared in a Jet Li video game. 

You're probably wondering... what's a pizza restaurant doing in SF Chinatown reviews? This one is just on the border... Just south of Kearny St.  Outta Sight Pizza is pretty famous for their Larkin St. location, and when they opened a second location to tap into the lunch crowd in the Financial District, and it's only half a block from southern edge of Chinatown, I decided to give it a go. TL;DR -- expensive, but the pizza's indeed delicious, and LOTS of vegan choices. Extremely thin and tasty crust, toppings that you taste without being overwhelmed by tons of pizza sauce.  Being the first time there, I asked what they recommend, they recommended 2 vegan entries. I asked them to recommend one meat (Sausage / Mushroom / Onion), and one vegan (MSG). Plus a can of Diet Coke. With 15% tip, I walked out $19.47 lighter. That's two SLICES of pizza (decent sized). A bit expensive, IMHO.  I'm glad to try it, but I wouldn't eat this every day, or I'd limit myself...