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Irving St. / Outer Sunset Food Map

Irving St. / Outer Sunset Food Map

Here's a guide to some of the great, cheap and often fast food along Irving St in San Francisco, where we used to live. In fact this street is the best value in terms of good food I have found in the Bay Area. Parking can be a challenge, especially during weekend days. Here's how to get to Irving and 23rd.

Menus for many of these restaurants can be found online Here.

Unfortunately, as we no longer have a house there, this page is slowly getting out of date.

Dim Sum/Chinese Bakeries

There are half of dozen of these along the block. All so far seem to be very good. Superb prices on your usual items like BBQ pork buns, turnovers, curry puffs, custards, sesame balls, dumplings etc.

Tapioca Drinks

Known as Pearl Tea, Bubble Tea, Boba etc. these are teas and fruit drinks filled with soft, chewy balls of tapioca. They came from Taiwan, I think, and are sweeping the world. I like them. There are half a dozen places on the street to get them.

The Map

Even numbers are on north side, and do not always align with the odd numbers. North (and G.G. Park) are to the left. There are more places to come...

Note: NETY means Not Eaten There Yet. Bold places are particularly recommended.

19th Avenue
If you must Starbucks 1800 1825 Irving Pizza Pretty good pie (if you like soft crust) and slices. And really, your only choice for quasi-Italian.

Very tasty, famous for 5-space chicken and soups. PPQ Vietnamese 1816 1833 Pho Hoa-Hiep II NETY. Vietnamese noodle soup (phở )

NETY Peko Sushi 1830
Quite tasty Cantonese, open until 1am Go Go Cafe 1830
20th Avenue
If you truly must KFC/Taco Bell 1900 1919 Sweety Cafe Tapioca drinks
Very good Tapioca, internet cafe. Has other snacks not yet tried. iCafe 1916
Decent Korean, higher priced than average Tofu Village 1920 1941 Sheng Kee Bakery The fanciest looking with a very wide bakery selection and smaller dim sum selection. By strange coincidence, one of their other branches is within walking distance of my Sunnyvale house!
NETY K's Cafe 1924
General Chinese, open until 11pm. Average quality in our 1 visit so far. New Cheung Hing 1936
21st Avenue
731-2548 Veggie Chinese. NETY. Several reviewers name it the best Vegan in the city. One vegan friend said the meat substitues were almost frighteningly realistic. Shangri-La Vegetarian 2026 2025 Wonderful Foods Tapioca drinks and candy. Driven down the block by Quickly's pricing.
Great custard, larger variety of dumplings Sun Maxim Bakery 2034 2049 Happy Donuts Donuts mostly, but also Vietnamese Sandwiches for $2.50!

22nd Avenue N-Judah to downtown
A chain with various fried snacks and great price on basic tea and tapioca tea. Quickly 2116 2115 Sunrise Deli Arab food. Fantastic Falafel (right out of fryer,) pitas etc. Many vegan options.

Nice, but not stellar standard Japanese

Micado 2126 2123 Chabaa Thai Brand new, open until 1am! Two sisters serve, the mom cooks the food. Very friendly. A touch below Marnee, but good.
NETY, often out of the good stuff early. Dim Sum, buffet Irving Seafood 2130
Great Ban Minh (Vietnamese Sandwiches) for $2.50. Highly recommended. Closes at 6:30 Irving Cafe 2146 2181 Yum Yum Fish 566-6433 We found the sushi good though not superb (later in the day.) But great value -- $1.20 for a piece of Nigiri. Last order at 7:15pm. (Among many Chronicle Bargain Bites winners on the list.)
Closed. A smoothie bar is coming? Star's Flowers 2154 2191 New Hai Ky A Vietnamese/Chinese restaurant, excellent BBQ, noodles, great prices, closest full restaurant. Cheapest tapioca teas on the street, too. Closed but replaced with something similar.

Former House23rd Avenue N-Judah outbound

Dim Sum, good. Closes 6:30 TC Pastry 2222 2225 Marnee Thai 665-9500 One of the better Thai places in San Francisco. Chronicle review.
Tasty phở bò noodle soup Loi's Vietnamese 2226
731-3143 Hip chinese food. Cheap and excellent. Huge, fresh portions. Till '10. CLOSED Chronicle Review. Reviews So 2240 2243 Happy Bakery Dim Sum, good, combined with a cheap buffet take-out (untried).
Baskin Robins 2250

24th Avenue
2305 Johnny's Hambergers Classic American. NETY
For a break from the asian delights. NETY. And there's also the Dubliner pub on 20th closer to Lincoln. Durty Nelly's Irish Pub & Restaurant 2328 2335 Ha's Chinese NETY.
2337 Lam Hoa Thuan This vietnamese/chinese restaurant always has a line in front of it on the weekends. People are lining up for roast meats and poultry by the pound, as well as takeaway food. We went to the restaurant part, and it was great and cheap viet/chinese food. Very similar to New Hai Ky.

25th Avenue
2495 Tel Aviv Kosher Deli & Liquors NETY.
26th Avenue

Also note: Yan Yan Seafood at 2241 Judah, NETY.

Goemon Japanese at 1524 Irving is quite good, better than Mikado or Yum Yum. Underdog hotdogs at 1634 Irving is tasty with plenty of Organic politics in your dog.

What Else

What else will you find on these streets?

  • Branches of most banks with ATMs.
  • Several large asian grocery stores and a few smaller ones
  • Lots and lots of hair stylists, salons, massage.
  • Every kind of cell phone shop.
  • "Random" stores with unpredictable cheap asian imports.
  • A hardware store that's amazing for its size.
  • A bike shop.
  • And of course, Golden Gate Park -- the world's largest man-made park and one of the largest urban parks in the USA -- just a block away.
  • Various other usuals -- dental, real estate, variety etc.

Need More?

Well, there are also great clusters of restaurants at 9th and Irving (N-Judah goes through there on the way so you can get off and get back on easily with your transfer) and a few in Cole Valley you can also get to from the N-Judah. There's also a nice concentration at Taraval and 19th, and a superb collection in the Richmond on Clement and on Geary from 10th to 2nd.

If your tastes run to Indian or Mexican or the other major non-asian cuisines you'll need to check out these areas.