The Hot List: Our favorite restaurants and bars in SF right now

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For anyone prepared to ask us, “Where should I eat tonight?” here’s our answer: the Hot List, our opinionated guide to the top restaurants and bars in San Francisco right now.

Some of the picks are new and noteworthy; others are rediscovered favorites. All are worth your while, whether for an elegant cocktail and a cheese-soaked burger or some of the Bay Area’s best — and most creative — barbecue. We’ll update the list at the top of every month.

For more restaurant recommendations, check out our series Eat Here Now. 

And if you’re ready to raise a glass, let Swig City be your guide.

The most opulent dining room in the Tenderloin
Italian cuisine has anchored most of San Francisco’s high-profile fusion concepts over the past few years (see: Morella and Modí). It does so once again at Ciaorigato, an Italian-Japanese restaurant where the interior is as visually stunning as the food is meticulously thought-out. Owner Dario Nicotra — who also runs Modí, a Mexican-Italian spot in the Transbay Terminal — swears it’s the only such project in America, and intriguing dishes like okonomiyaki pizza, bucatini with tsukune (chicken meatballs), and a kind of Piedmontese “sushi” made with veal and mayo-esque tonnato sauce would appear to bear that thesis out. Apart from the food, this is a beautiful restaurant, worthy of a first date or a 20th anniversary. The former home of Robin Song’s Gibson has been gussied up with edgy ceiling frescos that evoke the Vatican if Banksy were somehow elected pope. Ciaorigato didn’t just inherit its predecessor’s good bones, either; it also got a pizza oven, a barbecue, and four basement walk-in refrigerators, making the Tenderloin’s most gorgeous new place one where the kitchen can really play. 

Because you’ve waited long enough for these oysters
Likely holding the record for the longest soft opening in San Francisco, the two-and-a-half-year-old Lillie Coit’s won’t make its official debut until the fall. Incomplete though it may technically be, North Beach’s scruffy-glam brasserie is already a neighborhood icon with a strong industry following — plus it’s got one of the city’s best late-night happy hours, anchored by the buy-six-get-six-free “Oyster Jubilee” and a three-egg omelet with cultured French butter. It’s a superb food menu, and the all-$17 drinks are hits as well, particularly the smooth Blood Orange Gimlet and the tart Pamplemousse French 75, along with genuine classics like an Aviation. “Never early, sometimes later” is owner Nick Floulis’ motto, and yes, you can find him there until after midnight most evenings, fueled by espresso martinis (there are three on the menu) and an impressive gift of gab. He takes his 8 p.m. lunchbreaks across the street at Original Joe’s, which uses the same meat purveyor as Lillie Coit’s for its $99 32-ounce tomahawk steaks.

A surprisingly gentle bar with a full kitchen
The only aggressive thing about Chestnut Street’s newest nightlife spot is the determination with which the owners Jamal Blake Williams, Stryker Scales, and Nate Valentine kept the prices low. (Every cocktail is $14.) Otherwise, it’s the city’s latest exponent of a trend toward post-bro bars, an easy-on-the-eye interior with skylights, lots of light-toned wood, and walls hand-painted to evoke the nearby Presidio’s forests. While Bar Darling can be raucous late in the evening, it’s an absolute joy to visit during happy hour for drinks like the Mama J, a smoky-spicy-sour margarita variation, or the Amber, a fat-wished gin martini with a delightful texture. A project from the team behind Bar April Jean, Harper & Rye, and Peacekeeper, it stands out from its peers because it’s got a full kitchen, serving bites like a smoked salmon crudo with horseradish raita ($12) lamb merguez sliders ($13). Note those conspicuously affordable price points as well.

A love letter to Peru in Downtown Oakland
Even before your top-notch food arrives, there is a lot to digest at Lucuma, downtown Oakland’s hip, eclectic slice of a Peruvian restaurant. Owners Garrett Morris and Renzo Roca decorated it with pieces collected during visits to Peru. Lima-born Roca worked as the general manager of the now-closed Peruvian restaurant Piqueos in SF’s Bernal Heights. He brought the whole team with him, including chef Wilbert Ek Tun, to open Lucuma in Oakland. The menu is largely a slightly modernized variation on Peru’s culinary mash-ups, including the anticuchos, perfectly grilled beef heart spooned with huancaina and herby chimichurri, all paired with creamy pavé potatoes, and tallarines verdes, a ribeye steak with pesto pasta. There are 14 ceviches, including a tiradito clasico made of slippery slices of wild salmon in a shallow, creamy emulsified sauce of rocoto pepper and aji amarillo. Don’t miss the cocktails, including the El Capitan (think a Manhattan but with pisco). They are excellent.

A Din Tai Fung competitor arrives at SF’s hottest mall
For years, Taiwanese chain Din Tai Fung has set the standard for xiao long bao. But with the opening of Supreme Dumpling at Stonestown Galleria, XLB lovers no longer have to settle for subpar dumplings or drive to Din Tai Fung in Santa Clara. Supreme Dumpling, based in Washington state, has a similar, though smaller, menu than its international competitor and, importantly, beats it handily on price. Order the classic pork-and-shrimp soup dumplings or the Szechuan spicy variety, which will leave your mouth pleasantly tingling. Round out the meal with cucumber salad, pan-fried pies filled with garlic chives, and a bowl of braised beef shank. 

The sourdough bagels San Francisco deserves
If you want the quality of a Parisian baguette in a bagel body, then get here, stat. Last year, baker Noah Orloff launched his pop-up in the Outer Richmond by demonstrating insane dedication — grinding wheat via stationary bike, then hand-delivering bagels citywide by bike. The secret is that he allows his dough extra time to naturally ferment, which makes for bagels with airy chew and a crackly crust. They are technically “sourdough” but not necessarily sour. Bones, which opened in mid-June in a permanent to-go space in Noe Valley, has a short menu that includes your usual bagel with lox, cucumbers, capers, dill, and cream cheese; there’s also a popular bagel dog (available after 11 a.m.) and Four Barrel coffee. But purists will find that luxuriating in a bagel, untoasted and eaten over the sink, sesame seeds raining down, is all that is needed.

A new generation of lesbian bar
Since we wrote about Rikki’s, the new Castro bar for women who love women, fans of the San Francisco Valkyries, and craft cocktail aficionados, we have been unable to manage a return visit (not for lack of trying — the line is just too long!). Named for pioneering SF lesbian bar owner and athlete Rikki Streicher, it’s a lavender-hued restaurant and bar — and unlike at nearby gay sports bar Hi Tops, nearly every patron appears eager to cheer on the games. Rikki’s is part of a trend: Lesbian bars were on the verge of extinction in the U.S., but the explosive growth of women’s professional sports is fueling their second act. Throw in the fact that Rikki’s opened in the boys’ club that is the Castro, and its smash debut is all the sweeter. 

SF’s first dedicated makgeolli bar 
With Mexican restaurant Incendio, Bar Brucato, and Jilli opening on South Van Ness Avenue in recent months, an often-overlooked street in the Mission is suddenly popping. Jilli, in particular, is a unique-in-SF project, an outpost of an L.A. Korean restaurant that serves clever mashups like jja jang poutine and rigatoni alla kimchi vodka alongside the obligatory small plates like popcorn chicken. The star of the show is makgeolli, the slightly effervescent, milky-white fermented rice wine that’s poured from teapots into metal saucepans. It runs to the sweet side; if you’re down to explore, there are $40 flights of four pours. “Drink responsibly reckless,” Jilli’s puckish tagline goes, and with dishes like gochujang pork jowl that’s cooked sous vide for 24 hours, then roasted over charcoal, we can get behind that. 

Comfort food — with a dash of luxury
You’ve got big shoes to fill when you take over the space that once held the beloved Universal Cafe. Nevertheless, husband-and-wife team Parker and Caroline Brown took the plunge, opening a restaurant that’s as committed to providing a quality audio experience — including rotating nightly DJs — as it is to serving top-notch comfort food. Parker, a veteran of the now-closed Michelin-starred restaurant Aphotic, leads the kitchen, but this time his work is tweezer-free. His casual approach reflects his Chicago roots — that is, if cheese fries came with caviar, as they do here. Among the best dishes are gnocchi with short rib and giardiniera (think Chicago beef) and fish with butter beans and salsa macha. If you want to ball out, there’s a $35 gluttonous burger with a side of bone marrow.

Elegant cocktails and flavor-packed Thai-Japanese cuisine
San Francisco’s swankiest new cocktail bar is tucked away on the ground floor of a SoMa office building. Bar Shoji is the shochu-soaked counterpart to Cafe Shoji, a coffee and matcha counter that’s become a popular caffeine stop for downtown workers during the day. The food and drinks come from Ingi “Shota” Son and Intu-on Kornnawong, established talents known for, respectively, sushi and Thai food. Elegant cocktails include the Kabosu, a riff on a margarita starring the rare Japanese citrus for which the drink is named. Even better are the Thai- and Japanese-inspired dishes, like uni and amaebi donburi, halibut cevich in tom kha sauce, and the highly Instagramable fondue burger. 

The spiritual successor to 2024’s viral sushi spot
All-you-can-eat-and-drink sushi, sake, and hot pot for $19.95? Really? Such a happy-hour deal is indeed possible at the aptly named Party Pig, which opened a few weeks ago in a former chain pizzeria space on Geary Boulevard, repurposing the old salad bar to hold a galaxy of items to dunk into broth. Owner Kevin Chen, who operated the Mission’s much-missed all-you-can-eat sushi sensation Ko until it closed in February, believes a larger space in a better location is the key to success. Be aware that Party Pig has rules: a 90-minute time limit, restrictions on how much patrons can order per round, and charges for uneaten food. But it is unquestionably time to party.