The 5 most exciting restaurants opening in San Francisco in November

In November, San Francisco’s new restaurants will bring to the table Southern-style fried chicken and waffles, classic English sausage rolls, and Philadelphia-style roast pork sandwiches. Though it’s shaping up to be a slower month for openings than October — which saw the rollout of several high-profile restaurants, including Michael Mina’s Bourbon Steak and Arquet at the Ferry Building — there’s still plenty to satiate diners looking for something new.

Chef Seth Stowaway, formerly of Michelin-starred Osito, expects to open Chicken Fried Palace, a diner-inspired spot that will pay tribute to his Texas roots. A couple of weeks later, chef George Dingle, whose Michelin cred comes from his time at the erstwhile Monsieur Benjamin, hopes to debut his first restaurant at the Inn at the Opera. 

If you’re looking for the city’s best restaurants and bars right now, check out the Hot List, which we update at the beginning of every month. 

Now, here are the most exciting openings expected in November. 

Four months after WesBurger ’N’ More vacated for the great grill in the sky, Seth Stowaway of the Mission’s former Michelin-starred Osito is taking over the space with a casual project that matches its predecessor’s retro-kitschy vibes. He’s teaming up with chef-partner, native Tennessean, and “steward of the buttermilk biscuit” Cole Jeanes on Chicken Fried Palace, an homage to American diner culture that will deliver Southern-inflected comfort food like fried chicken and waffles alongside a menu of boozy milkshakes and coconut slushies from Nora Furst of nearby wine bar Buddy. 

You better believe there will be chicken-fried steak. But CFP won’t be some glorified truck stop; the jovial, live-fire-loving Stowaway promises an elevated experience with seasonal California produce and flavor inspirations from as far as Taiwan. Even the cocktails are likely to be top-notch — so you’re gonna want more coffee, hon.

A sign teasing this much-anticipated British restaurant is up outside the Inn at the Opera, and chef-owner George Dingle says his debut venture will, at long last, open inside the cozy hotel by the end of November. When it does, British expats will get a true taste of home: Dingle (born in Bath and raised in Gloucestershire), who was chef de cuisine at the now-closed French bistro Monsieur Benjamin, will be joined by his wife, Anissa, a front-of-house pro who has pulled together an approachable wine list for their first project as a couple. The menu will offer British classics like Sunday roast with Yorkshire pudding, meat pies, Scotch eggs, fish and chips, and a hefty sausage roll. 

There’s more to Philadelphia-style sandwiches than cheesesteaks — and bread-obsessed Philly native Matthew Kosoy is set to school San Francisco on the nuances of the grinder when Jerry’s Roast Pork makes the leap from pop-up to fast-casual brick-and-mortar. Having named his previous project, Rosalind Bakery, after his grandmother, Kosoy conceived of Jerry’s as an ode to his grandfather. When these roast pork sandwiches debut at the intersection of Sacramento and Davis streets inside Embarcadero 2, it will effectively marry the two. Look for pizza and salads, but hoagies are the main event, overflowing (opens in new tab) with meat, cheese, and plenty of fried onions. Chalk up another potential win for downtown’s escalating revival. 

Since quietly opening in the Fillmore last summer, Aji Kiji has consistently drawn long lines of customers hoping to snag the takeout sushi spot’s famously photo-worthy donburi, maki rolls, and bento boxes. But as of the end of November, you’ll no longer find chef-owner Jinwoong Lim slinging some of the city’s best takeout sushi on Fillmore; he’s headed to the Financial District. 

The new Aji Kiji location on the corner of Pine and Kearny streets will carry nearly the same lineup of bamboo boxed lunches filled with smoke-imbued salmon topped with roe, deeply marbled otoro, and buttery amberjack. Lim, who previously worked at Kinjo (now closed) and Kabuto in the Richmond, uses two kinds of red vinegar to season his short-grain Tamanishiki sushi rice and packs a tiny fish-shaped bottle of house-blended soy sauce with every meal. He says the only notable change at the new location will be separate lines for customers picking up preorders placed online and walk-ins hoping to snag a box.

Fans of poultry puns and sumptuously fatty roast duck, get ready: Quack House, a second restaurant from the team behind Go Duck Yourself — the “Canto-BBQ,” roast duck-centric restaurant that opened in Bernal Heights last spring — debuts in November. Brothers Simon and Eric Cheung grew up with their father running the now-closed Hing Lung, one of Chinatown’s most notable roast meat delis, and will debut the counter-service Quack House in the Nob Hill side of the Tenderloin.

The Cheungs hope to feed all the singletons in the neighborhood, not to mention provide a radius for delivery that extends into the Outer Richmond. The menu will include all the Go Duck Yourself hits. including, of course, the famous Cantonese roast duck (which comes with rice, but you can add bao with hoisin sauce), plus soy-marinated chicken, barbecue pork collar, and crispy-skinned pork belly. It’ll be open every day from 11 a.m. to 9 p.m. — so there’s barely a moment you won’t be able to get your fix.