Zuni Café, Mediterranean restaurant at Market Street, San Francisco, US
Zuni Café is a two-floor restaurant on Market Street in San Francisco, with exposed brick walls, copper-topped tables, and large windows that face the street. The dining room also holds a wood-fired brick oven that is used to prepare several dishes on the menu.
The restaurant opened in 1979 and over the years became a fixture in San Francisco's dining scene. It received the James Beard Foundation Award for Outstanding Restaurant in 2003, then another James Beard Award in 2018 for Outstanding Service.
Zuni Café has long been a place where California cooking and French techniques meet on the same plate. The wood-fired oven in the dining room is visible from many tables, making the cooking feel open and direct.
The restaurant is close to the Civic Center BART station, making it easy to reach by public transit. Reservations are recommended, especially for dinner, as the place tends to fill up quickly on most nights.
The kitchen's roasted chicken is ordered roughly one hour before it is brought to the table, as it takes that long to prepare in the wood-fired oven. It comes with a bread salad made with pine nuts and dried currants, a combination that has stayed on the menu for decades.
The community of curious travelers
AroundUs brings together thousands of curated places, local tips, and hidden gems, enriched daily by 60,000 contributors worldwide.
