Food I'm Eating/Places I'm Visiting: Yank Sing in San Francisco

Santa Rosa has a good restaurant for dim sum – San Francisco stalwart Hang Ah has a branch right here in town (2130 Armory Drive). It looks funny because the building was once an A&W Root Beer restaurant, but the food is good. Sometimes, though, I get a hankering for dim sum in the city (for those of you not in the SF Bay Area, here “the city” means San Francisco), which always feels more authentic. Having some business to attend to in nearby Berkeley yesterday (picking up a new futon we had made), we decided to make a day of it. 

My favorite dim sum place in San Francisco is a humble place called S&T Hong Kong Seafood, at 2578 Noriega St. We’ve been going there for years. Another favorite was Tom Kiang, on Geary St. near 20th Avenue (no longer in operation) along with the place right next door – until the chef changed at the latter and things went abruptly downhill.

However, thinking it would be fun to try something different, I went on line and searched “best San Francisco dim sum,” which brought up sites with recommended restaurants. The consensus was that Yank Sing in the Rincon Center was the best place in the city for good dumplings. When I saw on Yank Sing’s website that they offer $4 dollar parking with validation, I was sold. 

There was a bonus. The Rincon Center includes the historic Rincon Annex Post Office, an Art Deco building built in 1940, now part of a complex with apartments, offices, and shops. It preserves New Deal murals by artist Anton Refregier. The post office closed in the 1980s, but the lobby with the murals is intact, integrated into the Rincon Center development. The old post office lobby is worth a look if you have any interest in New Deal art, Art Deco architecture, or the history of the US Post Office. 

But, back to dim sum. Yank Sing was a disappointment. It was fun to pick dishes off the circulating carts (a feature many dim sum restaurants have abandoned) and I liked the elegant glass teapots. The curry and vegetable dumplings were an unusual variation and the barbecue pork rice noodles were good, but, on the whole, I was expecting more from a restaurant with a Michelin rating that people claim is the best in San Francisco. In addition, most of the offerings were not as hot as I would have liked (the xiao long bao buns were barely warm). 

The meal for two came to $138 plus tip, which I would have happily paid for a memorable experience, but, as I say, the food was mostly unexceptional. It felt quite overpriced. At S&T Seafood on Noriega, the same meal would have been about $65 and the food would have been as good or better. Additionally, S&T is always filled with Chinese families and friends speaking Cantonese, which adds to the charm (at Yank Sing, the only Asians present were working at the restaurant). At Yank Sing, you pay for the location. I won’t be going back, except perhaps to look at the post office lobby again if I happen to be in the neighborhood. 

After lunch, we strolled over to see what was new at the Ferry Building, stopped in briefly at the San Franciso Railway Museum (77 Steuart St), which presents the history of the municipal trolleys the city runs using cars purchased from defunct trolley systems all over the world, and then ran over to the Legion of Honor to see the Manet & Morisot show before heading home by way of the futon shop in Berkeley. All in all, a fun day despite disappointing dim sum.