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photo credit: Jeremy Chen

R&G Lounge image
8.2

R&G Lounge

Chinese

Chinatown

$$$$Perfect For:Big GroupsClassic Establishment
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Bring up R&G Lounge around your boss, uncle’s cousin, or even your favorite questionably flirty Trader Joe’s cashier, and you’re bound to hear at least one nostalgic story about the Chinatown institution. This Cantonese seafood restaurant has hosted everything from graduation celebrations to bachelorette parties to coworker bonding sessions since 1985. And it’s still the only place we want to pack a table with a big group of friends, roll up our sleeves, and devour a humongous pile of crab legs. 

R&G is a vortex of controlled chaos. But that’s what makes dinner fun. The multi-story space is loud and a little rambunctious. There’s something happening at every turn. Groups of ten and twelve people shuffle around each other on the stairs going from the first to second floor dining room. Bartenders shake lychee martinis at the bar on the ground floor and crack jokes with regulars, adding to the constant buzz in the air. Amidst the mayhem stand the hosts, who calmly communicate between floors via earpieces, and, like well-trained air traffic controllers, usher in groups of diners gathered on the sidewalk.

R&G Lounge image

photo credit: Jeremy Chen

As for the food, the menu is the length of a young adult novel. You’ll see bowls of sweet corn soup, steamed clams, Peking duck, and seven types of fried rice. Stories you’ve heard about this place likely involve the iconic salt and pepper crab. The stunning crustacean turns heads as it's paraded through the dining room and becomes the gleaming centerpiece on nearly every round table. It arrives semi-deconstructed with fried legs piled under the shell, and crunchy seasoning mixed throughout. The other seafood and meat dishes are also worth getting. The baked sea bass is flaky and sticky from the sweet glaze. Shrimp is served with velvety scrambled eggs. And the house crispy beef is just what we want to snack on through road trips or long movies. But still, if you only get one dish, make it the crab.

We’ll jump on any excuse to take down a whole crab in one sitting, and experience a Chinatown staple that shows no signs of slowing down. R&G Lounge is one of the most fun places in town to eat with at least ten other people who probably wouldn't say "no" to getting a crab tattoo on their lower back. If that person is you—or you need convincing—now's the time to get here.

Food Rundown

R&G Lounge image

photo credit: Jeremy Chen

Salt & Pepper Crab

If seafood dishes in SF were celebrities, this salt and pepper version would be Meryl Streep. It’s been an iconic standby for decades, thanks to crisp, light batter, tender crab meat, and crispy fried garlic you’ll want on everything.

R&G Lounge image

photo credit: Jeremy Chen

R&G Special Beef

We could single handedly polish off an entire order of this crispy beef—it’s that good. But we usually just order at least two plates of it for our table.

Salted Fish With Chicken Fried Rice

Our favorite fried rice on the menu. The salted fish adds a little punch of umami to every bite.

R&G Lounge image

photo credit: Jeremy Chen

Baked Chilean Sea Bass

This sea bass jiggles like a mound of Jell-O when you pass it around the table, and is covered in a sweet glaze that gets stuck to the roof of your mouth, in the best way.

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FOOD RUNDOWN

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