Quince Restaurant
Much of the produce comes off a farm Michael and Lindsay Tusk partner with, and the menu follows whatever that farm has. Three MICHELIN Stars and a Green Star sit on the room for it.
Why go
The Tusks state the terms themselves, in a line the guide prints on their page: Provenance and sourcing remain the single most important tenet of our cuisine and our mission to be as sustainable as possible.
1 You can see it in what the inspector was served in spring: a small bowlful of gently cooked first-of-the-season peas are served in a silky broth brimming with flavor from guanciale and Tomales Bay clam,
agnolotti filled with white asparagus, and local lamb cooked in the fireplace with fava beans and green garlic. Those are spring sentences and they will be different sentences in October. The room is an early-1900s building in Jackson Square that the Tusks refreshed at their twentieth anniversary. They opened Quince in Lower Pacific Heights in 2003, moved it here in 2009, and took the third star in 2017.3
Order this / avoid
- Order: the pasta, whichever shape it is that week. The guide's line is that "pasta has always been a highlight here." Then whatever came out of the fireplace, and the bread, which arrives tinted with vegetable ash.
- At the bar: the Dungeness crab and sea urchin beignets. They come four to an order and the kitchen fires them two at a time so you eat them hot.2
- Avoid: Monday, when the kitchen is closed.
What locals & experts say
- MICHELIN Guide California, three stars and a Green Star:
The commitment to seasonality and locality is striking, with much of the produce sourced from their partner farm.
1 - Michael and Lindsay Tusk, on their own kitchen: "Output and waste are other key metrics we can control across our restaurants. Finally, the people component is indispensable." Their statement of intent, printed by the guide alongside the Green Star.
- MacKenzie Chung Fegan, the San Francisco Chronicle's restaurant critic, ate here three times for her 2024 review, twice walking in off the street without a reservation:
Service at Quince is generous and gracious, and it's not reserved for those who paid for floor seats.
2 She and Cesar Hernandez rank the room 18th in the Bay Area on the paper's 2026 Top 100.4 - Michael Tusk, to Lauren Saria in Eater SF, on what the reopened menu is for:
We want it to be a California expression at the end of the day.
7 One course each night is built around Fresh Run Farm and its farmer, Peter Martinelli, and he calls it Bolinas and Back.
Good to know
- Booking: essential for the dining room. The Bolinas Bar seats walk-ins, though the four-course California Coast and Valleys menu served there wants a reservation of its own.10
- Price: $390 for the ten-course menu, $280 for the four-course, and $220 at lunch.5 The Chronicle's critics counted five courses at lunch in November 2025 and the kitchen's own page calls it a four-course menu, so ask when you book.
- Timing: dinner Tuesday through Saturday, closed Monday, with lunch on Friday and Saturday.10
- Drinks: Thad Vogler, who runs Bar Agricole, oversees the cocktail list.6
- Nearby: Cotogna is the Tusks' other room.8
- Getting there: Pacific Avenue in Jackson Square, a short walk down from Chinatown.
Verdict
must-visit — Which room you sit in is the whole decision. Reserve well ahead if you want the dining room and the long menu; if that is beyond the budget, the bar gets you the same welcome for a much smaller bill. Two decades on, nobody eats the same dinner twice here, and that is the harder thing to keep doing than the stars.