San Francisco: Mr. Pollo

On May 1st, my coworkers and I proudly represented our organization at the May Day march in San Francisco in support of comprehensive immigration reform.  We marched all the way from 24th and Mission to the Civic Center.  It was a lot of fun and I ended up with the most awkward tan ever.  Ugh.

Anyway, instead of heading back home to San Jose, I decided to stay the night in SF with T.  After the rally at the Civic Center, T picked me up for dinner at Mr. Pollo:

With only four tables, Mr. Pollo's already tiny space is taken up by it's open kitchen:

With only two people manning the entire restaurant, it's no surprise the restaurant is so small.

Mr. Pollo offers a prix fixe menu that changes daily.  $20 per person for four dishes.  You don't know what's on the menu until it's placed before you and the server rattles off the ingredients of each dish.

I...couldn't remember half of what our server said right after he said it.  So forgive me as I try to reconstruct each dish to the best of my memory.

First was the soup.  A chilled watermelon puree with cucumber, Thai basil, and creme fraiche:

It sounded really interesting and it tasted interesting too.  It could have been so refreshing, but there was just something a little...weird...about the basil and watermelon combination.

Next came the salad.  It was a green papaya salad with carne asada, manga, and pumpkin seeds:

Also interesting, but a little too salty for me.  The toasted pumpkin seeds were a little strange too.  I felt like I should have spit out the shell (but I was too lazy to).

There's one thing that's not on the prix fixe menu.  For an additional $8, you can split an arepa with a friend:

The arepa was the best thing we had that night.  The chicken filling was super flavorful while the grilled shell was crispy and delicious.  I would've been happy with just the arepa.

The entree was an egg with salmon, grilled eggplant, and wasabi:

Kinda of anticlimactic for a main.

The dessert was a chocolate mousse with candied blood orange and raspberries:

A nice end to the meal.

At the end of the day, we weren't that impressed with Mr. Pollo.  We really wanted to be, but alas.  Love the atmosphere though.  And the arepa.

And immigration reform.


Mr. Pollo
2823 Mission St
San Francisco, CA 94110
(860) 912-9168