Sam's Grill & Seafood Restaurant • 1867

The curtained booths at Sam's Grill have hosted deal-makers and seafood lovers since 1867, when the restaurant first opened in the old California Market near the end of the gold rush. Tuxedoed waiters still glide between the private partitions, delivering platters of exceptionally fresh local catch and turn-of-the-century San Francisco classics that have barely changed in over a century. Pull the curtain, order the sand dabs or Hangtown Fry, and dine exactly as the city's power brokers did generations ago.