Few People Know That San Francisco Is The Birthplace Of The Iconic Dish - Cioppino
By Lysa Allman-Baldwin|Published July 19, 2022
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Lysa Allman-Baldwin
Author
For over 25 years Lysa Allman-Baldwin has fed her wanderlust for “everything the world has to offer” by passionately writing travel and feature articles for numerous global print and online publications. A Digital Nomad, Lysa is also a professional speaker, workshop facilitator, and author.
San Francisco is synonymous with amazing food. From Italian to French, Chinese, Greek, Mediterranean, Vegan, Seafood, and more, you will definitely find and love it here. But few people know the city is the birthplace of the iconic dish – Cioppino. The history of this iconic dish dates back to the late 1800s when there were scores of Italian immigrants living in the city’s North Beach neighborhood and working as fishermen on the bay. Come along as we explore five San Francisco restaurants that serve some of the best cioppinos on the planet!
Depending on which historical account you follow, a few different individuals have been credited with first creating the dish.
Cioppino came about not so much as a desire to create a fantastic dish, rather as a way to make the best use of the leftover seafood from their daily catches as a meal while they were out on the water. Years later, when many Italian restaurants were established here, the dish carried over to those kitchens, eventually becoming the iconic dish that it is today.
Nevertheless, the basic elements of cioppino are Dungeness crab, squid, clams, shrimp mussels, scallops, calamari, and some kind of fish, again, all depending on the leftovers from the catch of the day. All of it is then added to a tomato-based broth add loads of savory seasonings then simmered until it becomes a stew. Add some crusty garlic bread and you’ve got yourself an outstanding, hearty, seafood meal.
One of the most popular places to get a bowl of piping hot cioppino is Scoma’s Restaurant.
The enterprise has two locations, the first opened in 1965 in San Francisco’s Fisherman’s Wharf District as a coffee shop also selling great sandwiches and seafood, then eventually becoming a restaurant. The menu took off and it a second location was added in 1969 just across the bay as Scoma's Sausalito.
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Founded in the 1920s (and undergoing a few different names in the early years), Tadich Grill is the oldest, continuously run restaurant in California, and the third oldest in the country.
The cioppino here is nothing sort of nirvana and has been a part of this landmark restaurant’s classic European bistro-style fare menu since the very beginning.
Family-owned and operated for over three decades, the Fog Harbor Fish House is one of the top-rated restaurants in the city.
The cioppino here is one of their crowd-pleasing house specialties, and is made with crab, fresh fish, shrimp, clams, and mussels. The icing on the cake is the fresh, hot, baked in-house (every hour!) sourdough bread for dipping into the savory broth.
Woodhouse Fish Co. is another popular cioppino standout with both locals and tourists.
Also featuring two locations, one on Market St. between 14th and 15th Streets, the other on Fillmore St. between Pine and Bush, they use mussels, clams, cod, crab, prawns, and scallops in their delicious version.
Pier Market Seafood Restaurant takes its cioppino one step further, serving it over pasta.
Established in 1983, the restaurant offers a casual fish-market dining experience, earning it numerous accolades including "Best Seafood in San Francisco."
An honorable mention definitely goes out to Alioto’s Restaurant. For over 90 years it was a landmark on Fisherman’s Wharf serving up the most amazing Sicilian family recipes. Their cioppino was among the best. Sadly it did not survive the pandemic and closed permanently, but it will always be remembered as one of the first restaurants to offer this iconic dish to the world.
Have you had the cioppino at any of these outstanding San Francisco restaurants? If so, we’d love to see your photos and hear about your experiences there.
