The Best Places in Northgate & around

1. US Coffee Championships #4 · U.S. Coffee in Good Spirits Championship · Tim Tran
2. San Francisco Chronicle The Best Coffee in the Bay Area

A smashburger shop built into a shipping container alongside Two Pitchers Brewing Co., Lovely's has a menu that reads like a love letter to drive-through nostalgia. Picnic tables and string lights fill the dog-friendly outdoor space. The fried onion burger, a riff on the Oklahoma classic George Motz made famous, cooks the patty right into thinly sliced onions so the beef fat goes everywhere it should.

1. San Francisco Chronicle Best restaurants for outdoor dining in the Bay Area
2. The Infatuation The 25 Best Restaurants In Oakland

A hot chicken shop that started as a popup and grew into an East Bay institution with a '90s aesthetic that nobody asked them to drop. The bone-in and the sandwiches are the move, and the heat scale is honest, meaning medium is a real warning and anything above it is a commitment. Complimentary comeback sauce arrives ready to talk you off the ledge. Nashville-style fried chicken done without ceremony.

1. San Francisco Chronicle Best fried chicken restaurants in the Bay Area
2. The Infatuation The 25 Best Restaurants In Oakland

The grandma slice is the reason to linger: airy crumb, crackery bottom, and a sauce that tastes like someone had strong feelings about it. Mama's Boy is a two-floor NY-style slice shop in Uptown Oakland, counter orders downstairs and a little more breathing room above. The 20-inch pies go whole or by the slice, with garlic knots and local draft to round things out. It landed at #9 on 50 Top Pizza's national slice list, which is a specific thing to brag about.

1. 50 Top Pizza #9 · 50 Top Pizza Slice USA
2. The Infatuation The 25 Best Restaurants In Oakland

Vertical spits of peppery, marinated meat looming behind the counter set the tone at this dark, industrial counter-service spot in Oakland. The shawarma comes wrapped in flour tortillas with a fierce, garlicky toum that means business. Named one of Esquire's Best New Restaurants in America, Shawarmaji has quietly shifted what Bay Area diners expect from a wrap. Order the chicken and ask for extra toum; you will not regret it.

1. Esquire #10 · The Best New Restaurants in America
2. San Francisco Chronicle Best Middle Eastern restaurants in the Bay Area

The patacones and arepas keep things recognizably Colombian, but then a labneh dip shows up alongside yuca buñuelos and the tahini slips into the leche de tigre, and you realize the kitchen is tracing the country's full range of African and Lebanese influences. This Oakland restaurant runs loud, with a playlist and colorful room to match, but the service stays warm and the food stays sharp. Not a quiet Tuesday kind of spot.

1. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant

1. James Beard Awards 2025 · Semifinalist · Outstanding Pastry Chef or Baker · Monique Feybesse
2. James Beard Awards 2026 · Semifinalist · Outstanding Pastry Chef or Baker · Monique Feybesse and Paul Feybesse

A former pop-up that found a permanent home inside Au Lounge in downtown Oakland, Chef Smelly's draws on Creole family recipes to put out Cajun-spiced seafood and soul food. Garlicky Dungeness crab and blackened shrimp anchor the menu, and the platters run large enough to qualify as a commitment. The San Francisco Chronicle named it among the Bay Area's top seafood spots. Dress accordingly: this is crab-cracking, garlic-breath, no-apologies territory.

1. San Francisco Chronicle Best seafood restaurants in the Bay Area

Tuna kitfo is the order that sets this Ethiopian bistro apart, raw minced fish in place of the usual beef, melting in a way that earns the detour to Uptown Oakland. The vegetarian platter covers the classics well, and if you make it to dessert, the teff chocolate cake is a quietly clever use of injera's starring grain. The San Francisco Chronicle named it among the Bay Area's best Ethiopian spots, which tracks.

1. San Francisco Chronicle Best Ethiopian restaurants in the Bay Area

1. San Francisco Chronicle The Best Coffee in the Bay Area

1. The Infatuation The 25 Best Restaurants In Oakland