Another day, another restaurant opens up in the city's whimsical Mission District. But wait! This one should be super keen, or so we're told. Chef Thomas McNaughton and chef de cuisine Michael Gaines' (sous chef at Manresa) new joint, Central Kitchen, has been described as an "upscale spinoff" of McNaughton's Flour + Water. Located at Florida and 20th Street, it promises to be gritty and quote the feast. And yet so much more. Each item is somewhere under the $30 range. Which? Is still very pricey, we get it. However, it costs money to make good (nay, great!) food. more ›

At least 37 were displaced over the weekend after a four-alarm fire tore through a Victorian on Valencia and Duboce just before 10 a.m. on Sunday. The residential building is located across the street from noted bar, Zeitgeist. "A total of 30 adults and 7 children were displaced by the blaze," reports SF Appeal. "All of those people have either been provided housing for the night or made their own arrangements." more ›

You guys, the Valencia swing is back! And this time it comes affixed with streamers! What fun. Mission Mission has been chronicling the plight of the swing on Valencia Street ever since a kindhearted soul strung it up last December. Then, like Maleficent swooping in on a hot party, a kooky neighborhood local cut it down, screeching, "This isn’t a playground." It went back up again a month later, this time with steel cables. Alas, that one was also pruned by the anti-fun police, aka a city official. But, ha, now it's back! For how long? Who can say. It's probably being brutally torn down right now. However, that shouldn't stop you from erecting a swing in your own neighborhood. more ›

Fitting for the Mission District, the Sycamore is serving up the Yuppie Burger today. And it sounds really top drawer. Via their Facebook page, the Sycamore boasts: "Today's Burger Special is the Yuppie Burger - sauteed mushrooms, goat cheese, caramelized onions, and roasted garlic aioli - with fries and a PBR or soda for $12." For $12? more ›

A sewage spill blanketed the inner Mission with a faint sent of fecal matter this morning. Pipes overflowed due to last night's rain. Ew. Gross. According to KRON 4 Morning News, the scene at 2100 Folsom is "stinky," but has since been cleaned up. Firefighters, Department of Public Works crews, and neighbors helped wipe up the mess. more ›

Roland Pouncy, the man accused of strangling Richard Sprague to death back in February, has pled not guilty to the murder and robbery charges in court today. more ›

Have you been out in the Mission lately? Did the bars seem crowded to you? They did to Mission Local, who discovered that Blondie's on Valencia — always a popular place to get an obscenely large and watery martini — was blowing their Fire Marshall-issued maximum capacity of 49 people by about 100 people on a recent busy night. But according to the Fire Department, it's not their job to do headcounts at these smaller establishments. more ›

On Mission Street last night, an apparently stolen car ended up crashing right in to the front gate of Casa Guadalupe Produce Market near the intersection with 26th Street. According to witnesses on the scene, the car was occupied by three "youngsters" attempting to pull some stunts in the middle of Mission street around 10 p.m. Neighborhood blogger OMGtheMish fills us in on what happened: more ›

Last night at Charles Phan's Wo Hing General Store in the Mission, scads of gastronomes and food writers met at Zagat SF's 30 Under 30 party. What is 30 Under 30, you ask? Well, it's a list concocted by Zagat's editorial team highlighting Bay Area chefs, bartenders, restaurateurs and other industry types under the age of 30. Here are seven shots we snapped at last night's bash that, more or less, captured the essence of our night. more ›

On Sunday, 22-year-old Danielle Walker from, Tiburon allegedly threw a Jack Russell Terrier out a third-story window. SF Appeal reports, "SFPD officers responded at 1:34 p.m. Sunday to a report of animal cruelty in the 100 block of Albion Street, which is between 15th and 16th Streets." more ›

La Cocina's 2012 San Francisco Street Food Festival will be held this summer on August 18th, from 11AM - 7PM in the Mission District. The annual event raises cash for the non-profit's incubator program which helps provide our fine city with amazing food at reasonable prices. This year's festivities will include 33 micro-vendors along with 40 owner-operated restaurants and the usual packed crowd. Get there early!
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Mission Bicycle recently unveiled via Facebook a bicycle for children named after the area's neighboring 'hood, Noe Valley (a neighborhood stereotypically teeming with families and lesbians and lesbians with families) called "The Noe." Cute, right? Well, according to the Mission Bicycle employe SFist spoke with today, it's a joke. Said employee claimed it was a potshot at poor, innocent Noe Valley. Heh. Then again, the Mission District also bubbles over with, dare we say, native Latino kids residing in many, many parts of the Mission. But that's... well, it's not something any self-respecting Zeitgeist-going, Brian Wilson beard-growing, Tartine-queuing young adult chooses to think about too much. Kills the magic, you know? more ›

On Saturday night, Joe Payne captured this shot of a fire hydrant geyser shooting water into the air like it just didn't care. Wee! The scene happened on Folsom and 20th in the Mission District. Mission Mission has some choice shots of the blast as well. Oh, and check out video footage, shot and edited by Michael Gondry, below. more ›

Ah, yes. Now, this is the kinda of graffiti we like: bold with a dash of guilt and a hint of self-awareness. Friend of SFist Pete Cat came across this gem while lollygagging in the city's Mission District Friday night. Some rapscallion wrote on a brick wall (a canvas notoriously difficult for building owners to erase), but left such a cheeky (and French, if we may say) spray of graffiti that one can't get that mad at it. Adorable, really. Adorable. more ›

Another small, independent record shop bites the dust. Force of Habit, the little punk shop at 3565 20th Street (at Lexington) appears to be on its way to closing as SFist finds that a new restaurant/café is moving in called 20 Spot. Force of Habit owner "Braindead" Dave Devereaux died last July at the age of 41 of unexplained causes. At the time, his family said they hoped to sell the shop and the online record business to someone who would keep it open, and a Save Force of Habit campaign launched to aid the effort. But it seems that was not meant to be. more ›

SFPD announced Friday night that they have arrested a 32-year-old suspect wanted in connection with three Mission District sexual assaults. Acting on anonymous tips from the community, San Francisco Police Officers arrested their suspect at Cesar Chavez and Treat Street. Investigators from the special victims unit linked the suspect to the attacks using the previously released surveillance footage and physical evidence from the crime scenes. more ›

If these two recent crime reports are any indication, the transition to 2012 was a stabby one for San Francisco. In less than a week, arguments over the price of crack cocaine and the outcome of a Mission District soccer match ended in unfortunate stabbings. more ›

Posh tech cafe The Summit will close its doors on January 28. Decried by some as a "masturbatory business fantasy," the creatively-minded Valencia Street space served coffee and pastries to "free thinkers, craftsmen, artisans, entrepreneurs, and the public." Only Blue Bottle, Ritual, or Four Barrel trained baristas were asked to apply for a gig at the "democratically-priced" cafe. more ›

A little after 8 p.m. on Wednesday night, a four-door Toyota sedan hit a cyclist riding at 17th and Valencia streets. "The full extent of the bicyclist's injuries was not immediately known," reports BCN (via SF Examiner). "[T]he victim was in pain but conscious and talking when emergency crews took him to the hospital." more ›

A group of Occupyists protesting Mission evictions on Saturday afternoon wrongly accused Tacolicious and its owner, Joe Hargrave, a small-business owner of evildoings. Brimming with Tea Party-like fervor, hope and confusion, "hundreds" of Occupy ilk (some of whom recently re-located to San Francisco and the Mission themselves) converged outside the Valencia Street location take action against evictions in the Mission. The group claimed that Tacolicioius, a noted restaurant serving titular tacos and more, wanted to evict the building at 739-741 Valencia. Problem is that Tacolicious doesn't own the building. They can't evict anyone. They don't want to evict anyone. more ›

Police are on the hunt after an early Friday morning sexual assault and beating in San Francisco's Mission District. Sometime between 3 a.m, and 4 a.m., a man followed a woman walking on 24th Street from South Van Ness to Portreo Avenue. When he finally approached his victim, he demanded money. When she didn't give him any, he took her to another location. That's when things got ugly. more ›