Palapas Taco Bar

Not Mexican food, but it’s still pretty good. The salsa bar was a pain due to it being surrounded by tables and the sneeze guard being a little too low. Very sad that this place has closed.

I have a true problem with a place that offers flour tortilla chips, colored at that to accompany your meal (for a fee of course). Then you read the menu and they have thai, greek ‘burritos.’ Again even more weird. The food tastes ok and on Mondays they have free agua frescas. Oh and a burrito with the works will run you around $ 8. Ok but I’d rather go to Chipotle.

Meh, still the same.
It is not a joy to eat burritos if they are not wrapped the right way.

Adequate burritos and fusion wraps.
Fixins bar has a wide variety of salsas and condiments that look more exciting than they are.
The idea of a palapa (thatched tropical hut) in downtown San Francisco is nice. Could we have an outdoor pool and a swim-​up tequila bar too please?
It’s a much better deal before 2 when chips are self-​serve. After two they start putting everything away and it looks more and more like a convenience market looted after a natural disaster.

The food here is mediocre at best (earning a mere 2 stars), but the salsa bar is the reason why this place earns 2.5 solid stars. I would come back if I was desperate for Mexican and not willing to stand in line at Chipotle.

i guess i wasn’t expecting the lunch line set up. i thought i was going to get mexican food so i had my mind set on enchiladas… silly girl.
ordered one chicken taco, cost $ 7, already cold by the time i sat down?
it tasted good, but this place is totally watered down. the hottest salsa they have taste like tomato purée
the tortilla chips were really good tho
ps. my tummy hurts

Palapas’s food is just like dog food. It tastes just like it looks — delicious! Haha… just kidding. That was Tyrone from the Chapelle Show.
Palapas is actually not that good, but I like to go there because the chips and salsa bar are money. The burritos and tacos are pretty bland, though they are full of fresh ingredients.
The restaurant is pretty big, but it gets crowded by 12:05pm for the lunch rush, so get there before that.
Bottom line, if you want Mexican food, go to the Mission. If you’re stuck in the Financial District without enough time to BART over to the Mission, Chevy’s is probably better. But do try the chips and salsa at Palapas. 3 stars for that.
And another thing… the address listed here is wrong. It’s actually on the corner of Pine and Front, not on California St.

Is this place serious? First of all there are all these Mexican that work there but owned but some Korean dude?
At first, I didn’t like the «cafeteria» like atmosphere and when I order it LOOKED real good. As I sat down and took a bite my first reaction was, «I guess the guacamole was good» but that just covered up the dry, several days old meat that’s been sitting out. And you know the the following bites are worse then the first bite.
Seriously Mexican food is not hard to make what so ever, but leave it out over several days to «dry» out is just plain gross. I know it’s cheap but just don’t waste your time.

I’m always on a hunt for the perfect burrito, and this place only inspired me to keep looking. It has a very inefficient and odd layout — note to self: hiring schizophrenic designers is never a good idea when planning a restaurant. They try to emulate La Salsa in their exotic sauce offerings, most of which are just plain wrong. The end result was a completely forgettable lunch that doesn’t hold a candle to Alex Gourmet, my current número uno. Thanks for playing, though.

I wouldn’t say this is the best place for burritos/​tacos because I’ve never had one from Palapas.
Enchiladas Special was good one time I had it, but the Tortilla soup is what keeps me coming to this place. It’s flavorful and really hits the spot. PLUS it doesn’t take as long to make as the other stuff they have at this place.
It’s clean and has a salsa bar, so can’t complain much.

I have been here a couple of times. First off, several people I know have told me this place was good for a burrito. You are probably thinking gee weezy this woman really likes her mexican food (yep).
They have these chips that are coloful and good. The burrito’s are again huge and after 5 bites I am ready to throw in the towel. ok maybe 6 bites.
The restaurant inside is quite nice and spacious. I think at 12pm the place might get packed, however you should try and explore this place. Everyone has different taste in what they like.
I think for me I just need to explore the menu more. I think after writing some of the reviews I need to give the burrito’s a rest and go for something a little different.

I had lunch here with a colleague last week and it was just okay for me. Most Mexican restaurants were going crazy with pre-​Cinco de Mayo celebrations, but Palapas was really pretty empty. I had a burrito (mostly because I hadn’t had one in ages and was craving one). It was big so I didn’t finish it, but sometimes bigger isn’t necessarily better.

The tortilla soup is OK. I make it my lunch when it is raining and I don’t want to go further than 2 steps away from my office for lunch.
Avoid everything else. The burritos and quesadillas are disgusting.

look at your thigh.
i just ate a burrito that size from palapas.
look at your watch.
in 30 minutes, i will be dead.

This is right across from my office so when I really only have 10 minutes for lunch this is where I go and only for the tortilla soup. Many in office swear it’s the best but to my taste I would prefer more chicken flavour and less tomato, and whole avocado chunks instead of guacamole (which just gets blended into the broth).
But it’s much better than most around here and the prices are good ($ 5.25 for a bowl of soup). And if you get the soup you can cut the queue and go straight to the soup section of the counter.

This place is literally yards from my office. I really, really, really wanted it to be good. My life would be so much easier if it were. I’d been there once before and had been underwhelmed. I felt they could do better so I gave them a second chance. Now that I have, this much is certain: Like the perm I got in college, I won’t be going there again.
I went with the unfortunately named ‘Señor Peanut’ burrito. I went with the Señor because I can have peanut sauce on anything. I thought, OK, here is a burrito I can order when I’d really rather have Thai food but am too lazy or stressed to do anything other than fall out of my building and mutter ‘give me a Señor Peanut to go’. One thing they strive for here is quantity. My burrito was as big as my head and easily outweighed a Third World newborn.
My burrista had to use all of his considerable upper-​body strength to subdue the heaping ladlefuls of beans, rice and mango salsa. The chicken, not so much since there wasn’t much to deal with.
«How did you find your chicken, sir?»
«I simply looked under the mango salsa»
So, right off the bat, I have inappropriate flavors mingling together and ice cold ingredients duking it out with with tepid ones. You don’t have to be Wolfgang Puck or a Cal Physics professor to figure out how this movie comes out. You get a cold burrito.
Mango salsa and cabbage. Like George Bush in a spelling bee, they were out of place and had no hope of doing well. The whole thing didn’t work.
Even with only half of the Señor Peanut in my office wastebasket, I was concerned the janitor would hurt himself emptying so I put a sticky note on it that said ‘LIFT WITH YOUR LEGS’.
That was one big mofobo.

I like PTB. Great food– and yes it is expensive for the format served– taq style. I love the friend tortila chips — made from the flour tortillas. i love their salsitas– they have a lot of them– over a dozen. my favourite– the NM red chili salsita!
Buen Provecho!

It’s a cross between really high quality authentic Mexican and Taco Bell quality food. They have a pretty good salsa selection and a very friendly staff.
I’d recommend any of their burritos. The tacos are alright, they would be better if they were actually homemade style corn torillas.
Just remember, they only take cash.

Bizarro burrito served with bizarro non-​crispy chips. A competitor to Chipotle and a small step up from Taco Bell. Skip it and head to Mixt Greens or Sellers Market instead.

The tortilla soup is pretty damn good. It has veggies and chicken broth and it’s a good cold day soup. Everything else is sub-​par.
There are almost always cute guys in suits here. People seem to have a lot of group lunches here becuse there’s a lot of seating. Perfect for guy watching.
So go and get a bowl of tortilla soup but becareful to not spill a spoonfull of soup down your chin as you watch the men parade in.