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Categories: Seafood Markets, Farmers Market
Neighborhood: MissionWe now have live lobster on special for only $8.99 per lb. Get our fresh catch before its gone!
Mon-Sat. 9:30 a.m. - 6:00 p.m.
Sun. 10:00 a.m. - 5:00 p.m.
I like it a lot, a real lot. It's like fishing in hopes of catching something in the deep blue ocean, except I know you will catch something so the game is twice as fun. I browse up and down the murky isles, taking in all of the latest catch laid out across the ice. Halibut, salmon, talapia, scallops, muscles, shrimp...I want you all. How will I decide - oh wait, you are all so cheap I can taste you all.
Best seafood market I've been to in SF, especially for the value. 2 - 1.5lb lobsters + 1 - 2+lb Dungeness Crab (out of local season so more expensive) totaled $38. A-MAZING. I would have knocked off a half or maybe 1 whole star for only having previously frozen sushi grade fish, however, the directed us to their other store Basa Seafood Express on 24th and Folsom for sashimi. I stopped by there at 2pm today and they said that the sashimi would not be in until 4pm because the guy was still cleaning the fish. At least I know my tuna tartare will be fresh!
They have all kinds of shellfish and filets but I was a little disappointed to see people buying their frozen shrimp there. That's just silly. Anyway, this place is fresh and cheap and I LOVE it.
This is a good fish monger. At first, I was intimidated by all the varieties of fish, and stayed pretty much with the ready cut filets, until I saw some fella getting three red snapper dressed down. I now venture over to the whole fishies for purchase.
So prolly 4x cheaper than bi-rite, and twice as cheap as whole foods. I had a huge catfish dinner for less than 3 bucks. I going back today for somefin new.
late afternoon time it can get a wee smelly, but overall, this place is really clean.
what a GREAT discovery by my housemate
OYSTERS... FRESH. SWEET. CHEAP
I LOVE IT!
With many different types of oysters (my favorite are the blue point ones) at around 65 CENTS each, less if you buy in bulk, all you need is some cocktail sauce, lemon, tobassco, ponzu sauce, and green onions and there is officially NO NEED to ever go to happy hour for oysters. Happy hour at the comfort of your own home. Whoo-Hoo!!!
Giving this market anything less than a five is ridiculous... and that fool who gave it a 3 should be banned.
They had 7 types of fresher than fresh oysters that were all amazing as well as inexpensive. The fish was amazing the lobster was sweet, the dungeness crab delectable.
The prices are great. I just can't say enough good things about this fish market. It makes me sad that I don't have one near where I live :(
This place is awesome. Great prices and great quality seafood. When I pickup fish from here, they always do a great job in descaling, degutting and beheading. :)
Also, the fishmongers and fishwives are so nice and friendly!
Fish heads, fish heads, rolly polly fish heads
Fish heads, fish heads, eat them up. Yum!
I actually came here for Salmon steaks, not fish heads, but was pleasantly surprised at the quality and prices of the fish. I've been to another fish market on Mission street and was in tears after cooking some very fishy fish. Ew.
I am placing 4 stars because I need to come back and try more catch.
Did not seem as clean on my last visit. A big deal to me. Seafood still great... just not as confident.
Best seafood market we have found thus far in Fresh, clean and a great value.
I couldn't have been happier with what I found at Sun Fat. Yeah, Mission parking in the 20's is horrible, but you can find a meter and the service is fast and efficient so 15 minutes should suffice.
Was making frutti di mare spaghetti for 2 so I only needed a *little* of *everything*. The woman who helped me was friendly and made sure I didn't get more or less than I wanted of any ingredient. 1/2 lb small scallops, 1/2 lb deveined med shrimp, 1/2 lb mussels, 1/2 lb Manila clams, grand total $12.11. Yes, that's right. And that quantity could easily feed 4 hungry people. Super delicious and fresh and let me reiterate what other have said the place is really clean too no fishy smell or old dead fish!
Next catfish fry, crab boil, garlic mussel, seared ahi, or surf and turf meal I make starts with a trip to Sun Fat.
Now thats what I'm talkin about! Ive been looking for a good reliable source of fresh seafood for quite some time now. I always pictured, living in a city like this, having bayside fish markets with fisherman choppin heads off in a frenzy and throwing fish through the air into a waxed brown paper wrapper, into your hands, for next to nothing. For some reason, its not like that here, but Sun Fat's is as close as you can get at least.
The fast paced, friendly, and high volume (which usually means its very fresh) business done here is how it should be when it comes to seafood. Great selection, service and prices will keep me coming back over and over. Next purchase...oysters!!! (very cheap and seemingly very fresh..ill report back later.
I'll just briefly add to the massive number of other 5 star reviews. Excellent selection, great quality and super nice people who are very helpful.
The nicest Chinese guys selling the freshest fish. I was so happy when I found octopus. Why American stores don't sell octopus? It should be imposed by law :). I'm going to come here very often.
Really nice people.
Good quality for not too expensive. I left with 4 pieces of salmon (about 5-6 oz.) for less than $15. As a first timer, I had even come in here, looked around, ran across the street to Mission Meat Market, and come back because the quality, freshness, and presentation looked so much better at Sun Fat.
They had a great selection, although no wild salmon like I wanted; had to settle for the farmed :( All kinds of shrimp, octopus, scallops, mussels, clams, etc. It was also nice that when I took my salmon out of the package later that evening to cook, there was nary a stinky fish smell to be had. Freshness. They skinned in for me too.
My only complaint was that there was kind of no organization in the way they were taking orders and ringing people up. It was hard to tell where to stand and who had already been served. A better line-forming/ringing up station would be great.
Overall I would definitely come back and get some good quality fish at a great price!
Cheap and friendly meets clean and fresh. Magical. What else does one need from a seafood store?
Sensitive souls not advised: they chop up live crabs in plain sight.
there's a pretty good selection of a variety of fish and seafood at this place... it all looks pretty clean and fresh too which was a surprise as you wouldn't really think there would be much fresh seafood in this area.
was pretty convenient when i used to live just blocks away
the mission is truly such a convenient place to live without having to rely on a car for all your needs
I feel that adding my review would be superfluous among all these raves, because I too have only the best to say of Sun Fat Seafood Company. But, let me add my own inside vision into this great resource for fresh seafood: If you need to make a seafood or fish stock, go toward the back. There are pieces of salmon tail, or head or catfish pieces that are extremely inexpensive and there's nothing like using these "throw-away" parts for starting a great seafood stew or chowder.
Then also, they will totally clean the crabs for you. You'll pay for the whole crab, but will just bring home the legs and chamber parts. A lot of Asians will buy them whole, alive, and kicking because we have a jones for the crab butter that you find inside the shell after it's been steamed or boiled... an acquired taste, indeed. Some dishes will call for this butter to be mixed in with curry for a crab curry dish.
They'll have fresh live crayfish from time to time: steam or boild them and suck they little heads, bite they tiny tails.
Also periwinkles... Periwinkles! These are sea snails that are also steamed or boiled and are picked out of their shells with toothpicks and dipped in garlic, parsley and butter a la escargot bourgogne.
Two dozen mussels will cost you less than $5 and you can whip up an inexpensive mussels fra diavolo (marinara sauce with a lot of red pepper flakes added) and linguine pasta. A great inexpensive dinner for two.
This place is one of San Francisco's great neighborhood treasures! The only challenge is parking but you can get over that if you have a friend drive with you and have them circle the block a couple of times.
So far, 2 for 2. This is the best seafood place I've been to yet in SF. Not only do they have a great selection with great prices, but the people are very helpful and friendly.
The first time I bought some whole fish, but didn't have enough ice in my cooler, so they through in some dry ice packages for free. Tonight we got some oysters and they have us a fresh one for free to taste on the spot.
No reason to buy seafood anywhere else.
I craved crabs.
I yelped.
I came to Sun Fat.
I sucked my crabs hard the day after I recovered from my stomach flu.
Yummmmm!!!!!!
Forget about Fisherman's wharf. It's for the tourists who know nothing about the city aside from their guide book.
When I got there, the lovely cutie crabs are swimming in 2 huge tanks of clear water. I asked the guy to grab one for me, he did, an energetic babe indeed. I paied $16.00 for a damned big crab that kinda scared me, someone who's never dealt with a crab that's alive.
When I got home, I boiled a big pot of water. When I tore the paper bag that has the crab open, the crab was still moving, my roommate screamed. I slowly slided the babe into the pot of boiling water, boiled it for 20 minutes. At the same time I made a dipping sauce that my mom always made for crabs. Here's how:
1 tbsp grated ginger (use the ginger grater, not the cheese grater)
1 tbsp asian rice vinegar
1 tbsp sugar
I dumped them all in a food processor, which made the texture kinda weird, but it tastes just right.
Awesome crab!! So meaty, so sweet, so much juice! And the shell was so easy to break that I finished it up without any utensils!! My teeth are more than enough.
I like Saskia's review:"They're fresh and they don't have to put "Fresh" on their sign. Because if you have to say it, it probably isn't true." I went into the other store just across the street to Sun Fat, YUCK!! The crabs there were swimming in this brown colored tank of water, and fish lying around your ankle level.
Sun Fat is the best. Dungeness Crabs are awesome!!
This is by far one of the best sea food markets I've ever been to.
I came here many times while I lived in San Francisco to get fresh fish for dinner and it was always so fresh and so tasty. The service is excellent. There is never a wait and plenty of different types of seafood to choose from. Much cleaner and healthier than a fish market not far away in my opinion.
Once I came in and there was a guy ordering fish that had a parrot just chilling on his shoulder. I thought, "What a well behaved parrot!" I would think it would like to have some fish for dinner. Only in San Francisco eh?
Several cool things to watch are how they butcher the fishies. They will gut it for you and you can watch as they do it on the counter right there. CREEPY! They also sell the crabs to you live so they are much fresher when you get home. I once saw the salesperson put one in a bag for a lady and I thought how creepy it would be to feel it wriggling on the way home.
If you like it fresh or fresher than the normal fresh. This is the place to come!
Oh and their salmon is to die for!!!!
Friendly & efficient service at great prices. Staff will guide you all the way if you're a bit of a seafood novice & will gut/fillet any fish. Tiny bit pricer than Mission Meat kitty korner from here but well worth it, with a wider selection as well.
My mom and I bought 4 dungeness crabs here for half the price you would find anywhere else. We prepared it in the oven with plenty of garlic and butter. It was New Years Night. My dad made a toast to us with cheap champagne that made me cry. Even though I've never told him this, he is my hero.
That night, we eat. A lot.
Sun Fat is the best seafood distributor in the city in my estimate. They're Chinese/Vietnamese, so they reserved the best crabs cuz my momma told them so. She is also my hero. Love her.
5 stars.
* I'll try to be funny in my next review.
Sun Fat Seafood (not to be confused with the old Wang Fat Seafood at 18th and Mission that used to smell like a Marseilles prostitute) is now one of my favorite Mission stops. Part of my weekly routine now consists of hitting Sun Fat and loading up on a cornucopia of seafood bounty--fish, shrimp, oysters, scallops, mussels, crabs, and more; then I pick up some nice limes, avocados, cilantro, and tomatoes from one of the many vegetable stores on the way home; and treat myself to some tangy ceviche to die for, a little broiled snapper with basil, and impress the ladies with some pan-seared scallops with tequila lime sauce and jicama. (or something like that...)
The bottom line is their selection is great, the seafood fresh, and the prices low. $20 provides enough fresh seafood for the week. I haven't checked my mercury levels yet, but until then, ignorance is bliss! Oh, and sushi-grade ahi! Yummy! (and affordable)
Wow, my friend grabbed some oysters from here, and they were delicious!! I've had oysters at restaurants, but they don't compare to the fresh ones that you shuck yourself. (My friend did the shucking, luckily, but the work was worth it!) I'm definitely going back for other seafood soon! They oysters were inexpensive and delicious!
BUWWHAHAHHA ok, a more sober reedit
this is a hard review for me to write.
my boy, fish boy, has been my boy for decades. seafood center on clements, his father opened that place years ago. since then, the father has moved onto much bigger things but the seafood center still is in *the family*.
ive spent a life time with this guy. been buddys since i had hair and he was skinny. his older sister and auntie are friends with my sister and i JUST found out they are also friends with salty, who is also friends with some other buddies from a life time ago, but thats another story.
this seafood buddy of mines, he provided the seafood for JAM OUT WITH YOUR CLAM OUT.
that mofos got me king crab crab legs delivered to a house in chitown when i needed it.
that being said...
i hesitantly write this review of sun fat
parking sucks here.
yes, they are very friendly and helpful
cheap
good selection of whatever is available fresh.
will this be my new number one seafood joint?............. no
bloods thicker than water
yeah.... gotta keep in the fams yo
simple. im still a seafood center on clement guy.
but yeah if yous not asshole like me, this place rocks. no doubt, come here for good shit.
fyi they dont carry live spot prawns.
I love this place because it's clean and the service is really friendly.
I take tourist friends/family here. "This," I say, grandly, "Is where I get my fishstuffs."
They rarely have any idea that such a place can exist without an accompanying supermarket.
As much as piles of dead fish go, Sun Fat has drop dead sexy dead fish. Dishes I've made from their ingredients have gotten me laid enough that I suspect them of selling date rape fish, but my survival instincts keep me from checking that out too closely.
There's another Sun Fat in Oaktown, and it's even better, but I keep forgetting how to cross the bridge. I hear BART goes there, but I don't believe rumors.
All the little pink bags....
So the guy grabs a twitchy thing with opal eyeballs and clubs it over the head. The number on the scale jabbers around. Watching this kind of death-for-dinner is as close as you're gonna get to living how most of the world lives for a LONG ass time, so WATCH closely.
That said, Sun Fat has all little fishes and bottom feeders you could want, including those creepy crab tanks. The proprietor and his white-smocked SWAT team are all business, scooping up the slithery stuff and charging very little.....plus it's called Sun Fat.
After leaving the mission 8 months ago, this is the one store that I miss the most. They always have the same stuff that Bi-Rite sells, at a fraction of the cost, plus 10x's more selection. My favorite picnic activity is to grab a bunch of $.75 Oysters and take them up to Dolores with a bottle of Tapatio and a lemon from one of the neighboring mexi-marts. Or you can pick up some cheap whitefish, then goto a mexi-mart and get a can of beans, tortillas and an avocado and make some quick fish tacos at home.
As noted above, they close at a quarter to 6.
I love this place. The prices are incredibly competitive. The selection is pretty good, but it could use more fresh never frozen seafood. There are a decent number of whole fish that they will clean for you at no charge, I always keep the heads so I can eat the cheeks!!
The staff and service are expedient and professional, which I much appreciate from my local fishmonger.
The real bargain is their live seafood; which includes several varieties of crabs and clams, as well as lobsters, muscles, and oysters.
This is the only place I buy my seafood, unless its from a fisherman on the docks.
I could wax poetic with an anecdotes, but since you're reading a lot of these, here's all you need to know, in order of importance:
1. The delectable sea creatures purchased here were undoubtedly swimming in their natural habitats the day before, totally oblivious to their grim (but delicious) demise. FRESHEST EVER.
2. The hard working, down-and-dirty staff are super helpful, but also friendlier than the most jolly of fisherman.
3. Prices are AMAZING. Example: sashimi grade tuna @ $10 a lb, fanny bay oysters at $0.65 a piece.
I don't plan on ever buying fish anywhere else, ever again. Ever. (Except maybe Zushi Puzzle.)
STOP READING! GO THERE NOW!
My go to spot for seafood. A great variety all reasonably price. Yes, it's a fish market but it is very clean and so are the fish compared to let's say the places in Chinatown. In fact, I always thought fish markets were all grungy and smelly until I came here and was astonished.
Bike Parking: no designated bike parking, I usually chain my bike near 23rd & Mission.
Excellent seafood at great prices! I got some excellent service when selecting a variety of live oysters for a tasty snack for me and the gf.
Best seafood shop - better than anything I've seen on Clement, Irving, or Chinatown. You can probably get better pre-cut fillets/pieces of fish at Whole Food or other fancy food places - but you are probably paying at least double.
The shop is always clean and never smells 'fishy'. The folks who work there are fantastic - friendly, helpful, fast. The other day, we were doing hot pot at home and went down there to get seafood. I was about to buy a red snapper to fillet but my wife asked the fishmonger. He recommended a live catfish - I'd never thought about catfish for hotpot - but hey, what the hell. They did a nice fillet job and we had delicious catfish for the hotpot!
I digress.
The quality of the seafood has been excellent, as is the value. Throw in the nice service and the cleaniess of the shop, no reason to go anywhere else.
One of my two go-to places (check my groceries list for the other) for fresh, great, affordable seafood in SF and I cannot believe I have not reviewed them sooner.
Sun Fat is fabulous-- they carry a wide range of fish and particularly shine in their variety of whole fish and shrimp. (Finally! a sustainably-raised alternative to the ubiquitous tiger prawns). The best place to purchased live crabs in SF as well as a deep selection of oysters, clams, and mussels.
Everyone working there is super-nice and is happy to prep your fish in any way you request. And, they even accept credit cards.
They also stock a good selection of seasoning for a clam-bake-- Old Bay, Creole Mustard, etc.
Can't say a bad word about them...
I'm Chinese...so you don't even have to tell me about the asian fish markets. Freshest fish in town for half the price as Whole Foods (what are you doing shopping in a chain anyway?) I used to go out to the Sunset Super, but Sun Fat feels even fresher (and besides, it's closer to my new place...I'm nothing if not lazy). I got some gorgeous shrimp here for $5.99 a pound. The whole time I was looking around at what I'd be buying next time: cleaned squid, live crabs, beautiful wild salmon. The mind boggles.
On the other end of the spectrum, I was in Oakland Chinatown the other day and there were dead fish floating in the tank of the grocery store I wandered into. What gives?
Just wanted to add my voice to the chorus! These guys are so sweet--had the same situation as Jeff L, just squeezing through the gate. They apologized for not being able to scale our fish, even though they were doing us a favor!
Delicious fish, good prices, couldn't be run by nicer people.
When I stopped by to pick up some sea bass, they were out, but that was my fault for getting there late. But what I found appeared to be fresh, the place was clean, and the staff was friendly. What else could you possibly want from a fresh fish market? Works for me.
Too bad it's across town, otherwise I'd be down there more often. Parking in the Mission is also a major drag, so plan ahead if you're driving.
Fast, friendly, efficient service and GREAT quality to match the price. You MUST go!
Get your Dungeness crabs there, for $uper cheap and they clean 'em for you in under 30 seconds!
This place confuses me. Do you really want cheap fish?
Absolutely gross but gritty and somewhat charming, this place would fit in perfectly in China town. On mission street, it just stands out in the long line of discount and dollar stores.
I trusted you yelpers and decided to buy mussels there, shrimp too. I didn't get sick and the staff was super friendly, so until I see differently, I am going to say go for it.
This place epitomizes what I love about San Francisco. You walk in and you're not in a store, you're in these guys's workshop. There's no fancy displays, no dedicated cashiers, just a bunch of real friendly guys working on the fish, and you just walk right up and chat with them until you've figured out what you want. I almost wanted to ask if I could stick around and help...it looked more fun than going back to the office.
Even though I don't live that close to the Mission, this is still my #1 seafood shop.
Neighborhood: Mission
Category: Seafood Markets
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Category: Seafood Markets
Neighborhood: Mission
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