French Fries in San Francisco

25 restaurants in San Francisco list french fries on their menus. The cheapest is Cholita Linda at $4.75. The typical price across town is $6.99, and the dearest we found is $13.30 at Bernal Heights Pizzeria, so the two ends of the list are $8.55 apart, which is 180% more for the same dish. Of the 25 kitchens listed, 7 charge more than a dollar under the typical price, 10 sit within a dollar of it and 8 charge more than a dollar over.

We track french fries in 498 other areas and compare them all on french fries across United States. The typical price there runs $6.49 at the median, so San Francisco is dearer than most of them, with a lower typical price than 119 of the 498. The lowest best price anywhere we cover is $4.00 at Big Tony's Pizza II in Chicago, IL, and the highest best price is $7.50 in Seaford, NY. The nearest area with it is Oakland, about 12 mi away, where the best price is $5.99.

Where is the cheapest french fries in San Francisco? Cholita Linda, at $4.75 on Ferry Building 1 Ste 44. The same dish reaches $13.30 elsewhere in town, so where you order it changes the bill by $8.55.

What should french fries cost here? About $6.99 is the typical price across the 25 kitchens in San Francisco that list it. Of the ones listed above, 7 are more than a dollar below that and 8 are more than a dollar above, so the typical price is a middle rather than a floor.

Is it cheaper nearby? The nearest area we track it in is Oakland, about 12 mi away, where the best price is $5.99. That is $1.24 more than the best price here.

Why do the prices differ so much? We compare what each menu calls the same dish, and menus are not identical: portion, cut, sides and the kind of room you are sitting in all ride on the price, and none of that shows up in a number. Part portions and half sizes are kept out of this comparison, and a chain charging the same at several addresses is counted once, so the spread above is between genuinely different kitchens rather than the same one repeated.