Mozzarella Sticks in San Francisco

29 restaurants in San Francisco list mozzarella sticks on their menus. The cheapest is Sabrosa Pizza at $5.50. The typical price across town is $9.99, and the dearest we found is $18.00 at The Brixton, so the two ends of the list are $12.50 apart, which is 227% more for the same dish. Of the 29 kitchens listed, 10 charge more than a dollar under the typical price, 8 sit within a dollar of it and 11 charge more than a dollar over.

We track mozzarella sticks in 700 other areas and compare them all on mozzarella sticks across United States. The typical price there runs $9.90 at the median, so San Francisco is dearer than most of them, with a lower typical price than 266 of the 700. The lowest best price anywhere we cover is $4.00 at Master's Pizza in New York, NY, and the highest best price is $11.28 in Lake Grove, NY. The nearest area with it is Alameda, about 10 mi away, where the best price is $7.80.

Where is the cheapest mozzarella sticks in San Francisco? Sabrosa Pizza, at $5.50 on 4124 Geary Blvd. The same dish reaches $18.00 elsewhere in town, so where you order it changes the bill by $12.50.

What should mozzarella sticks cost here? About $9.99 is the typical price across the 29 kitchens in San Francisco that list it. Of the ones listed above, 10 are more than a dollar below that and 11 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 Alameda, about 10 mi away, where the best price is $7.80. That is $2.30 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.