Dating back to the mid-18th century, San Francisco's Chinatown may be the nation's best-known Chinese-American enclave. In addition to the fabulously exotic foodstuffs—live turtles and frogs, Asian vegetables, even armadillos—on display at purveyors, you'll find a bewildering array of restaurants, many of them extremely reasonably priced.

A tip:
Some Asian restaurateurs aren't fluent in English, so exercise patience and understanding.  

R & G Lounge
631B Kearny Street
(415) 982-7877
Lunch, dinner
One of San Francisco's better regional Chinese restaurants, and a mecca for connoisseurs of authentic Cantonese cuisine.

Bow Hon
850 Grant Avenue
(415) 362-0601
Breakfast, lunch, dinner
The menu of this Formica-and-linoleum-lined gem is a mile long, with everything from rice plates to noodle soups to sand dabs.

Dol Ho
808 Pacific Ave
(415) 392-2828
Breakfast, lunch
The clientele is almost exclusively Chinese, but everyone who enters is given a warm welcome and a vacant (if not entirely clean) chair.

Golden Flower Restaurant
667 Jackson Street
(415) 433-6469
Breakfast, lunch, dinner
Perpetually packed, this Vietnamese restaurant does a brisk business ladling out steaming bowls of pho.

Hing Lung
674 Broadway
(415) 398-8838
Breakfast, lunch, dinner
Most people come here for the juk, a sort of rice gruel that's made with meat, fish or other goodies.

House of Nanking
919 Kearny Street
(415) 421-1429
Lunch, dinner
Though often derided by locals, the perpetual line out the door tells a different story.

My Canh
626 Broadway
(415) 397-8888
Lunch, dinner
Little more than a storefront on a busy stretch of Broadway in the heart of Chinatown, My Canh boasts a mere six or seven tables and minimal decor.

Yank Sing
427 Battery Street
(415) 781-1111
Lunch, weekend dim sum brunch
Yank Sing is sometimes so packed the management suggests patrons trek south to its Stevenson Street location—or settle in for a long wait.

You's Dim Sum
675 Broadway
(415) 788-7028
Breakfast, lunch, dinner
Excellent dim sum and other regional Chinese specialties in a typically nondescript dining room.