Bob’s Broiler

Another one bites the dust, Bob’s is no more. CLOSED. But don’t worry this place is not related to Bob’s Donuts on the same block.
I never liked this place, not just because of how dirty it was or the subpar diner food. Like some people would say, the place gave me the heebie-​jeebies: because the layout reminded me of the Pinecrest Diner (another place I’ll never set a foot in), which is famous for a SF murder more than 10 years ago — waitress shot by the short order cook, after arguing about an order of poached eggs. The cook died later in prison from a brain tumor (might explain his actions).

Basic menu items at this greasy spoon diner, such as burger and fries or french dip, are satisfying but too expensive for what you get and the quality. Actually witnessed waitress cough into her hand and serve a plate of food to a patron WITHOUT washing her hands.
ATTN: Bob’s has been sold!!! New owners are now renovating the inside. Word on the street is that they are going to keep it as a diner.
Hopefully, they’ll read these reviews and learn from the previous owner’s mistakes.

Fancy it’s not. Health food it’s not. But for good simple diner fare Bob’s Broiler is really good.
If you’re looking for fancy, healthy, or gluten-​free, why the hell are you going to a place called «Bob’s Broiler» ??
For what it is, Bob’s is the bomb. And inexpensive.

EXPENSIVE poor quality food. Everything is cooked in soybean oil. I ordered a plate of eggs, hash browns, sausage, and bacon. No toast since I’m gluten intolerant. Coffee on the side.
The hash browns taste like water. The sausage is some weird stuff not palatable to American tastes. The bacon, all 2 slices of it, is dry and bland. The poached eggs have VINEGAR in them. What is vinegar doing in my eggs???
The service is extremely slow, and there are more employees than customers.
I couldn’t eat the hash browns, but managed to down most of the rest. So I’m pretty unsatisfied and definitely not full, but I’m sure I can recover from this bad experience. Until the bill. The total? $ 17. what what what??? Truth be told, I’d be willing to pay this much for high quality and tasty food, but this stuff is garbage, and probably cost them less than $ 1 to prepare!
I try to argue about the bill to no avail. I got probably about 1 breakfast platter’s worth of food, but I got billed the price of 2 breakfasts. It came out to $ 7 base, $ 4 add hash browns, $ 3 add sausage. And this is with skipping the bread.
So what do I do? I leave without tipping. They sure as hell got their money’s worth already. I don’t think I’ve ever before left a waiter-​ed place without tipping in my whole life!

After passing by Dottie’s with a line out the door in the rain in a sea of umbrellas, my friend and I were like «oh hell no» and I wasn’t trying to get wet so we decided to go elsewhere. Luckily my friend knew of this place that he used to go to with his Dad when he was little. I agreed so he can get in reminiscent mode.
It’s a nice little cozy spot on the corner of Polk and Sacramento and was very comfortable and clean. The server was pretty informal and was even talking on his cell phone while serving customers, but it didn’t bother anybody. This seemed more like a neighborhood diner, but I wouldn’t mind driving the distance and look for parking to eat here.
I looked on the white board and saw their many daily specials which all looked good and mainly consisted of different omelettes, but I went with their florentine special. Just your basic eggs florentine but they add avocados and their hollandaise was very creamy and lemony… it didn’t taste like that powdery stuff I’m used to. And it came with some home fries instead of the normal hash browns. My friend got the corned beef hash and eggs. Both were generously served up and it was a great breakfast.
$ 20 for the two meals and a coffee. Well worth it.

Barely acceptable and overpriced food. Milkshake was more like chocolate millk.
Appauling service. Bitchiest waitress I’ve ever had. Had to ask for our check three times and then she slammed it down on the table without saying a word or looking at us. Seemed pissed at us from the moment we walked in the door. Others seemed to be having a similar experience.
If it wasn’t the only place open at 2am, I wouldn’t have bothered. In the future, if I’m looking for a place at 2am, I’ll go hungry.

After a dinner party, a couple of glasses of wine, a couple beers, and some decent bourbon, we are in need of second dinner. As it’s 2:30 in the morning Sat, our options are limited in SF. First choice was of course Grubsteak but the line was out the door. Scratch that idea. So we drive by this place that looks practically empty… this looks OK.
So I guess we will be «that» table. The table of people who either can’t regulate volume or are trying to be obnoxious (aka hilarious). The waitress has obviously been there forever and is tired of:
a) working that late at night.
b) serving belligerent drunks.
c) life in general.
In any case, this review won’t take that too much into consideration. I mean my party was the LOUDEST/​only one there.
We all order the same thing, the Bob’s Burger w/​fries. Which came out 2 mins after we order. There were two problems. The fries that came w/​it; not enough of them. The burger was WAY under done. When she took our order, she didn’t ask how we wanted it. I completely forgot to specify. I would describe these burgers as rare… actually more like flame kissed… so basically luke warm in the middle. The size was decent and it came w/​avocado and bacon so I wasn’t so bummed. I like my burgers medium well and my steak medium rare. Over all though, I would come back… unless Grubsteak’s line dies down. Then I’m all over Grubsteak.

I’m sure you remember that early scene in «The 40-​Year-​Old Virgin» when Andy unwisely goes home with a drunken woman from the bar (actually it’s director Judd Apatow’s wife, Leslie Mann). She curdles out, half-​conscious behind the wheel — «I’m starvin’…Let’s get some (ahem) French toast!» — before vomiting on him in her car. Well, if they were to ever make it to a place with French toast in one piece, this is where I pictured where they would end up. It does have that post-​hurling vibe about it. Must be the formica and the squeezed-​in naugahyde booths.
Anyhow, Jamie W. and I had a similarly humiliating experience preceding our visit to Bob’s. We had been summarily ignored by the late-​night wait staff at Grubstake and walked out in a huff (see my updated review:
). The oblivious host told us to «have a nice evening». Whatever. We trudged up Polk recognizing that Bob’s would be our alternative to satisfy a sweet tooth. But we went gonzo that night and ordered breakfast.
We were just happy we had a waitress who actually took our order this time. Jamie went for the $ 4.25 (ahem) French toast, and I had the $ 5.50 short stack of New England Blueberry Pancakes (see photos). I’m not sure what part of the plate was supposed to remind me of a Vermont inn, especially since the blueberries had that unmistakable canned look to them. But I have to tell you our standards were pretty low after the Grubstake fiasco that anything short of a pile of manure would have suited us. Luckily, it was better than manure.
FOOD — 3 stars… typical diner fare that meets expectations
AMBIANCE — 2.5 stars… well, it ain’t French Laundry
SERVICE — 3 stars… a bit absent-​minded — but she at least showed a conscience when she served unlike others I don’t need to mention…(cough) Grubstake
TOTAL — 3 stars…“I’m starvin’…Let’s get some (ahem) French toast!”

BISCUITS AND GRAVY!
and the waiter who always remembers me and points out that every time i come in i am hungover.
what a creepy memory

bleh.
Waitress messed up or order big time…
We order a coke, a lemonade, a patty melt w/​coleslaw, and a patty melt w/​fries.
We got NO drinks what so ever and two patty melts w/​coleslaw. Had to ask her for my fries and had to go find our own ketchup.
To take the cake the coleslaw was gross (mayo and lemon??) and the patty melts were uninspired.

I’m really only giving bob’s 4 stars because it’s my grandma’s favorite place and I love my grandma. If it were up to me it would be a 3 star at most.
My grandma loves it because she has lived a few blocks away for almost 20 years, is a regular here, knows everyone, and they’re all really nice to her. They’ll make stuff for her that’s not even on the menu, but that she requests (they probably did have it on menu about 20 years ago when she first started eating there, but anyway…) The waiter that a few other reviewers complained about is indeed the owner’s son, and yes, he’s not the best– the owners are way nicer and more helpful.
I give props to a place that grandmas feel comfortable in.
That being said, if you’re not a grandma, or accompanying your grandma, or extremely hungover, I don’t really think there is much at Bob’s to draw you in. The food is really mediocre– which in a town like San Francisco just doesn’t cut it. I mean, even at local burger dives they serve Niman Ranch meat around here, so why would I pay comparable prices to my neighborhood joint for just plain greasy omelettes and burgers? I tend to order a tuna melt sandwich or sometimes the catfish, or eggs. It’s passable, but really it’s just a service to my grandma, self-​sacrifice for the older generation if you will.
If you’re not in the self-​sacrifice mode don’t do it, plus the less others who go there the more tables will be free for my grandma– not that it’s every really full anyway.

I’da given it four stars, but I felt like the server had her fingers in my drink. Explanation below. As for the food: Call a bacon cheeseburger what you will. I’ll call it health food. And the one I ordered here was perfectly decent. What I like in a good burger is a charry or grilled flavour, and that’s what I got here.
I think I’d go here before going back to Sliders, really.
Perhaps that makes me too forgiving of how I ordered Diet Coke with no ice and witnessed the following: the server scoop ice into a cup, start to fill it, realize she had filled it with ice, grab another cup, and use her hand to hold back the ice in the first cup while draining 2 ounces of Diet Coke into the new cup.
Seemed a little distasteful to be so conservative about wasting two ounces of Diet Coke that accidentally went into a cup with ice that you had to fondle a bunch of cubes and drain a trickle of liquid across your fingers into a new cup. But at least she remembered I didn’t want ice!

For those of you that don’t know me… I am a shy, Montana boy… so my standards for cuisine are kind of low… so i LOOOVE this place… it reminds me of home!!!
THe wait staff are friendly to me… probably because I am a repeat customer. They even know my dog… benson…and know he is a service animal (dont ask) and they even fry up an extra hamburger patty for him as a special treat. one time she brought him a piece of bacon on the house… i thought that was really sweet! When I first started eating there i thought they were kinda rude… but you know, a diner wouldnt be a diner if you didnt have rude wait staff… the only thing more perfect would be if the waitress was named Flo…
THis place is excellent for a quick meal after a night out drinking… or if you are meeting a friend and want someplace chill to hang out and talk. if you are coming here looking for a life altering meal, you wont get that.
I usually get a hamburger with a salad… so yummy. just the right about of grease!!! Occassionally I get the the french toast for breakfast… or later. they serve breakfast all day!!!
SOOOOOOoooooooooooo! Next time you are out and about to go tits up from drinkin too much on polk street… come on in so you have something to throw up in the morning!

So you’re having an early morning hang-​over or a late night drunk greazy burger craving on a Polk street. Not in TL yet, but you’re pretty close.
NOW, STOP! Do you see any other breakfast alternatives? Wanna go shadier? Lower Polk? Nah, I know, you DON’T!
Eggs? Hash browns? Thick old fashioned milk-​shakes?
Make your life easy, come in, sit your ass down.
Don’t try to be all gourmet about it, give me a break, it’s greasy — yes, it WILL make you full — YES! Don’t be picky about it, it’s just a «Bob’s dinery» not a «Petit Robert»

As a kid, I always knew I had done something stupid when my mom started singing the old Sound of Music song, «Maria,» except that she would change the lyrics to «How do you solve a problem like a Devonnnnn?»
The lack of the necessary third syllable in my name always added to the thinly veiled condescension. A not-​so-​discreet way of saying «my daughter is a dumbass but she’s only 7 so I will sing a song from a popular musical of my youth so she won’t know I am making fun of her.»
Well, she was wrong. Dead wrong. Hello therapy!
Repressed issues talked over with my therapist aside, I did a classic «Maria» move Friday night. After an evening at various bars along Polk, my friends and I headed to Bob’s for greasy sustenance. I was only moderately satiated by my grilled cheese with avocado sandwich, and the fact that it cost $ 11 also was rather disappointing, but they were friendly and didn’t bat an eyelash when one of the guys passed out face first in his fries.
Plain and simple, Bob’s is a two star going on three star establishment, not unlike Rolf and Liesl’s «Sixteen going on seventeen» gazebo scene. So what bumps it up?
Maria moment: It’s 2:30 AM, I am in the back of the cab on the way home when I realize that I have LOST MY PHONE. I may lose a lot of things on a semi-​regular basis (wallets, jackets, dignity), but the cell phone was always the one I held onto. («How do you solve a problem like a Devon? How do you catch a cloud and pin it downnn?»)
After a freakout that lasted easily into the next morning, and after a number of my friends called my number and no one picked up, I finally called Bob’s. To my great delight, they had my phone and even better, had respected my privacy by not opening it once, not even to answer the incoming calls. That’s class.
…Avocado with cheddar and fries made to order
Dinged up diners with help from south of the border
Recovering my phone without any attached strings
These are a few of my favorite things…

I really like BOB’s BROILER, it’s been at this same location for at least 25 — 30 years? I use to live a half block away on Sacramento street.
They must be doing something right to stay in business for such a long time.

Oh Bob’s…
I really wanted to like you, especially because I’m such a Diner nut, but it just didn’t click here.
Breakfast was ok, I don’t think it’s too hard to fry eggs and bacon, but my biggest complaint was the cleanliness of the whole place. Just not sure if the silverware’s being washed properly, and 4 dollars for a glass of Sunny D is cutting it.
I thought the staff was great, and the menu had the traditional items, but Bob’s lacks the down home charm that a diner should have.
Where’s the neighborhood special? What makes this place tick? Nada.
So I guess I’ll continue my search for the perfect diner elsewhere.

I originally posted this review in the wrong business! Sorry Bob’s Donuts!
I ordered sausage & eggs, daughter ordered a French burger (cheeseburger on a French roll) and our guest ordered biscuits and gravy. With the sausage & eggs, you have a choice of toast or a biscuit. I went with the biscuit and when I requested gravy, was told it would be 1,005 cents more. Thinking my ears may be playing tricks on me I reiterated «1005 cents?» Affirmative. «Okay, we’ll see how this translates out on the bill», I though to myself.
In our booth, daughter and guest were seated so they could see the server coming from the cooking area and, as our food was being brought to the table, they both get really funny looks on their face … it seems that the lady who served us, who told me her name was Louis (not Louise, Louis), momentarily lost control of daughter’s plate and the food slipped onto her chest … not a problem for Louis, she pushed the open faced French burger back onto the plate with her BOOBIE! I must say, I almost didn’t believe daughter when she told me this, but the melted cheese was clearly imprinted with what could have been a BOOB! Daughter is fussy. She only ate about 3 fries.
My sausage and eggs were just that, sausage & eggs, with home fries. I ate it all. Now, for the biscuits & gravy, guest scarfed his down but I couldn’t get past the mystery ingredient, a jell like substance, in the gravy so I only took a bite or two.
During the course of our visit, I had my back to the cook (s) & server but it was difficult not to hear part of the conversation going on behind me. I kept hearing Louis say the word «motherfucker». Daughter did not believe me when I told her this but, then the phone rang … «MOTHERFUCKER YOU BROKE MY HEART!». Now, the kids and I thought this was downright hilarious. Each time she said the word, it was at least five decibels louder than any other word in her sentence and she said it often. There seems to have been a shift change while we were there and the last thing we heard was MOTHERFUCKER YOU GOT TO LEARN spoken to the cook coming on shift, as I went to pay our check.
The gravy did not cost 1005 cents, I was charged $ 1.70 for B&G, but guest was charged $ 4.75 for the exact same thing. Total check $ 28.00 and change for our food and three coffees. Oh, and Louis had a big fat glass of red wine that she drained before accepting my money which could explain her fondness for motherfuckers.
Gotta give it a 1.5 on the food/​service but definitely the fun factor brings it up a notch or two. I promise to be back … for donuts!

I haven’t dined here and I probably never would because this place has «DIET SUICIDE» written all over it. But, DAYAM, Bob! Where’d you learn to make an apple pie like that? The term «panty dropper» usually applies only to alcoholic beverages, but I’d like to make an exception for the apple pies Bob’s churning out over there. Three bites in and Heidi A and I were staring lustfully at one another, fighting the deep primal urge to rip our tops off and roll around in that hot, steaming mess of apples, sugar, and delicious vanilla ice cream. Talk about a birthday treat!
Is this the effect you have on all women, Bob? Is it? Because I am dying for more… and more… and more…
Thank you, Matthew R for providing the birthday pie and the supervision we required during and after devouring that monster. Like I said– I probably wouldn’t dine here, but I will so be back for the pie. And next time, I’m taking Starla. Look out, Bob! Here we coooome.

I ALWAYS pass this place while walking off to some other restaurant on Polk Street. For the most part, I’ve been scared to go in.
A. It seems like a senior citizen’s joint. No offense. I almost would feel as if I was intruding on their turf.
B. Seems sketchy… not a big chain. who knows how the food would be.
C. No lines. Hummmmm…
I have to say. I LOVE that there are no lines here. You seat yourself here. The menu is filled with every joy possible. Combos of everything you love. And yes, there are old people chilling by the bar counter, but there are the straggling yuppies who want good food with their chums as well. They are asian owned– which means I need to support my peeps. Service is attentive and fantastic. Always filling your water, coffee, whatever.
Friendly, fast service, super cheap prices, family owned. Love that its a few blocks away, with no long lines. No scene, just good food. Bob’s has proven that you shouldn’t judge a place on the outside (in the case of seniors– the inside).
P. S. The OJ is expensive.