Menu Guide · San Francisco
Tonga Room & Hurricane Bar — Menu Guide
By Firoz Khan · FK Digital Media
Deep inside the Fairmont San Francisco sits one of the strangest and most beloved dining rooms in America: a tiki bar built inside the hotel's former 75-foot swimming pool, with a lagoon where the deep end used to be, a band playing from a floating boat, and a thunderstorm that rolls through every half hour. Anthony Bourdain called it "the greatest place in the history of the world." The food is Polynesian-Asian fusion bar fare, the drinks are classic tiki, and the whole thing has been running since 1945. Below is our independent guide to what it costs and how to plan a night here — written in our own words, with prices reported from published sources, not copied from a menu.
At a glance
- Location
- 950 Mason St, San Francisco, CA 94108 (inside Fairmont San Francisco)
- Cuisine
- Polynesian / Asian-fusion tiki bar
- Price level
- $$ — casual; $20 cover once live music starts
- Hours
- Wed–Thu 5–10 PM; Fri–Sat 5–11 PM; live music from 7 PM; 21+ after 10 PM
- Reservations
- Limited bookings via the Tablz app; first-come first-served otherwise
- Phone
- +1 (415) 772-5278
Food
The menu is tiki-bar comfort: shareable starters, poke, and a few heartier plates. The prices below come from the official Fairmont menu PDF published around March 2024 — they're dated and may have changed, so treat them as a guide to the price band, not today's numbers. Descriptions below are our own paraphrase of the dishes, not the menu's wording.
| Dish | Reported price (2024 menu) |
|---|---|
| Pork siu mai — steamed pork-and-shrimp dumplings | $15 |
| Coconut shell spicy tuna poke — ahi tuna with macadamia, taro chips | $18 |
| Curried crab won tacos — dungeness crab, yellow curry, pickled daikon | $16 |
| Tonga pupu platter — the big shareable spread | $66 |
| Tonga grilled ribeye | $54 |
| Marinated Korean short rib | $26 |
| Vegetable pot stickers — cabbage, black mushroom, ginger | $14 |
| Peel & eat prawns — wok-fried with jalapeño, garlic, yuzu mayo | $12 |
Our take: eat here like it's a bar with great snacks, not a restaurant with a bar. The pupu platter is built for a group; the poke and the crab tacos are the two dishes that justify the trip on their own.
Cocktails
The drinks program is classic tiki, and it's the main event for most visitors. Reported signature cocktails include the Mai Tai 1944, the Zombie (made with five rums), the Tiki Hunter, and the Wiki Wiki. Cocktail prices are unverified — a January 2025 review noted $2–4 per-drink increases, which suggests the list has moved since the 2024 food menu was published. Ask for current prices at the bar.
The experience
This is the part no other hotel restaurant can match. The Tonga Room opened in 1945, converted from the hotel's 75-foot indoor swimming pool — "The Plunge," built in 1929 — by MGM set designer Mel Melvin into a tropical lagoon. Since the 1950s, an indoor rainstorm — thunder, lightning, rain over the water — has rolled through roughly every 30 minutes, and it's still running. The house band plays from a floating boat stage in the middle of the lagoon. It's been called the most unusual restaurant in California, and the Bourdain line — "the greatest place in the history of the world" — is on the official site for a reason: people who go once talk about it for years.
What we'd order
If we had one night here, this is how we'd play it:
- To drink: start with the Mai Tai 1944 — it's the tiki canon — then let the bartender talk you into a Zombie if you're staying a while.
- To eat: the curried crab won tacos and the coconut-shell poke to start; the pupu platter if you're three or more.
- Time it for the storm. Get there before 7 PM when the live music starts, settle in, and let the rainstorm roll through mid-drink — that's the whole show.
Planning your visit
- Hours are limited: Wednesday–Thursday 5–10 PM, Friday–Saturday 5–11 PM. Closed Sunday through Tuesday — don't plan a weekend trip around it without checking.
- The cover: $20 per person once live music starts at 7 PM, applied to all seated guests regardless of when they arrived. It's waived for registered Fairmont hotel guests.
- Reservations are limited and handled through the Tablz app; otherwise seating is first-come, first-served — arriving early on Friday or Saturday is the move.
- 21+ after 10 PM. All ages are welcome from 5–10 PM, so families can do the early evening.
- Dress code is casual — this is a tiki bar, not a tasting room.
About these prices
Dish prices above are from a published 2024 menu and may have changed — the restaurant's official site notes the menu is subject to change. Cocktail prices are unverified. Always confirm current prices with the restaurant before visiting.