Coffee and cigarettes: the best dive coffee shops in San Francisco

This cafe is such a dive that it doesn’t even offer wireless internet for free. You have to pay for it! That is so fucking 90s I can’t even believe it. I mean, yeah, internet cards, not how I roll. It’s gigantic and always mostly empty. This cafe is so dingy, it’s not even the realness, it’s the wackness. I sort of dig it, except that the sandwiches here are $6 and look like the sort of unidentifiable pieces of bread with mutant vegetation stuffed between, the kind you get at a gas station wrapped in cellophane and completely inedible. Not to mention the coffee is gross – straight up gross. People still come here though. Some people.

This place is so gnarl, you need to be buzzed in by the barrista to use the bathroom. The bathroom says it all. I have seen bathrooms in dive bars in the Tenderloin with less piss on the floor than the bathroom at Muddy’s. Flies take romantic, leisurely strolls all over their bins of bagels. Bums come through begging for change. At least they have fast wifi, lots of electrical outlets (really important for those days when you’re stuck in front of the computer for 6 hours freelancing articles for the internet…) and it’s close to Buffalo Exchange (so you can spend money you don’t have).

Gross doesn’t begin to describe this place. Can we first start by discussing the location? 24th and Mission, right across from the BART station and a 24 hour McDonalds? Next to a “Chinese Food and Donuts” restaurant? In the heart of San Francisco’s Mission District? But despite the ick factor, can I get a hell yeah for the fact that this cafe serves alcohol, tons of vegetarian salads, and that wizened men as old as the mountains play chess at the window tables, talking in foreign languages? I love this place. The name is exactly right. La boheme. Yes it’s a dive, and yes none of the chairs match, and yes the coffee is pretty watered down, Cafe la Boheme is a damn good cafe.

The white toast that they serve at this dive is Wonderbread. But it’s less than five bucks for a (Eggo) waffle and two eggs. They serve omelettes, scrambles, potatoes, Chinese food. You known you’re in a classy joint when they serve Chinese with the breakfast fare. But I enjoy this coffee shop/diner because it’s cheap (a meal will run you less than five bucks), easy, unpretentious, and wholly unapologetic for its dismal appearance and questionable hygiene. Sounds good to me.

Bean bag = $1.50 pints on tap. Yes. YES YES YES. Also, cheap coffee. Cheap coffee of questionable value, but cheap nonetheless. The food is a tad expensive and they strangely serve pasta along with the standard cafe food of crepes, sandwiches, and eggs – but the beers more than make up for the expensiveness of the menu because Holy God are they cheap. Due to the cheapness of the beer, the floors of Bean Bag have started to resemble those of a frat house (sticky, moldy, beer smelling) but who cares when you’re too busy getting drunk with your friends in the middle of the day to notice?

While you can’t actually smoke inside, you can definitely smoke on the bench outside. I haven’t ever walked by that bench without seeing people smoking on it. There is also two outdoor tables, also generally claimed by the smokers’ alliance of San Francisco. People go to Muddy Waters with their notebooks and their angst and listen to slowdive really loudly on their iPods and write poems in their diaries with little doodles on the margins. It’s that kind of place. It’s always drafty in the cavernous old room, and the coffee is pretty generally always bad. There are always tons of people who come through and loiter creepily. Nothing looks sanitary.

This place is not large. In fact, it’s shaped rather like a closet, at the end of which is a dark room that purportedly operates as a lavatory. This place is just more bland than anything. The sandwiches are not very good, nor are they memorable. I’m sure they have something like a turkey sandwich with avocado and possibly a roast beef… the usual. Hummus and veggie. I have been here a few times and to be honest, I can’t remember remember what my experience was like. This cafe literally has no distinguishing characteristics at all, which is moderately creepy in is own right. For being a rather ‘nothing’ sort of place, it’s made its way onto my list. Cafe Valencia is just a nothing sort of dive coffee shop – completely inoffensive, but not particularly appealing either.

If I had to equate Curly’s to any establishment in the world, I’d say it’s like an independent Denny’s. Not quite a Denny’s but super close. The name Curly’s is cuter than Denny’s though. There are two tables where you can sit outside while drinking your coffee, and a waitress will even come outside to refill your cup as you people watch. It’s okay, this place. I don’t love it, but I didn’t hate it either. It’s a dive. It’s a Denny’s but more expensive. If that’s your thing, I’d go here, if that’s not your thing, go somewhere else.