Sam Smith is the food influencer San Francisco needed
Grammy award–winning singer Sam Smith has been in San Francisco for a sold-out, 20-night residency to welcome back the newly remodeled Castro Theatre. But while Smith is known most for their musical prowess and millions of album sales and streams, they’ve managed to charm a new contingency of folks: Bay Area food fans.
Smith’s not-so-secret (but sorta-secret) food reviews account @samserveddocuments their eating adventures. Prior to the residency in San Francisco, only a single post appeared on the account, of a kebab spot in Denmark. But starting in early February, Smith took in-the-know fans along on a food tour of the Bay Area, with the account growing from just 6,000 followers as of Thursday, February 26, to 48,000 followers just two weeks later.
The reason? It’s been a joy to watch Smith learn about the Bay Area through food. There’s the first Bay Area post from Smith, featuring photos of them playfully eating food at Hook Fish Co.; dangling a drumstick over their mouth at Firefly; or posing with the team at the French Laundry among bites at the famed restaurant. Who can take their eyes off of Smith at Sol Food in Mill Valley, singing “Soooo excited,” as they waited for their steak sandwich?
They proclaimed their newfound love of Lao Gan Ma, the chile crisp: “I found this, and it’s fucking rocked my world.” Watch the sheer exuberance at triumphantly scoring a table at San Tung for chicken wings, after being out of luck for seats at their first visit. “This food is completely worth the hype,” they say, taking down chicken wing after chicken wing, and declaring the restaurant a 10/10. “San Francisco, your food is incredible.” There’s no rhyme or reason to the restaurants Smith appears at, or anything too lowbrow or highbrow. (There’s even a photo of a sweet, child-run, roadside lemonade stand, if I may drive the point home.)
I’m saying it: Smith is the food influencer we needed.
This is not to diminish local influencers who put their time in at restaurants across the region. But rather, I think we (okay, I) sometimes need to hear fresh takes on the Bay Area from someone who’s not from here. San Francisco in particular has been battered by news media in the last few years — we all remember the D--m L--p eraand our time being a rhymes-with-Box News punching bag — that I’d damn near say we started to believe the bad hype ourselves. It didn’t help when we saw other outside food influencers dismiss the scene as a whole. The Bay Area collectively sighed when a Critic Who Shall Not Be Named cut short his much-hyped 2024 tripdue to his food being cross-contaminated with shellfish at a restaurant visit. He also stated he had safety concerns as a tourist and some restaurant reviews he didn’t feel comfortable sharing. He posted only three video reviews from that trip. “I was okay with people from the Bay being mad at me for saying it,” he said in an interview a year later. “Somebody had to say it.”*
In a way, we were desperate for someone visiting to see the beauty in the Bay Area that we do, what we fight for each day.
The Bay Area got a little taste of outside appreciation during the most recent Super Bowl, which saw a flood of people visiting San Francisco and the South Bay for the festivities. “Super Bowl Visitors Find San Francisco Better Than Its Apocalyptic Image,” a New York Times article declared. I was personally taken with the videos from Massachusetts digital creator Marc Lewis, who posted his explorations of San Francisco and San Jose. In his first video, after marveling over the hills and sharing some funny comparisons between his home state and the city, he declares, “San Francisco is an enigma. All the potential in the world. This place could be sick. Looking forward to seeing more of it.”
Smith unintentionally filled this need for affirmation through their food reviews. Bay locals are serious about our love for our restaurants — Smith says people have told them about the San Tung wings for four weeks now — and we love it when our recommendations fall to receptive ears. Now with Smith’s residency set to end on Saturday, March 14, assuming they don’t move here — although I can confidently say that collectively we would love that — it’s up to us to keep the hype train going for the Bay Area and for ourselves. ✦
*This is not to discount any of the work Keith Lee does to support restaurants. But damn, was it disappointing how his Bay Area trip worked out.
march 11, 2026