The Mess Hall Presidio Review: Matcha and a Smash Burger

One of my favorite matchas in the world is Matchaful, in New York City. I did not expect to find it in a 129-year-old army building in the Presidio, ten days after it opened as a food hall.

The Mess Hall at the Presidio is a new all-day food hall at 201 Halleck St on Presidio Tunnel Tops in San Francisco, and its cafe pours Matchaful matcha. Get it with a pump of vanilla. It opened August 15, 2026 in a building that went up in 1897 for the army post and then spent a century as a depot, a butcher shop, a feed store, and a mailroom. Now it’s a big, bright room of windows facing the bay, with three counters sharing one kitchen: Breadwinner (smash burgers, breakfast sandwiches, pastries from Breadbelly), Boda (Korean, with housemade banchan), and Dayboat Seafood (crudo, chowder, hand rolls), plus Wrecking Ball coffee, a market, and a full bar this sober girl walked right past.

The Matcha (Get the Vanilla)

Matchaful is a New York brand I first fell for on a trip to the city, and on its own it sits at the purist end of my Matcha Snob Scale. With one pump of vanilla it becomes, in my opinion, the best version of itself, and I’ll say that in front of any purist you like. My order was the small hot matcha latte ($7) with vanilla added ($1), and it’s the order I’d hand you.

We also got the small iced tea ($4.50), which was light and floral and, frankly, the more photogenic of the two drinks, which is why it’s the photo up top instead of the matcha. (I have priorities. They are aesthetic.)

A Smash Burger, After a Decade and a Half Without One

Then the part of this review I did not see coming: I ate a smash burger. Breadwinner’s ($17), ordered at the bar counter and eaten out of a compostable tray at a table by the windows. I was a vegetarian for most of my life, and this was my first burger in something like fifteen years, which is not a sentence I expected to type on this blog. My only other burger review here is a veggie patty in a lettuce wrap at Super Duper, so consider the goalposts relocated.

The verdict: pretty solid, and I really liked it. Crisp-edged patty, American cheese draped over the sides, shredded lettuce, a tomato slice, pickles, and a soft bun that knows its job. Would a lifelong burger person rank it against the city’s best? I don’t have the data yet (give me a year). What I can tell you is that $17 for a burger with nothing on the side is Presidio pricing, and that it was a very good first burger back, eaten in a very good room.

Make It a Tunnel Tops Morning

The cafe and market open at 7am every day, the restaurant counters at 11am, and the whole thing runs to 8pm Monday through Thursday and 10pm Friday through Sunday. It’s the only indoor seating on Tunnel Tops, which matters on the days the fog wins, and there’s a paid lot across the street at 220 Halleck. For the sit-down brunch version of a Presidio morning, Colibri in the Officers’ Club on the Main Post is still my number one, and the walk between the two is a very good idea.

The Verdict on the Mess Hall

• Best for: Matchaful matcha inside a national park · lunch with bay views after a Tunnel Tops walk
• My order: Small hot matcha latte with a pump of vanilla, the small iced tea, and Breadwinner’s smash burger
• Damage: $37.93 across two checks (drinks $16.07, burger $21.86, tips included)
• Hours: Daily from 7am (counters from 11am), until 8pm Mon–Thu and 10pm Fri–Sun
• Where: 201 Halleck St, Presidio Tunnel Tops (Google Maps) · messhallpresidio.com

See how the city’s matcha stacks up on my best matcha in San Francisco ranking, and for the rest of the park, my Colibri review maps out the Main Post morning.

For more of where I actually eat, start with the best restaurants in San Francisco — and subscribe to my newsletter if you want the new reviews (plus my writing life) in your inbox. I spent five years rating restaurants around the world in my travel guides — now the fork points at my own city.