California Common (Anchor Steam) is a signature dish of United States; we have verified places to eat it in San Francisco. An amber lager brewed with lager yeast at warm ale temperatures, fermented in wide shallow open vessels. Start with where to eat California Common (Anchor Steam) in San Francisco.

California Common (Anchor Steam) · San Francisco

An amber lager brewed with lager yeast at warm ale temperatures, fermented in wide shallow open vessels. San Francisco's native beer style, invented during the Gold Rush.

California Common, popularly called steam beer, originated in San Francisco in the 1850s when Gold Rush brewers fermented lager yeast at the only temperatures available without ice, on wide shallow rooftops cooled by Pacific fog. Anchor Brewing on Mariposa Street, founded 1896 by Ernst Baruth, registered Steam Beer as a trademark and preserved the style for over a century. Anchor ceased production in July 2023; Chobani founder Hamdi Ulukaya bought the brand in 2024 and a relaunch is in the works but the Potrero Hill brewery has not resumed brewing. SF craft brewers including Fort Point and Magnolia still pour the canonical California Common style.

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