Regulars know Bernal Heights Pizzeria as the kind of place where you watch soccer on the back patio, where the calabresa pizza gets you every time, where the owners remember your face. The online reviews are full of people who’ve been coming for years and plan to keep coming. So when the San Francisco Department of Public Health posted a red placard at 1361 Church Street yesterday, March 26, and ordered the place shut, it wasn’t just a health inspection story. It was an uncomfortable one — for a community that was genuinely rooting for this spot, and for anyone who ate there recently.
What the Inspector Found
Let’s not bury this: the inspection report is bad. Inspector Sojeatta Khim of the San Francisco Department of Public Health documented fresh rat droppings — and “fresh” is the inspector’s word, not an editorial flourish — under the three-compartment sinks, on top of the food prep table, on the pizza preparation surface, on the wooden board where spices are stored, on top of the flour mixer, under the stove burner, under the pizza oven, and inside the deep fryer. The closure notice describes the droppings as “scattered throughout the facility,” with the main kitchen bearing the heaviest concentration.
Read that list again slowly. The pizza prep surface. The spice board. Inside the deep fryer.
A red placard was posted at the front door. That placard can only be removed by a health department inspector — not by the owners, not by a cleaning crew, not by wishful thinking…