Renowned San Francisco seafood restaurant Swan Oyster Depot froze its Yelp page and disabled comments on its Instagram on Monday after an Asian customer posted to social media about inappropriate comments he received from the restaurant.
Tin Dinh said he and his sister, Tu Dinh, who are Vietnamese, were called “dim sum” several times by a rude Swan Oyster Depot staffer after placing their order at the restaurant on Aug. 20. He posted about the incident on Instagram on Friday, and since then the post has blown up, with over 6,500 likes and almost 400 comments as of Tuesday.
Tin Dinh explained that this wasn’t the first time patrons have complained about reportedly racist behavior. He shared Yelp reviews from several years ago that also called out Swan Oyster employees in his post. He hopes his post will make the restaurant acknowledge its “racist language” and issue a public apology.
In a message on Swan Oyster Depot’s Yelp page on Tuesday, the rating website explained its temporary freezing of new reviews, saying: “While racism has no place on Yelp and we unequivocally reject racism or discrimination in any form, all reviews on Yelp must reflect an actual first-hand consumer experience (even if that means disabling the ability for users to express points of view we might agree with).”
Jimmy Sancimino, whose family has run the Polk Street institution for decades, was identified in the post as the man who made the “dim sum” comments. Dinh wrote that when he notified another employee about the comment, the employee said they use the term to refer to customers who order from more than one staff member, as is common at a dim sum restaurant, and “it has nothing to do with race.”
Tin Dinh said he started ordering food from Sancimino when Sancimino walked away midway through, so his sister finished ordering from another employee. When they told Sancimino when he returned, he walked away, pointed to them and yelled “dim sum.”
He questioned the restaurant's explanation. “To use a dish from a different culture to specifically point out your customers is absolutely disrespectful. ... Why not just say ‘help’ or another word that does not involves someone else’s culture?” he wrote on Instagram.
Swan Oyster Depot is one of the Bay Area’s most recognized restaurants, for its history as well as its food. The restaurant won the James Beard America’s Classics award in 2000 and was a finalist for the organization’s Outstanding Service award in 2019.
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