The soccer ball lamp that hangs outside the restaurant on the corner of 18th and Capp Streets in the Mission leaves little doubt about what’s going on inside. Its name, written on a street sign hung up over its door, all but confirms it: Balompié.
Owner Amadeo Gonzalez Figueroa told Gazetteer SF that when he first opened the restaurant in 1987, he was up at 1 a.m., a bit drunk, trying to think of a name. He came up with Commentarios. “Because I wanted to relate it to soccer — everybody can come here and talk about soccer, and I said, ‘Nah.’”
A half-hour later he hit upon Balompié.
In over 50 years of playing, coaching, and watching soccer, I was embarrassed to admit that I had never heard the word. But I was absolutely familiar with the term “fútbol” – and even prefer it, for obvious reasons, to “soccer.”
“The right word, the correct word, is balompié,” he assured me. It’s a combination of balón, ball, and pie, foot. In Spain and Argentina, he continued, it’s balompié. In El Salvador, where Gonzalez Figueroa is from, he allowed that it could be fútbol or balompié; the same is true in Mexico, Colombia, and Venezuela.
Balompié Cafe has been at its Mission corner location for 39 years. Inside, it is lit by five more fútbol lamps. The walls are covered in banners, most of them given to Gonzalez Figueroa from his customers, representing teams from around the world. The restaurant’s two big screen TVs play nothing but balompié. While some Mission locals support Central or South American teams, many, including Gonzalez Figueroa, also love and come to watch the European leagues.
No restaurant can survive for four decades on balompié alone. The cafe’s Salvardoran menu is based on Gonzalez Figueroa’s grandmother’s recipes, and maintained by chef Patricia Jimenez, who has cooked there for 36 years. It includes carne encebollado, or beef steak with onions, and a long list of pupusas, filled with combinations of cheese, beef, pork, or chicken. My favorite was filled with spinach, zucchini, and cheese. I ate them with a side of rice and beans, and a Modelo poured into a cup shaped like a human calf and foot wearing a shin guard and balompié cleat. My son spared a sip of the best horchata I’ve tasted.
Gonzalez Figueroa, 72, played professional soccer in El Salvador and semi-pro when he moved to San Francisco when he was 20 years old. He said the restaurant has had its ups and downs. In the early 1990s, he said, “I had to fight with all the pimps because they came in and they wanted to use the restroom.” Later, Gonzalez Figueroa struggled with norteños and sureños, calmly recalling ducking for cover during a shootout on the cafe’s corner. He said he used to keep a machete under his cash register for protection, and is convinced that he once saved the life of a teenager who took refuge in the restaurant from gang members who wanted to kill him.
These days, Balompié Cafe feels like the right place to be for breakfast, lunch, or dinner — especially during the World Cup. On Wednesday night, Elisa Navarrete, a server at the restaurant, was wearing her Mexico jersey, as were many customers. Mexico easily advanced to the next knockout round, joining other teams that Gonzalez Figueroa said will be good for business: Argentina, Brazil, Colombia, and the US.
Navarrete was assisted by Evelyn Figueroa, Amadeo’s wife, who took me through a tour of the decor. The sets of goalkeeper gloves attached to the walls and cleats lining the shelves belong to her son, Amadeo Alejandro Figueroa, who plays for the local El Farolito team. To perfect her skills in a professional kitchen, Figueroa said, she attended and graduated from City College’s culinary program.
The restaurant’s Mission location is sometimes referred to as Balompié Cafe #1. The couple opened a second one, Balompié Cafe #2, in Figueroa’s hometown of Metapán, El Salvador, which they closed because it was too difficult to maintain quality control from such a distance. Balompié Cafe #3, located between Glen Park and Bernal Heights, was such a success that they sold it to a partner.
Gonzalez Figueroa is opening another restaurant in the East Bay city of Richmond shortly after the World Cup. I asked if it’ll be called Balompié Cafe #4.
“No. It’s just called Balompié,” he said.
