Stonestown Galleria comes alive most during meal times, when the food courts swirl with photogenic hunks of Taiwanese fried chicken and taro-filled buns.

In recent years, the 66-year-old mall in the Outer Avenues has quickly and quietly become a top culinary destination in San Francisco, thanks to a flood of new restaurants that have brought crowds ready to line up for freshly made noodles, fruity boba tea and, most recently, Japanese souffle pancakes. As traditional retail struggles in the digital age, malls like Stonestown are turning more and more to food to get people off their laptops and through the doors.

During last Friday’s debut for Gram Cafe & Pancakes, the Japanese chain’s first U.S. restaurant, devotees started lining up at 8 a.m. The first souffle pancakes — tall, jiggly stacks that have dominated social media feeds over the past few days — didn’t leave the kitchen until 11 a.m.

“You just always want to try the new thing,” said Audrey Aguirre-Woo, who joined the line from Daly City.

She and her friend Niki Lee also came to Stonestown for Marugame Udon’s opening day in late 2017 — it’s another Japanese chain that famously drew hours-long waits when it opened its first Bay Area spot in the mall.

“This line is actually decent,” Lee said, observing only several people standing between her and pancake glory.

San Bruno resident Donna Lee Lim figured she and her two kids had a decent shot of snagging souffle pancakes if they showed up an hour before 11 a.m. service. She was wrong.

“Oh no!” she sighed, as she noticed a Gram Cafe manager walk out with a “sold out” sign at 10:30 a.m., indicating there would be no more souffle pancakes available until the next round at 3 p.m.

Certainly, the buzz will die down in a few months, but if Marugame is any indication, lines will persist. On a recent Monday, 30 people patiently queued up before its doors opened at 11 a.m.

Lim decided it was worth sticking around to try one of the restaurant’s other pancake dishes, like a stack of thin pancakes layered with matcha mascarpone cream and red bean. She comes to Stonestown at least two times per month.

“It’s not for the shopping, it’s for the food,” she said.

While the mall houses plenty of the expected national chains like Wetzel’s Pretzels and Olive Garden, it’s the newer Asian imports that drum up excitement.

Another recent attraction is Yi Fang Taiwan Fruit Tea, which opened in December and has just one other Bay Area location in Berkeley. The Taiwanese chain serves its popular brown sugar pearl lattes — generously packed with unusually soft, warm boba — just four times per day: 11 a.m., 2 p.m., 5 p.m. and 7:30 p.m. It’s similar to Gram’s system, where only 30 orders of souffle pancakes are served three times per day.

Rope barriers are always set up to manage the Yifang crowds. An employee said they generally sell out of the brown sugar drinks after 30 minutes, and on weekends, after 15 minutes.

Two other relatively new Taiwanese chains are also proving popular at Stonestown: 85C Bakery Cafe opened last summer, bringing sea-salt iced coffee and soft breads to the mall, while Shihlin Taiwan Street Snacks opened last fall with fried chicken and other night market staples.

It makes sense for Stonestown to focus on Asian restaurants given the demographics of the neighborhood, just north of Daly City and south of the Sunset District. Plus, San Francisco State University is a 10-minute walk away, with a student body that’s 26.3 percent Asian.

Stonestown Galleria general manager Darren Iverson said the mall isn’t specifically targeting Asian restaurants, though seven of the 10 food-related businesses to open within the past year specialize in Asian food or drinks — not to mention a new Korean barbecue restaurant and a second San Francisco location of Matcha Cafe Maiko, which are both on deck to join Stonestown soon.

The mall’s current leasing strategy is to target unique concepts, Iverson said.

“We’ve been fortunate that we’ve landed ones like Yifang and Gram and Marugame that have been first to the market. It’s certainly a strategic focus for us,” he said. “Food right now is very popular, and it also helps drive the more traditional retail.”

Compared to other malls, Stonestown goes heavy on food: A third of its spaces are dedicated to food and drink. At Westfield San Francisco Centre, just a quarter serve food or drinks. Yet Stonestown’s pivot toward destination-worthy dining falls in line with larger retail trends.

“There is a desire to bring in more food and more unique food,” said Santino DeRose, managing partner at real estate firm Maven Commercial.

That’s because American chain stores are everywhere — and sell their wares online. Gram is likely to bring far more people to Stonestown than H&M or Chipotle.

Indeed, the people who line up for Gram will either manage to snag a coveted souffle pancake ticket and have time to kill before they actually get to eat, or they’ll give up and wander the mall.

Several people who learned they were too late for souffle pancakes on opening day meandered over to Eggxotic for a Hong Kong-style egg waffle, the little spheres plump with sweet taro or kimchi.

At Stonestown, the consolation prizes are plentiful — and tasty.

Janelle Bitker is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: janelle.bitker@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @janellebitker