A selection of local Chinese dishes

Beijing, a city of many wonders; so many in fact that it can seem a little overwhelming at first. The best way to see the city is on one of our many Beijing tours. This blog post takes a look at just a few of the restaurants you can sample on a Private Tour of Beijing.

Han Cang
This fantastic restaurant serves some of the best hakka cuisine in the city. Hakka is easy to recognize with its earthy, wholesome and tasty dishes.

Some of Han Cang’s specialties include three-cup duck, braised in rice wine and soy sauce; salt-baked shrimp and a range of oven-baked fish choices. The restaurant has a cosy, rustic feel to it; the walls are covered in rice paper, you sit around large wooden tables and service has a homely personal feel to it. If you’re lucky enough to get one; the tables on the top floor also offer beautiful views over the lakes outside.

Three Guizhou Men
Something slightly more ‘trendy’ for the next choice, the dazzling ‘Three Guizhou Men’. Often considered as a haunt of Beijing’s rich and beautiful; this fantastic restaurant has suitable food and atmosphere for its clientele. The spicy lamb rack served here is one of the best menu choices. If you’re slightly less adventurous then the ‘Beef on Fire’, comprising of strips of beef hung and cooked over chives and hot coals, is also a popular choice for foreign diners.

Jiumen Xiaochi
If you have slightly more adventurous taste buds then a look round Jiumen Xiaochi is a great idea. This courtyard restaurant complex is a throw back to the pre-Communist times of the city, when the city was full of laozihaos; what we would recognise as brand-name restaurants except these have been around for centuries. The complex offers a more traditional range of foods too, everything from traditional rice dishes to the more unusual offerings like flash-fried tripe and lamb’s head.

This is just a small selection of the restaurants available in this diverse city, and a little exploring can go a long way. There really is something for everyone in the beautiful city of Beijing.

Chinese Noodles

One of the most common comments we get on our tours is about the differences between authentic Chinese food and that of the Chinese restaurants back in the west. Western Chinese restaurant food is a very different experience to food in China, it tends to be based on Cantonese style food, heavy in meat and fried in oil, with a twist of the west in that it’s quite sweet, can often contain MSG additives and usually only has vegetables as a side option.

The real thing is a far more interesting experience! On the holidays in China that Wendy Wu offers, you get to experience a good mix of Chinese food. Breakfast is a mix of western and Chinese options but for lunch and dinner you get treated to traditional, local cuisine. All meals are included in our fully inclusive Group Tours, which can include a sampling of Peking Duck in Beijing or a delicious dumpling meal in Xian.

Although you get a good mix on the tour banquets, it’s worth keeping in mind that the dishes will vary depending on where you are in the country, though if you are thinking of eating out, the common saying goes “Northerners eat noodles, Southerners eat rice.” There’s also a difference in the spicing of the food depending on where in the country you are, the Sichuan region for example is well know for its spicy dishes. Our Private Tours include several free evenings to give you the option of exploring local restaurants.

So if you’re looking for a real authentic Chinese taste experience, then you can’t beat taking a trip to the country itself.