Introduction

Founded in 2009 in Nanluoguxiang, the tiny café, bar and live music venue encourages quietly the city's local talent with tribute nights to the classic rock gods whose posters and photos adorn the walls.

Backed by record label and design studio Rockland, Sixtynine Impression Music & Coffee (69 Cafe for short) only jumps out if you're looking for it, with a black doorway leading into an alley, marked with white records making the 69 logo.

The space inside is limited, which is fine for most of their events, where local singer-songwriter types play a set of covers of classic artists like Bob Dylan, The Beatles, Lou Reed and Radiohead. But when they invite someone like Snapline or Carsick Cars' frontman Zhang Shouwang to the stage, you'd better plan to turn up early or you won't make it through the door.

But what makes 69 Cafe great is its laid back atmosphere and homey, cozy design. Crammed with classic rock memorabilia and comfy couches, it's easy to while away the afternoon hours, or catch an experimental band on the weekend. Most shows start around 9pm and will set you back RMB20, so it's an easy night of quality music in the heart of bustling Nanluoguxiang.

They're stocked with the usual Tiger and Tsingtao beers for RMB20/bottle, with a few imported brews around RMB40. They also have a selection of standard cocktails and mixed drinks (RMB30-45), and some intriguing zodiac-themed drinks (RMB45-60) which we didn't try for fear of blue curaçao.

Laoshe Tea House is a hot spot for both foreigners and expats. Spend just two hours here at Laoshe Teahouse and you'll experience the authentic lifestyle of the old Beijing. Sipping tea, munching on local snacks and watching a revue of the most popular Chinese traditional performances are just some of the things you’ll do while here. The tea house is named after the renowned Chinese writer Lao She who is famous for his drama entitled, "Teahouse", which is a vivid portrayal of the social dimensions of old Beijing.

Laoshe Teahouse was founded in 1988. It soon became popular in Beijing for offering "Dawancha" or "big-bowl tea," a tradition that has been running for more than two decades. The best part is that the price has never changed. Today, you can still get a bowl of refreshing tea for only two Chinese cents. And if you don't have the change, don't worry a cup of tea will be served for free. The open air tea service is a tradition that goes back 17-hundred years and is just one part of the rich tea culture of Beijing.

Take Bus No. 5, 10, 110, and 120, and get off at Qianmen stop, or take subway Line 2 and get off at Qianmen station.

Mt. Qomolangma, known to the West as Mt. Everest, is Tibet’s most famous geographic feature. It has long been held as both a mystical dreamland and the ultimate challenge for Earth’s most skilled hikers.

It’s also the enduring symbol of Tibet and Tibetan culture.

But for those less adventurous people who still want a taste of Tibet, Beijing offers a number of Tibetan restaurants serving the region’s traditional foods.

Located on Gulou Avenue, Qomolangma Restaurant is one of city’s best-known Tibetan restaurants. It is also the only restaurant afflicted with Tibet’s representative office in the capital.

Diners on Dianping.com gave the restaurant an average score of 4.5 out of 5 stars. The roasted lamb steak was especially popular, with many reviewers praising its tender and moderate flavor. Portions are reportedly good for the price.

The restaurant also serves traditional tsampa, a staple foodstuff on the Tibetan plateau. Diners who didn’t have any experience with Tibetan food noted that the tsampa had an unusual taste that was hard to accept but still worth trying.

The roasted yak, as one of the most famous dishes in Tibetan cuisine, also came highly recommend by reviewers on Dianping.

Qomolangma’s restaurant is a good warm-up for aspiring travelers who cling to Tibet as their dream destination.

That lively strip called Nanluoguxiang might as well be called Hutong Main Street. The little offshoots are often worth a meander, with delightful finds such as Suzuki Kitchen, a bright, clean wooden little space with symmetrically arranged tables and a simple open kitchen. Folks here do the Japanese student thing in a demure cool way, with do-rag get-ups covering the scalps of goatee-spor ting dudes with black framed glasses, T-shirts and baggy jeans – a sort of Asian Where’s Waldo uniform – while the girls have giggly fun when this joint gets jumping.

Suzuki Kitchen is what happens when a former Japanese teacher called Suzuki and his Chinese student, with a bizarre obsession for bunnies (it’s not just because of the lunar year), develop a fondness for student Japanese staples.

Choose your weapon from a choice including a curry of chicken, beef or vegetables. Whatever your star, the brown gravy sauce is the same (20/30RMB), and it’s good Japanese curry, albeit a little bland in the spice. This is neither Thai nor Indian, but the Japanese take on curry that has become legendary in its own right despite the fact that it’s no looker – a bumpy brown land map with tiny vegetable or meat mountains beneath a thick, gloopy cloud of sauce.

Sizzling hamburger steak platters (28/38RMB) are grill-marked patties that are perfectly shaped with that earnest practice so well taught in Japan. Each comes wearing different outfits of sauciness, from teriyaki to demi-glace or cheese, but with the same ice cream scoop of mashed potatoes and vegetable accessories sold as solo acts or as parts of the well-priced set. An additional few RMBs on most mains turn your dish into a combo of salad, pickles, rice and miso soup – which, though a strange choice, makes more sense than the combination of fruit juices that seems to be a singular selection of orange (Really? With a saucy burger?).

Karaage (28RMB), Japan’s excellent version of fried chicken, is good dark meat with the crunch that it should have. Iron kettles of steaming sukiyaki (30/38RMB) are adorable edible play sets. Also available are the necessary rice bowls with fried pork cutlet or toppings of kimchi or chicken or both (20/25RMB).

Fishbowl-sized salads meant for sharing, or as a main, float about the room causing envy. This is where seeing isn’t tasting – when the Suzuki salad (25RMB) arrives, we find the nubby bits of pork are a salt lick among the eggs, iceberg and cucumbers. Bad enough to send back, it’s happily replaced with a green salad (22RMB) that hits the opposite end of the flavour scale with barely enough dressing to enliven it, and watery iceberg that adds little.

Suzuki Kitchen is a cosy haven of comfort away from the busy main drag. For those wanting a little sit-down quiet, stick with the front court garden. Alternatively, climb up to the roof and take in the relaxing surroundings.

Located inside Aman at Summer Palace Beijing, Naoki Japanese Restaurant features quite an amiable dining environment. As one of the most expensive Japanese restaurants in Beijing, Naoki Japanese Restaurant serves diners with delicately selected dishes in reasonable portions and all ingredients are guaranteed to be fresh. 

The traditional Chinese roof, monthly changed layout, comfortable lights and seat arrangement look comfortable. With considerate service, all staffs will make diners feel at home. Recommended dishes are goose liver, egg custard with tricholoma matsutake, Beef Steak, Teriyaki chicken, grilled South African lobster with charcoal and homemade anisette.

This museum is devoted to dynastic dining. The actual museum part is rather small compared to the acres of dining halls. However, the dynasty-by-dynasty exhibition of imperial food is utterly fascinating (even more so if you can read Chinese). Curiously, the collection begins with China’s so-called ‘ancestor’ the Peking Man, a few of recreations of whom are huddled around a fire, barbequing some titbits.

The remainder of the multi-floor complex is a restaurant. Every evening, an extravaganza of on-stage performances starring emperors and empresses aim to give diners an ‘Imperial Banquet’ experience. Dishes are reasonably priced; royal set menus are also available. It’s worth snooping through the private banquet suites on the top floor–some are so enormous and ostentatious the king himself would be impressed.

Starting at 6am every morning, you'll notice a motley crew of schoolchildren, middle-aged office workers and grandparents collected around the red doorway of 7 Daxing Hutong, just off Jiaodaokou Nan Dajie. Everyone has a bowl in hand and is attentively sipping on miancha (面茶) or 'flour tea' – a traditional old Beijing millet and rice flour porridge topped with a thick layer of sesame paste and a sprinkle of sesame seeds. 

Wander back into the hutong courtyard to the husband-and-wife team's tiny kitchen (they've been running this breakfast operation out of their home since 1994) and make your order (3RMB per bowl, pay after).

Located along an avenue known more for groups of tourists wandering between the National Art Museum and the Forbidden City than its dining options, Beijing Pie is serving up plates of comfort food superstars like gongbao chicken (36RMB) and beef stir-fry platters (62RMB).

The sign above the door doesn’t say ‘Beijing stir-fry’, however, so as we find a seat in the clean, brightly lit dining room, all eyes are on the pies, or, more precisely – pancakes. The Chinese language doesn’t make much of a distinction between the two; the restaurant’s English translation is ‘pie’, but what Beijing Pie actually serves up, bing (饼), looks more like a pancake.

At Beijing Pie, the ‘pies’ come stuffed with beef, pork or duck. We opt for the more traditional beef and pork (both 28RMB) and a selection of the home-style side dishes. The sides arrive first, which is reassuring in a town where the speed at which some kitchens pump out ‘freshly made’ dishes is dubious at best. 

Our sides, fresh tofu with scallion (16RMB), century egg with ginger (18RMB) and ‘loofah tips with dried chilli’ (a salad of squash greens with mild spice, 22RMB), are all plated with a care and an attention to detail we wouldn’t normally expect of an establishment this casual and this cheap. The vinyl tabletops belie the presence in the kitchen of someone who takes real pride in their work. 

The flavours are also on point: fresh, clean with a good balance of salt, sugar and heat. The loofah greens are particularly good (despite the silly name) while the tofu manages to make an impression in spite of its impossibly simple preparation. The handful of freshly chopped scallion is aromatic and provides all the sharpness a dish of humble bean curd really needs.

When the meat pies (well, ‘rou bing’) arrive, piping hot from the iron, the lack of oil is obvious. The hot greasy mess that we’re used to encountering at hole-in-the-wall stalls has been dressed up; it’s defiantly light and complex. The golden flaky crust, and glistening minced meat and scallion filling, take a long draw from a shallow bowl of black vinegar and go down smooth. The savoury filling is well seasoned and in good ratio with the breading – no skimping here.

Beijing Pie serves up classic northern dishes that both wandering tourists and Beijingers will enjoy. It’s a boon to an area lacking in culinary pedigree, and a style of place we hope becomes more common in the area.

Serving one of our favorite styles of dumplings, dalian huoshao (pictured above), and sporting the remarkably original and spontaneous name Dalian Huoshao, this casual eatery is a hotbed of elderly activity by day (can you say free unlimited porridge?) and host to the occasional debauched dumpling fueled romp by night.

Service is as curt as it is indifferent but we swear they could beat us every time we walk in the door and we would still be back for more. The speciality of the house is the main attraction but fried sweet prawns, shredded pork in green onion wraps and myriad other Beijing-styled region specialities deliver surprising flavour and outstanding value at this neighborhood greasy spoon.

Sanlitun’s skyline has been forever changed by the arrival of the InterContinental. The technicolour display blazes indifferently into the night’s reverie, a beacon of the continuing gentrification of the area – and the rising price point for a good time in general. Everything about the InterCon seems like it was designed with high-class partying in mind, from the marble decor to the crimson fedoras worn by uniformed staff.

The playfully opulent design of this steakhouse moderne combines elements of commercial pop art and trinkets from a gentleman of leisure’s world travels – the thick buckles and studded suitcases pair nicely with tones of brushed bronze patina and the smell of real leather. It smacks in part of Parkview Green’s high-design boutique property, Hotel Eclat. A waitress approaches, drinks are ordered and the menu is cracked.

You can tell a lot about a restaurant by the first few menu items. At Char you get a 180g Blackmore fillet mignon with half a grilled lobster, foie gras and shaved truffles – all of which are mindbendingly excellent – clocking in at a cool 2,188RMB. That’s right, Char is not for the faint of heart of light of wallet.

We regain our composure over an assortment of freshly shucked oysters (335RMB), briny and delicious in their cool baths of rich ocean liquor; fat Kumamotos and meaty Tia Maraas are a welcome surprise. Next a slightly flat, monotone, lobster bisque (138RMB) cries out for a splash of vermouth or sherry to wake it up, but dies a quiet lonely heat death, without enough sea flavour to stand up to the raw shellfish. A Caesar salad (128RMB) does a better job, with a delicious sous-vide egg supplying richness that the dressing lacks and crispy wisps of fried ham doing the rest.

For any steakhouse the main event is the meat, and Char does flaunt some impressive offerings. The famous Australian-raised wagyu from producer David Blackmore (1,288RMB per 180g) is exquisitely rich, with ripples of flavour-laden beef fat across the palate. We find the Jack’s Creek grain-fed ribeye (438RMB per 250g) to be a more toothsome, if comparably flavourful, alternative. Pair it with a glass of Tempranillo Rioja (218RMB).

Vegetarian options exist but seeking them would raise more questions than it would answer – Char is for carnal indulgences of the highest order. We end the meal with a trio of pineapple ravioli, a tart finish with a zippy lime mousse that helps cut some of the residual fat from the palate. For high-fashion beefy indulgence in the centre of the city, look no further than Char. Just be sure to bring that platinum credit card.