This is the second of three articles on great Beijing restaurants in beautiful settings. The others are Duck de Chine and Green T. House Living.

Maison Boulud a Pekin

This is Daniel Boulud's latest restaurant and the first outside the US. The restaurant is in the old American Embassy in the newly renovated and very upscale Legation Quarter (it's also called the Ch'ien Men 23 area), once the location of foreign embassies, just off the east side of Tiananmen Square. (Here's the Wikipedia article on the historical Legation Quarter.)

As you would expect from a Boulud restaurant, the food was perfectly prepared and the service almost spot on (one waitress had to call another person over to understand my "dirty martini" order). Like at the China Grill, it almost didn't feel like we were in China. My tasting menu with wine pairings was excellent (and they kept refilling my glass -- a nice plus). It's a great place to dress up and get away from the commotion of China. It's maybe the perfect place before taking in a symphony or opera at the National Centre for the Performance Arts (aka "the Egg") nearby. They have English menus and speak English well.

We walked around the Legation Quarter after dinner and checked out some of the other bars and restaurants. They're mostly just opening up now (lots of soft openings) so the managers were happy to show us around. Looks like there will be some fun places.

Address: Number 23 Qianmen Dong Da Jie. +86-010-6559-9200

In the past few weeks, we've been to a few really amazing restaurants set in very different but beautiful locations. This is the first of three posts describing the restaurants. The others are Maison Boulud a Pekin and Green T. House Living.

Duck de Chine

This may be my favorite restaurant in Beijing now and is certainly the best Beijing duck place (IMHO). This gorgeous restaurant is part of the 1949 Hidden City complex -- a set of very cool bar/restaurants in an old factory complex in Chaoyang. The area has my favorite balance of swish yet comfortable.

I had the good fortune to meet the manager and chef on one visit; they gave us a tour of the kitchen and explained their process. They have very strict quality standards, using a particular kind of duck, fed a particular way, and harvested at exactly 39 days. The cook the ducks over a wood fire (and the wood is aged, etc.) and even make their own hoisin sauce. The chef is from Hong Kong, so he brings the more delicate Cantonese style to their Beijing cuisine. (Their slogan is the cheeky "One Duck, Two Systems" borrowed from the phrase that China uses to describe how they rule Hong Kong, "One Country, Two Systems".) The duck was lightly smoky, not dry at all and yet not fatty or oily. They presented slices of crispy skin-only, skin with meat, and just meat so each diner could choose their own balance. Simply perfection. The other dishes were well-prepared also. One mixed veggie dish is a good example. While it seemed simple, each of the different vegetables was perfectly done (even though they had different cooking times) and coated with exactly the right amount of the sauce; there was no extra sauce pooling on the bottom of the dish nor was anything under-covered.

According to Michelle, their lunchtime dim sum is among the very best dim sum she's ever had (and we've had some damn good dim sum before). The restaurant also has a good (if expensive) wine list, makes good cocktails (hard to find in Beijing), and has the first Bollinger champagne bar in Beijing. They have English menus, and the staff can manage some English. There are a few other places in the 1949 Hidden City I want to try including a noodle bar and taverna. They also have a private club called the 49 Club; we looked into it, but it was just an expensive way to get private dining rooms. Maybe good for people who do a lot of business entertaining, but not worth it for us. In any case, 1949 and Duck de Chine are definitely worth visiting.

I didn't take any good photos here, but my friend Richard got some good ones.

Address: Gong Ti Bei Lu behind the Pacific Century Place department store in Chaoyang.) +86 10 6501 8881.

I don't really have much of a sweet tooth, which surprises some people since I love pretty much all other kinds of food. It's pretty much the one class of food to which I can say "no".  I like sweets, but I just strongly prefer salty stuff. So, it should come as no surprise, then, that my favorite confection in the world is Fran's Gray Salt Caramels.

Fran's is a Seattle-based chocolatier who makes a luscious caramel, robes it in rich chocolate, and the sprinkles a few grains of gray salt on top. The salt really brings out the yumminess (sorry for the technical term) in the caramel and provides a nice balance to the sweetness. They also make an equally great smoked salt caramel.

These little morsels of love are one of the few things we've had friends bring to us from Seattle to China; pretty much everything else we've been able to find here or live without. Michael (8) is especially fond the "salties", as he calls them.

If you can't wait to try them (and really shouldn't be waiting) and you don't happen to live in Seattle, you can order online right now. Too bad they don't deliver to China...

I just came across this photo I took last summer in Tokyo, which I clearly forgot to post at the time. What a ridiculously awesome sandwich. I'm pretty sure the Japanese on the poster says, "An honorable way to die. Get one today!"

Three all beef patties, special sauce, lettuce, cheese, pickles, onions, bacon, and an egg on a sesame seed bun... (The song and the sandwich are clearly better with the egg, bacon, and extra patty.)

Last night we went to a delicious and fun restaurant called The Noodle Loft. This restaurant is Shanxi-style and reflects that's province's fascination with noodles. They make a vast assortment of noodles there, all by hand, using a variety of techniques -- pulling, pinching, throwing, shaving with a knife, whacking off with a chopstick, and so on. We had four different types and barely scratched the surface.

One really cool preparation is where they make an entire serving of pasta from one very long noodle. The chef stands about 4-5 feet from the boiling water, pulls the dough from behind him and throws the single strand into the pot. He repeats this motion, pulling more yardage of noodle from the dough and throwing it. It's hard to describe but fun to watch. Here's a (bad) photo of the action. You can kind of see the long green noodle in motion.

On top of their good food, they had a show kitchen so you could see all the action. It had a bar around one edge with seats for a close-up view. The boys enjoyed watching everything and then got in on a the dough handling when one of the cooks gave them each a blob of dough. Andrew (11) declared that he might want to work there someday. (He's deciding between noodle chef, US Marine sniper, and Microsoft game developer. Pretty wide range.)

The Chinese name (面酷 - mian4 ku4) is way better than Noodle Loft. I think it can be translated as "Cool Noodles", "Extreme Noodles" or even "Cruel Noodles". Either way, it's a great place that we'll be headed back to.

(I've included a scan of both sides of their business card to help you find it. I'll try to do this going forward when the card has a map or other useful info.)

Since I arrived in Tokyo last week, I've been on a minor ramen frenzy. I'm guessing many of you have only had instant ramen in a styrofoam cup. As I wrote before, I love them, and the Japanese voted the instant noodle the greatest Japanese invention of the 20th Century. I agree. That said, real well-made ramen is a thing of beauty and way, way better than the instant stuff.

Like many good things in the world, ramen comes from China originally (la mein in Chinese). Then, like many other good things in the world, the Japanese took someone else's idea and made it really great. It was all I could do this week to not drag my family and friends to ramen for every meal (it turns out the Japanese have other good food too...)

Jangara Ramen

I've written about these guys before after I went last summer. This time, I went to two different locations. The first was in Akasaka near the Live Search team's office. This was much smaller than the Harajuku location, with just a few seats. My foodie colleagues and I actually went after the team dinner, even though we were totally stuffed, just because we wanted to eat the yummy ramen. This time I had the Bonshan ramen, an even richer, whiter pork broth full of tongue coating collagen and deep flavor (they claim that it's good for your skin too!). It's really simply luscious. I think it's even better than the signature Kyushu Jangara. Like a junkie, I actually went back to the Akasaka Jangara after the next night's dinner, but cooler heads prevailed this time. (Wimps.) I later reprised our summer visit to the Harajuku Jangara with Michelle, the boys, and my cousin Jessica, who is working in Japan. The line was long, but it was worth the wait. They have English menus, and the staff handled my English/Japanese/pantomime ordering with ease.

 
My colleagues Jill, Helen, and John outside the Akasaka Jangara Ramen.

 
A bowl of Bonshan ramen at the counter. (Sorry for the lousy pic.)

 
The aftermath.

 

Tetsugama Ramen

We chose Testugama mostly out of convenience since it's close to our hotel in Roppongi Hills. Like Jangara, it's Kyushu style (so pork-based soup) but theirs are lighter tasting. Like many ramen places, you actually order at a machine first, putting in money and then pushing buttons for the things you want. You get a stack of little tickets which you then hand to the waiter.

I ordered the spicy soup with hard noodles. (You can order hard, medium, or soft noodles. This isn't a statement about the doneness of the noodles; rather it's about the type.) This was so good Michelle claimed eminent domain and took the bowl. I enjoyed her shio (salt) based ramen instead. Their gyoza (dumplings) were also delicious. We really liked the feel of the place -- very friendly. I'm sad we discovered it so late in our trip; I'm pretty sure we would have gone back again otherwise. They do not have English menus, but the waiter did a fine job pointing out the major things we might want on the order taking machine.

Tetsugama's entrance

Michael (8) in front of the order machine.

  
My (soon to be Michelle's) spicy ramen. (I started eating before I realized I should take a photo, so the lovely presentation is a bit messed up.)

 

Restaurant Kurosawa

I should also note that we had a great soba dinner at Restaurant Kurosawa, another repeat visit from our summer trip (I didn't write about it that time, mostly out of laziness.) Kurosawa makes handcut soba with great buckwheat texture and taste. It's really different from the ramen noodles I mentioned above. Michael (8) loved the cold soba (dipped in sauce) so much that he ate half of another order. They also have other delicious dishes including a simple yet amazing tomato salad. For a noodle joint, it's not cheap, but boy, it's good. They have English menus.

Roppongi Restaurant Kurosawa storefront

 

The amazing tomato salad

I want to go out and eat more now...

For Christmas/Michelle's birthday dinner, we went with our friends Nori and Stacy and their son Jarett to the topmost restaurant in Beijing. Literally. The China Grill is on the 66th floor of the newly opened Park Hyatt Beijing. According to their website, this makes them the highest restaurant in Beijing -- a believable claim.

Naturally, the view is stunning: 360 degrees including a view down Changandajie -- the main drag that crosses in between Tiananmen Square and the Forbidden City. We had a pretty good evening as far as air quality goes (better than in the photo from their website above) so the view was nice. Even the heavy traffic looks good 66 floors up. (Unfortunately, the photos from my point-and-shoot weren't as great.)

The food was excellent as well. They serve both Western and Chinese food. We all opted for the Western meals since eating Chinese food here seemed a bit silly in the middle of China, plus we all  wanted steaks. I started out with an excellent martini, and my blue crab cake appetizer was really delicious, perhaps the best crab cakes I've ever had (which is a big deal since crab cakes are plentiful and tasty in Seattle). The ribeye steak was perfectly prepared and the shared sides of creamed spinach, mashed potatoes, and buttered asparagus were equally yummy. The other adults seemed to enjoy their meals as much as I did, and Michael (8) and Jarett ate their sushi with gusto (Andrew (11), as always, ate very little). I normally can pass on dessert, but the ones we tried were all great as well.

The service was great with good English from the wait staff. It's actually hard to find world-class quality service in Beijing, even at the best hotels (Michelle was practically run over by the staff at the Ritz Carlton brunch for instance) so this was a hugely welcome discovery. We all noted that it felt like we were in Tokyo -- high praise since the service in Japan is typically excellent.

The only real downside was how hard it was to find the hotel and the entrance. It's a brand new hotel that opened after the Olympics so no one, including our awesome driver, knew where it was. There is virtually no exterior signage marking the driveway (just small dark letters on a dark wall) and the entrance is actually under the building. In case you're looking for it, the entrance is on the south side of the Jintai building, facing Jianwai SOHO. You will still miss the entrance on your first drive-by.

The price was expensive by Beijing standards but not out of line with what you'd pay for similar meals in other top world cities. It's definitely a great place for special occasions. I look forward to going back for drinks or for lunch (and the view during the daytime).

China Grill at the Park Hyatt Beijing, floor 66
2 Jianguomenwai Street,
Chaoyang District, Beijing
+86-10-8567-1098

This is a long overdue post. Last month, just before we moved, I was in Hong Kong for an offsite. Since I had arrived early from the US, I followed up on a tip from a foodie buddy, Meng, who said I just HAD TO go try the dan ta at Tai Cheong Bakery (the website is much more fancy than the bakery). This hole-in-the-wall bakery is famous for these sweet desserts - thick egg custard in a pastry pie crust. Chris Patten, the former British Governor of Hong Kong, was apparently a big fan of the place.

So I trekked up the Central-Mid-Level escalators and looked around for the place. (As an aside, why do they have the escalators going down but not up in the morning? I don't care if there are more people going down. The damn hill is steep!) Although I was completely unable to follow a map that morning, I eventually found Tai Cheong and ventured in.

I bought the last two dan ta and some sugar puffs (blobby donuts covered in sugar). They were all still warm and fresh smelling. I took the bag and ate the goodies right on the street, across from the bakery.

OMFG, I had never had anything like these dan ta. The crust was tasty and flaky (apparently they use lard -- further evidence that pigs are proof of a kind and loving God) and the custard was rich, eggy, and densely flavorful. (My mouth is watering again as I write this six weeks later).

After I scarfed these two tarts down, I ate the sugar puff; this might have been even better than the dan ta. It was kind of like a warm brioche covered in sugar. If I hadn't bought the last two tarts, I might have gone back in for more. These were heaven on earth. What's more, they were cheap. I love Hong Kong. If you are in HK, be sure to go.

Tai Cheong Bakery
35, Lyndhurst Terrace
Central, Hong Kong
Tel: (+852) 2544 3475

Other info:

• In Cantonese, they say "daan taat" instead of the Mandarin "dan ta".
• The Tai Cheong website
• A nice write-up
• Ignore articles you find on the web saying the bakery is closed. They apparently did or almost did, but they're still around. I almost didn't go thinking the place was closed.

We've been sampling a lot of restaurants around our apartment and in the nearby environs, so I thought I'd share some of the places we especially like so far (and write them down so we remember.)

[Note: I've included the Chinese names where I have them. If you see a bunch of boxes in the post, it's because you don't have Chinese fonts installed. If see a bunch of non-Chinese looking characters, try changing your encoding to Unicode UTF-8. In IE, go the View menu and choose Encoding and then find Unicode (UTF-8).]

Din Tai Fung (鼎泰丰 - ding3 tai4 feng1): This is a well-known Shanghai-style chain from Taiwan known for their insanely good and juicy dumplings. We love this place and have been several times. The ones here in Beijing are much nicer than the one I went to in Taipei. In case you're looking for one, they also have branches in Los Angeles, Japan, Korea, Australia, Singapore, Hong Kong, and Jakarta. There are two branches in Beijing. The older one seems to be everyone's favorite (quieter, more private rooms), but the one at Shin Kong Place was fine too.

Guo Tie Zhou Pu (锅贴粥铺 -- guo1 tie1 zhou1 pu1): How can a place named "Potsticker Congee Spread" be bad? As the name implies, they specialize in potstickers and congee. They have a wide variety of fillings for the potstickers; we stuffed our faces with three different kinds of potstickers: pork and chive, pork and pickled vegetables, and egg and spinach. We didn't even get to the lamb or seafood parts of the menu. The noodles in the zhajiangmein (a Beijing specialty) were home made and lovely too. This is definitely a locals restaurant at local prices; we spent 50 RMB- US$7.31 for all four of us!! The most expensive part was probably the liter bottle of Sprite they brought out (it was the only size). Even better, they had English menus so we could more easily order. This is a winner; we'll be back. Address: 朝阳门南小街，金宝街西南口，向南100米 (从长安街国际饭店往北走)
Chaoyangmen Nanxiaojie, Jinbao jie xinankou, xiang nan 100 mi (cong Changan Jie, Guo Ji Fan Dian wang bei zhou). Thanks to Savour Asia for the find (they have a bunch of other places listed too. Must go try them as well.)

Isshin (日本料理 - ri4 ben3 liao4 li3): Isshin is a very good Japanese restaurant. The tonkatsu (fried pork cutlet) I had was better than most of the tonkatsu I'd had in Japan this summer -- tender and juicy meat with a very crisp coating. Michelle's tempura was good too, and Andrew (11) and Michael (8) ate a ton of tamago (this sort of scrambled egg thing, normally served as sushi but here they had just the egg) and tekka maki (tuna sushi rolls). Even the edamame (boiled soybeans) were better than average. To top it all off, they were very friendly - even giving Transformer toys to the boys after dinner as a gift. We went to the branch in Jianwai SOHO. It's in building 15 on the western half of this huge complex -- make sure you go to the correct part. The cab dropped us off on the eastern part, so we had a long hike in the cold and wind to get to the right place. There are at least three other branches in Beijing in the northwest part (closer to my office!  Yippee!)

Meeting Point: This is a  very decent family Italian restaurant in the basement of "The Place" shopping mall. Their pasta is all freshly made and served with tasty sauces (I almost stole half of Andrew's carbonara). The thin crust pizza was good as well as was the Montepulciano by the glass Michelle ordered. Perhaps the most amazing thing, however, was the hot chocolate the kids ordered. It wasn't the hot chocolate drink we expected (although it was on the beverage menu and served in a mug); it was more like a hot chocolate pudding with just the right level of sweet and bitter chocolate flavor. The boys didn't like it much, but Michelle and I gladly finished the rest. Unfortunately, the salads were disappointing. More room for hot chocolate! The Italian owner is very nice too.

Xiao Wang Fu (小王府 - xiao3 wang2 fu3): Yum, yum, yum! Very tasty Beijing-style food: good duck, killer jiaozi (dumplings), to-die-for salt and pepper ribs, and the list goes on. The one we went to on Guanghua Lu (near the Kerry Centre behind Guomao) was decidedly not fancy, but let me say again -- yum. The Ritan Park location is apparently much nicer (and more expensive) with a patio. We were especially thrilled to learn they deliver to our apartment (with a delivery fee of only 1 RMB - about US$.14 -- yes, fourteen cents -- per dish.) Xiao Wang Fu was also pretty cheap; we spent 172 RMB (US$25) for six dishes. Finally, they have what I consider the perfect menu -- Chinese, English, Pinyin, and photos. Address: 朝阳区光华路东里2号, Cháoyángqū Guānghuá Lùdōng Lǐ 2 Hào, GuoMao.

Paulaner Brauhaus: The famous German brewery has a microbrewery/restaurant in Beijing where they make their own beer. Michelle and I had a nice, authentic lunch there -- good wurst, pretzels, and beer. Only the onion soup was bleh. Except for the Chinese waitstaff, we could have been in Germany. It's in the Kempinski Hotel near Lufthansa Center.

Pekotan Butcher and Deli: This is a great shop in our neighborhood with amazingly good bread (especially the baguettes); it just smells like a French bakery when you walk in. They have some attractive set menu lunches for 28 RMB (US$4) that we still need to try plus a good selection wine for purchase. After 9:00pm the baked goods are half off (and they're not expensive to begin with); I've braved the cold a few times already to get the still-yummy bread for half price (it's so dry here that the stuff doesn't really get stale.) Address: Central Park Apartments, Tower 12.

Yonghe King (永和大王 - yong3 he2 da4 wang2): This is a huge fast food chain with hundreds of outlets across China. Fortunately for me, there's a branch just a short walk away from the office. They're clean, open 24 hours a day, cheap, and delicious. I've had breakfast there several times and dinner once. The congee is very good as are the dan bing you tiao (kind of an egg coated flaky tortilla around a fried non-sweet donut -- hard to explain, but trust me, it's great.) The beef noodle soup is good too. They have a few set menus with photos on the board, so I can order something; I need to translate more of the non-photo items to try more stuff out. This is cheap too; I spend I think 10 or 12 RMB for breakfast (about US$1.50).

Yotsuba (四叶 - si4 ye4): This is widely considered to be one of the best (if not the best) sushi joints in Beijing; we saw no reason to dispute that view. They fly their fish in daily from Tokyo's Tsukiji Fish Market, so everything is very fresh and oishii (Japanese for delicious). The first one is in Chaoyang; we went to the one in Shunyi at Lake View Place (near Dragon Bay Villas); this is walking distance from our house!

Our good friends Chris and Leslie threw a lovely going away party for us last night, themed "B(ac)on Voyage" (Chris lost the party naming with his entry of "Chor-revoir"). Obviously the theme of the evening was bacon. Leslie really outdid herself, making bacon-infused bourbon to power the Bacon Old Fashioned cocktails -- a delicious blend of bacon-infused bourbon, maple syrup, bitters, and orange. It was meant to be a bit of a joke, but they really turned out well. The bourbon was just a bit smoky and a great match with the maple syrup and bitters. (The real proof of excellence is that Michelle stole my drink after tasting it.)

Leslie also made bacon-maple-chocolate chip cookies, which tasted for all the world like chocolate chip pancakes with maple syrup and bacon -- yummy -- as well as BLTs (always delicious). There were a whole host of other good foods too, but I admit, I only had eyes for the bacon flavored treats (no surprise).

Once we were fed and watered, the guests rocked out to Rock Band 2 (with the hot new Fender Precision Bass ). This was a surprisingly good group of Rock Banders, especially given the high average age of the party-goers. There are definitely some good songs in RB2, so I think we'll have to get a copy before we go.

For another view of the evening, here's Leslie's account.

Obviously, huge thanks to Leslie and Chris for hosting the party and to all our friends who shared the evening with us. We're lucky to have such great friends and will certainly miss them once we move to Beijing. Hopefully, we'll see everyone a bunch both in Seattle and Beijing.