Beijing food consists of local specialties and those delicacies from all over the country. When you walk down the hutongs in Beijing, you will be amazed by various restaurants and snack bars. But if you don't try the following dishes and snacks, your Beijing tour can be somewhat wasted.
Beijing Roast Duck, also known as Beijing Kaoya or Peking Duck, is considered to be most delicious food in China and renowned both inside and outside the country for being agreeably fatty and its tempting appearance, tender meat and delicate taste. Characterized by the slightly yellow appearance, tender taste and light fragrance, Beijing Roast Duck can be taken with other meat or vegetable foods, thus not only a popular dish for banquets but also a home-style delicacy. Quanjude Roast Duck Restaurant (全聚德 Quánjùdé) in Beijing is the most famous roast duck restaurant around the world.
Beijing Noodles with Soybean Sauce, or Beijing Zhajiang Noodles, is ranked in the top 10 noodles of China. The essence of authentic Beijing Zhajiang Noodles lies in its fried sauce made of superior yellow soybean paste. The control of heat and selection of ingredients also count, which are to be done by experienced chefs. The proportion of fried sauce is also critical. A great proportion of diced fat and lean meat can make the fried sauce tasty.
Beijing BBQ is a special barbecue roasted on a round iron plate with fruitwood and pine chips. Put the marinated beef and mutton slices on the plate to roast over and over again and eat with the ready-made sesame cake. When the BBQ is done, it will make you mouth-watering and the space will be full of meat flavor.
Beijing Mung Bean Milk is a local specialty made of mung bean. The starch is extracted, leaving the grayish-green fluid to make the Mung Bean Milk by fermenting and boiling. The boiled bean milk looks dark in color and tastes sour with a tinge of sweetness. In fact, you may feel the peculiar odor is unpalatable for the first try though it is of high nutritional value.
Quick-Fried Tripe, a specialty of Beijing, can be seen everywhere in Beijing. Cut the clean tripe of sheep or beef into slices and cook with boiling water; then dip in the mixture of oil, sesame paste, vinegar, chili oil, fermented bean curd broth and chopped green onion, etc. to enjoy, which is tasty and refreshing.
The main ingredients of Fried Liver include pork intestine and liver which are cleaned and sliced to stew in a pot of pork bone soup with seasonings. At last, dress with starchy sauce before served. Although named "Fried Liver", this snack is in fact not fried but stewed, and there is more pork intestine than liver in it.
It is believed that Stewed Pork Offal originated in Nanheng Street in South Beijing. In the age of expensive meat, the laboring people used to cook pork offal instead of pork. Stewed Pork Offal is cooked with wheaten cake, pork intestine and lung. Take a bowl of steaming Stewed Pork Offal covered with mashed garlic, chili oil and chopped scallion, you will find the pork intestines are thoroughly cooked but not mushy while the wheaten cake and pork lung with enough broth are tasty but not greasy.
The ingredients of this snack include rhubarb rice flour, soybean flour, sweetened bean paste, white sugar, sesame oil, sweet osmanthus and nuts. The stuffed rolls are finally rolled in soybean flour to cover with the flour evenly, and the process is just a donkey rolls on the ground, thus the name. Glutinous Rice Roll with Sweet Bean Flour is a sweet and glutinous dessert for all ages.
The wrap of this snack is mainly made of flour and glutinous rice flour while its fillings consist of sesame seeds and walnuts with white sugar. The snack tastes sticky, soft and sweet. The fillings are manifold and generally range from nutritious nuts to yam paste. Therefore, it is a nutritious food.
Copper pot, mutton and sesame paste are essential to Instant-Boiled Mutton. This dish is easy to make. With clear soup as the bottom, the delicacy of mutton is maximized. In this dish, the mutton is supposed to be fresh, tender and free of mutton smell while other ingredients shall be fresh.