BEIJING, CHINA

HOTELS

Hotel G

Boutique hotel near Workers Stadium and Sunlitun Village
Large rooms and bathrooms. King size beds. Modern décor. Friendly staff, with an intermediate level of English.
Basic gym and business center.
Breakfast in hotel restaurant is decent. Has both western and Asian options.
Near a number of good restaurants and a spa (Long Island Spa is around the corner)

RESTAURANTS

YueLu Mountain Dining Place
West Gongti Rd. Chaoyang District

Hunan style restaurant next door to the Hotel G and a couple blocks away from the Workers Stadium
Menu highlights: Fish head soup – braised fish head in sauce with spicy pickled vegetables minced on top. Be sure to ask for fresh noodles to sop up the sauce once you’ve finished picking at the head. Vermicelli noodles on hotplate. Red braised pork (Mao Shi Hong Shao Rou) famous for being Chairman Mao’s favorite dish – braised pork belly with green and red bell peppers. Fried cabbage comes with dried red peppers and a delicious acidic note from black vinegar.
*Stay away from the roast duck. Completely inedible. Dehydrated duck, mainly bones and incredibly spicy. Like jerky but gone horribly wrong.

Spice Spirit
Sunlitun Village

Szechuan style food. Very spicy but delicious.
Menu highlights: basically everything but mapo dofu and pork belly with steamed buns were particularly excellent.

Si Chuan Hui Guan (Si Chuan Club House)
B block, The Third Land, Shuguanxili, No 1. Chaoyang District

Excellent Szechuan food. Went with co-workers who ordered everything in Chinese but think it can be done with just English speakers and lots of pointing
Menu highlights: Kung pao chicken – fried with light sauce, covered in chilies. Fish poached in oil with Szechuan peppercorns. Mapo dofu. Cold cucumber slices in light vinegar give the palate a cooling break in between all the spicy offerings. Szechuan sausage is a tasty secret. Served cold and sliced in an oval shape the fat is infused with Szechuan peppercorns. As the fat dissolves the delightful numbing sensation of the peppercorn spreads but never mutes the smokey, hearty flavor of the sausage itself.