Best dimsum restaurants in Beijing

If you are an authentic Chinese food lover, you must be familiar with dimsums. Here, we pick the best restaurants in Beijing where you can get the best shrimp dumplings, steamed creamy custard buns, and char siu bao.

Tang Palace

Owned by the Hong Kong Tang Palace Food and Beverage Group, the Tang Palace chain restaurant is almost a household name for dim sum in Beijing. With deluxe décor and a spacious dining hall that resembles the traditional large dim sum restaurants in Guangdong, the Tang Palace is popular among customers from Guangdong. It is said that the branch inside the Beijing Tibet Hotel is the best of all, though you have to find out on your own if it’s true.

Crystal Jade Restaurant

The restaurant in the SKP Shopping Mall is on the must-go list of dim sum lovers in Beijing. It not only features the classic dim sum like shrimp dumplings, chaoshan fenguo, and chilled mango sago pomelo dessert, but also the contemporary dishes like the most photographed tomatoes with Japanese sesame dressing – wait, you said you didn’t see the dressing? It’s inside the tomatoes!

Dragon Court

Indeed, it seems that only the dim sum restaurants with deluxe décor can go with such name today. What’s more, the Dragon Court has proved with its food that the name is no exaggeration. Its steamed creamy custard buns are said to be the best in Beijing, because it managed to achieve the just the right consistency of the creamy custard inside the buns, which is quite tricky. You may also try chaoshan casserole porridge and Guangdong dishes other than dim sum here.

Lei Garden

Lei Garden is an old and well-established restaurant brand for Guangdong cuisine, with Michelin-starred branches in both Hong Kong and Shanghai. Its signature dish Cantonese crispy pork belly, with strictly selected top-quality pork and a sophisticated cooking process, is a taste from heaven. Just remember to reserve the dish before you go to the restaurant, because it’s highly possible that the dish will be sold out!

Hengshan Hui

The restaurant has been the favorite of people from Guangdong and Hong Kong who live in Beijing since its opening in 2008. The authentic flavours of its dim sum have made all praises redundant. What’s also special at Hengshan Hui is its down-to-earth atmosphere that reminds people of the local Guangdong restaurants, where guests actually see dim sum as part of their life instead of a special treat.

See more: Discover the traditional Cantonese dishes

Source: Internet

Try the unique and weird dishes in Mekong Delta, Vietnam

While wandering around one local market in the Mekong Delta, you can find it easy to catch the image of rats, scorpions, snakes, etc. being sold everywhere. From fish noodle soup to flavorful bee worm salad, these are a lot of specialty foods in Mekong Delta that you should not ignore while visiting this beautiful and peaceful region.

Bee worm salad in Ca Mau

Ca Mau has a favorable location (in the Mekong Delta of Southern Vietnam). That is why it is endowed with a plentiful source of food supply, ranging from the tropical forests to sea source. So, it is not hard to understand the cuisine here is more special and impressive. It seems a pity to ignore its delicacy, called bee worm salad. Taken from U Minh tropical forest, bee worm dazzles tourists with buttery, greasy and even strange flavor.

After dipped in boiling water, bee worm will be then fried on the pan. Other ingredients, including fried onion, pepper, fish sauce, and a bit sugar, will be also added. The next step is to soak sliced banana flower in salty water. To tickle gourmets’ taste buds, fried bee will be mixed with fried groundnuts, sliced banana flower, some kinds of herbs, and finally seasoned with chili, vinegar, and fish sauce. You can sense all kinds of flavor from this bee worm salad, from sweet, salty, sour and spicy, to buttery and greasy. These are all flawlessly combined to leave an unforgettable impression on your mouth.

Dishes from mouse

Food from mouse is considered a delicacy in Mekong Delta. On the whole, the locals are keenly fond of catching mice that have been grown in the rice fields. Mice are often found damaging coconut trees. That is why people tend to hunt them for food. For them, if the mice ate what they use and eat, they have to be eaten as well.

There are many ways to cook mouse in various dishes, like steamed rats, grilled rats, deep fried rats, and so on. The chef will carefully remove the mice’s heads, feet and fur. In addition, their organs are also cautiously removed because they may become poisonous without being carefully handled. Residents fall in love with eating mice because it was also part of their delicacy during the war. Thus, do not be hesitant to give this food a try once you set foot in Mekong Delta!

Gourami fish

As a specialty dish in Mekong Delta, Gourami fish (or Elephant ear fish, to the way local residents often call this fish) is always added to a list of many visitors who step into this region. Although its name sounds a bit weird because of its appearance which looks like an elephant ear, enjoying the fish can be a great experience. The dish is often found in many restaurants or kinds of homestay in the delta.

You are quite able to enjoy this dish in several restaurants in Ho Chi Minh City. But, to gain its true flavor and taste, it should be cooked in a traditional Mekong style. At that time, the chef will fry the whole fish to crispy perfection. Then, it will be cut into pieces and served upright. To get the most out of its flavor, you should roll a piece of fish, pickles, and vegetables in rice paper and then dip the roll in fish sauce, lemongrass and chili.

Various insects

If you do not want to stay anywhere near smelly food but still want to challenge yourself with adventurous food, go for fried insects. In many Asian cultures, eating insects is a common thing. The types of edible insects vary from grasshoppers, bee larvae, and white crickets to scorpions.

But why insects? Are we running out of food or is there any particular reason to eat those bugs? Lately, the United Nations has recommended people to consume insects instead of meat as it is a great source of protein, fat, and vitamin. In fact, it might sound weird but very healthy to ingest.

Frog

Frog is a “less scary” food compares with many others that will follow in the list and it is not only just a beer snack but Vietnamese also have it as a meal. The frogs used in cooking are small ones with long legs. They can usually be spotted in the Mekong Delta all year round, but the high season is in spring or during the rainy season. After skinning and gutting, it will be fried, steamed or grilled and then served on the dining table. You can enjoy it with rice or just have BBQ frog with lemon, salt, and pepper. Other than boiled or grilled, you can choose to eat frog curry, frog porridge, or sauteed frog with lemongrass and chili.

Source Internet

The top 5 beef noodle soup restaurants in Taiwan

A visit to Taipei is not complete without having a bowl of beef noodle soup. Braised beef stewed in a steamy, savoury broth and served with handmade noodles, you cannot think of a better meal.

Yong Kang Beef Noodle

Founded in 1963, this small, family-run, two-level restaurant has a reputation as one of the city's best places for beef noodle soup. Such is Yong Kang's status that it annually sits out the festival competition for Taipei's best beef noodles, preferring to pass the baton to upcoming restaurants or so it claims. Australian beef is used for the main cuts, but the DNA of the spicy red broth can be traced to Sichuan.

Address: Yong Kang Beef Noodles, No.17, Lane 31, Section 2, Jinshan South Road, Taipei, Taiwan

Lao Shan Dong Niu Rou Mian

According to this restaurant’s signage, it is been in business since 1949. Located in the Wan Nian Building in Ximen, this basement joint’s Jia Chang Mian (NT180, approx. SGD$8).

The beef dumpling soup was also tasty, and the dumplings were much larger than others. Take note that ordering is from a chit with only Chinese characters, no photo menus here.

Address: Lao Shan Dong Niu Rou Mian, No. 70, Xining South Road, Wanhua District Taipei City, 108. B1 Level, Taiwan

Regent Taipei

The Regent Taipei is a multiple-award winner at the Taipei Beef Noodle Festival and offers a number of acclaimed beef noodle dishes at its Azie Grand Cafe. New Formosa at Azie took the festival's creative prize in 2013. It features beef slices alongside bird's nest fern, a crunchy and slightly bitter green from Taiwan's mountains.

Address: Regent Taipei, No.3, Lane 39, Section 2, Chungshan North Road, Taipei 104 Taiwan

Lin Dong Fang

Another heavyweight in the old school beef noodle stakes, this hole-in-the-wall eatery has been pleasing palates for three decades. Its beef broth contains a secret ingredient the shop claims is used in traditional Chinese medicine.

Address: Lin Dong Fang Niu Rou Mian, No.274, Section 2, Bade Road, Taipei, Taiwan

Mien Mien Chu Tao Tasty Noodle House

Spicy, clear and tomato broths are offered at this beef noodle specialist with two outlets in the city. Unlike many red braised broths served around town, Mien Mien's Sze-chuan beef bone noodle soup is searingly spicy. The soup lives up to its name with a rich flavor of bone stock, chili burn and the mouth-numbing addition of Sichuan peppercorns.

Address: Mien Mien Chu Tao Tasty Noodle House, 1/F, 1-162 Fuhua Road, Section 1, Shilin District, Taipei, Taiwan

Source Internet