Never Ask What You Are Eating

food in Beijing is amazing!
  
You Fancy Now

There are the restaurants with fancy lighting and very nice interior. If you really are cool and have a larger group, you get a private room with a table and air-conditioning.  A lot of the places I've been to have this glass you can rotate at the middle of the table.
As mentioned before, when you order, the dish is meant to be shared by all so the portions are huge and the rotating table comes in handy. People usually order juice or pop. This comes in a large bottle that gets poured into people's glasses as needed. Tea is also very common to be had with a meal. Sometimes they serve hot water to drink.

The food is prepared so it not only tastes great but looks awesome as well. I have eaten sweet and sour fish which was very delicious. It was a whole fish diced up into little squares but still attached to the skeleton and the fish head, tail were all there of course. Same with duck, it was a whole duck diced up into pieces, bones and all. Keep in mind that all food is eaten with chopsticks even soup and meat, so the meat has to be cut up. Prices are about 25 yuan to 60 and up.

Those eggs are are obviously not from a chicken but taste good

 Local Specialty


There are also plenty of local restaurans you can go to. Those places have a couple flies flying around and the menu is usually all in chinese symbols, so when I order, i just have to take a gamble and have a suprise meal. The food is not as fancy but very delicious. The dish prices range from 5 yuan, something very small that you should order more than one to 30.


Craving a Big Mac?

Another type is the fast food chinese style, chinese food that takes minutes to prepare and is open 24hrs a day, not as good but still much better than anything you could get in the USA. prices range from 1yuan to 30.

KFC delivers! on a bike, just like Pizza Hut

We also have McDonalds, KFC, Subway and Pizza Hut. They are not very common but can be seen from time to time. Their interior is very nice and the food options are somewhat the same but modified flavors. Like ice cream in McDonalds is not only vanilla but 3 other flavors. Same with the little pies for desert, not only apple but other fruit, some I have never heard of.

Different type of meat on stick, I'm sorry its a little blurry

Eating off the Streets, but Exactly What are You Eating?


One last type of food is streeet food. people set up a little griddle on a cart at a corner or side of the street and sell food. They cook it right there as you watch. It is very good and extremely cheap. There is meat on a stick. just be ready that the meat could be anything and you would not know it. I've seen liver, ear, chicken neck, heart, chicken feet, octopus, pigeon and rest i could not identify. You could also get fried tofu, dumplings, fried dough, pancakes that are composed of dough, egg and you can request meat along with lettuce, known in our group as the "chinese taco".

Look to the right in the picture, a typical stand with food











In restaurants, sometimes it is not a good idea to inquire what you are eating either. I have had a local specialty donkey meat in a sandwich. It was very good. Also, never look in the kitchen! Even in the fancy restaurants, it's dirty or very dirty.

Mythical Chinese Food

1. Fortune cookies are NOT chinese. I have not seen one fortune cookie the whole time i was here.
2. Kung Pao Chicken tases very different from Panda Express
3. There is no such thing as fried rice. They can make it for you if you specify what exactly this phrase entails.
4. Egg rolls are not really eaten here.