We woke up quite early, lazed around in bed checking our phones, reading etc. We finally got up around eight as we had to meet our Lost Plate morning food tour before 9 AM. We left at 8:45 - walked down the alley (Yey I saw a Jianbing maker so will go get some tomorrow morning) and around the corner to meet in front of the fire station to meet Iris our tour guide.

We had to wait a bit as another couple was supposed to join us buty they didn't show up so the tour ended up just being the two of us, Iris and our driver. We jumped into a tuk tuk an were off to our first stop a beef pancake place. The hand rolled/pushed and flattened dough was worked on a table until it was very thin than filled on one edge with a mixture of beef, leeks and onions and than rolled all into the dough and up over the filling until it was a big round ball. The ball was than flattened out and fried each side in oil. It turned out to taste fantastic and I could see how it would be very filling for breakfast. They had been operating in this location for 70 years with three generations.

Our next stop was a breakfast beef stew place. Our guide found seats for us in this very busy restaurant and she waited in line to get a bowl of the stew for us to try. We got one bowl to share and some bread. We saw people tearing up the bread and putting it in the stew so I did the same. To be perfectly truthful it didn't look appetizing at all. It was a very gloopy consistency and looked bland. As soon as I took a bite I could see why there were lineups every morning and they ran out before noon. The stew had so many layers of flavours and the vegetables had a perfect tenderness to them. It was very spicy by itself and than there was chili oil on top. Hubby found it way to spicy and I found it quite spicy even for me. 

Our next stop was to a cricket store. Many people buy them as pets. Crickets are huge. I had not idea they got that big. They wanted to show us crickets fighting but we didn't want to see that so they just had two jump around a little.

From there we walked through a morning market and saw lots of lovely produce etc. There were some absolutely huge radishes, some kohlrabi, lettuces, squash, pumpkin that looked like Kombucha squash but they called it pumpkin and lots of different nuts and seeds. It was a lovely walk with some interesting people watching.

Afterwards we met up with our tuk tuk driver and we drove to another busy market where Iris jumped out and grabbed some snacks to take to the next spot as there wasn't anywhere to park and have them there. Our final stop was for dumpling in broth and hand pulled noodles with beef and veggies. The noodles were fabulous but I was getting so full I couldn't finish them. The dumpling were good but the broth was quite sour. I liked the dumplings we had at the Hutong place in Beijing better as the broth was spectacular. 

All in all it was a wonderful tour. After they dropped us back to our apartment we both puttered for a little bit and than after all that rich food we both had naps. That night it was hubby's turn to choose dinner but he couldn't find anything he liked so we ended up at KFC at the mall which was fine if a little difficult to order thighs but they pulled in a guy who spoke english and everything was soon organized.

After dinner we took a walk to see the Bell tower and than through a park with lots of snuggling teenagers to the Drum tower. We sat for a bit enjoying the brightly lit tower and hubby noted that maybe part of the Muslim market was behind the tower but we were too tired to explore anymore so home and bed we went back the way we had come.