I've got spurs that Beijingle-jangle-jingle

Wednesday, September 05, 2012
Beijing, China
Wow, sorry for the lack of posts, everyone! We've been so caught up with our trip that we've been having difficulty setting aside time to update you with another blog post! Time to play a little catch up.

So… back to the story where we left off: Our intrepid adventurers had arrived in Beijing in the afternoon of September 1st, and were deciding how to spend the evening of their first day in China… .

We decided to venture out into the rain, to check out the nearby night market. By this time, it was nearly 9pm local time, and things were starting to shut down (weather-related, we were thinking). The huge pedestrian boulevard (Wangfujing St.) is closed to cars and trucks, and is normally packed with locals and tourists (as we've found out over the past few days). Imagine Yonge/Dundas Square, but four blocks long. That's close to what Wangfujing St. is like. On this particular evening, however, there was nearly nobody. We went down the little alleyway known for its snacks, and everyone was shutting down. Managed to get a pan-fried spring roll and a chicken-on-flatbread anyhow. Andrew got hosed, paying 20 yuan for the spring roll…. And was too sleep-addled to think it through, until after the fact. Ah well. Burned early means we'll be more careful later.

We realized that the subways here in Beijing close down at about 10:30pm, and we were rapidly approaching that time, which would also account for the lack of people out and about . We called it a night, and headed back to our hostel.

Sunday September 2nd

A beautiful (if overcast) morning! We recall that there was rain forecast for Sunday, but we managed to get away with none, all day. :)

We set out earlyish after a pretty crappy sleep (the beds are very hard, and Andrew couldn't get comfy), and a breakfast from the Hostel Restaurant (eggs, toast and all the fixin's for Andrew, and an omelet for Shannon). We set out for a day of wandering, heading towards "Ghost Street": a street in the north-eastern section of our area of Beijing known for having hundreds of restaurants (and most of them good!). We strolled towards the subway, and made our way to Beixinqiao subway station, bookending the Ghost Street strip. We knew which way to go immediately, due to the hundreds of red lanterns hanging in front of every restaurant, lining the street on both sides. We walked up one side and down the other, picking a restaurant that seemed busy .

There was a restaurant that seemed promising; lots of people eating and a bunch of them having hot pot. There was a picture menu with some rough English translations (very, very rough in certain cases). Andrew noticed many tables with people wearing plastic gloves and chowing down on crayfish...so this seemed like a promising choice. We managed ordering without too much difficulty, and got a few things for lunch, including some locally-brewed black beer, which was tasty. The first to arrive was a dozen crayfish, fried with a HUGE amount of dried chilies. This came with two pairs of disposable plastic gloves, which help to keep the chili oil and crayfish juices off your hand while you crack them open and eat them.    They were SO good. We also ordered a bowl of fried long beans with green chilies, which were amazing! (Yay, greens!) The green chilies were cut into the same shape as the beans, so they were a bit surprising when you bit down on them. :) The final dish we ordered was a bowl of stewed pork belly (skin-on) braised in soy and garlic . So tender, and damn tasty...reminded of Chef Walsh's "HF (holy f**k) Pork Belly".

After lunch, we walked back to the hostel in order to see more of the city, and bought some snacks on the way. We crashed for a nap, which turned into a solid sleep of 3hrs (damn jet lag). We rousted ourselves (with difficulty), and decided to head to a Muslim restaurant for dinner, recommended by the Lonely Planet (we didn't feel like wandering). After a short subway ride, we found ourselves wandering, and realized that the restaurant we were looking for wasn't there any more. Damn. >_
The rest of the evening basically consisted of the long walk back to the hostel, and crashing into bed.

Monday, September 3rd

The next morning we decided to do the Hutong wandering that was put off yesterday. A quick bite in the hostel restaurant, and we were off! We wandered due west towards the wall of the Forbidden City, and then north along the outside wall . We walked all the way to the north end of the Forbidden City before we actually got a glimpse of the moat, and the city beyond. Amazing views.   We walked the north end of the moat, and cut across the street to Jingshan Park, due north of the Forbidden City. What an amazing area. The park contains one of the few hills in Beijing, and it's a man-made one. The rubble from the construction of the HUGE moat around the Forbidden City was piled up, to create the hill in the centre of Jingshan Park.

We strolled through the landscaped gardens and trees, working our way up the hill, to the collection of pagodas on the way to the top. See the pictures for the view from the summit. Amazing. We wandered through the park for a good chunk of time, watching people playing the Chinese version of hackey-sack using something looking like a feathered badminton birdie. We saw people dancing, both Chinese traditional dance, and modern ballroom. We saw kids running and playing, and parents chasing . There was a musical performance that we heard from the top of the hill, but missed by moments when we finally got down to the performance area. Wandering through the park, we also happened upon a sort of "Dinosaur Park"...sections of treed walkway with dinosaur sculptures throughout. Huh.

After the park, we continued walking north towards the Drum and Bell Towers...not to actually go in since we were getting pretty pooched...but just for the nice walk. Heading north and east into a hutong neighborhood, we had our first restaurant roulette experience, here in Beijing! The hutongs are the ancient streets and alleys of Beijing, most of which have been demolished to make way for the development of the city. There are a few that are still intact (more or less), and that's where we wandered for the remainder of the afternoon. Lunch came at Shannon's sharp eye, noticing a busy little hole-in-the-wall. We went in, to many stares, and sat down. The menu was entirely Chinese, with very poor english translations, so we muddled our way through, eventually ordering a bowl of stewed veggies and noodles, and a meat pie, wrapped in dough and pan-fried . Tasty, if wanting salt.

We continued our Hutong wandering, working our way back to the hostel for a nap… which turned into a 3hr sleep again. (Damn jet lag!)

Upon waking, definitely refreshed, we decided to try the town's specialty dish, Beijing Roast Duck (known to most westerners as Peking Duck). The top restaurant in the city (arguably, of course) is Da Dong Roast Duck Restaurant. Chef Da Dong is known for raising his own ducks to his own specifications (half the fat content of regular ducks), and treating the ducks with a patented process, involving separating the skin from the flesh, and then air-drying them for days. The roasting process is done in specially-designed ovens (spherical), with real wood coals, to perfume the duck with smoke. The final animal is crispy all over, and very tender. We tried booking a reservation, but they were fully booked. We were recommended to just turn up, and get our name on a list, and wait for a table . We walked over, which wasn't far, and put our names on the list.

We were told the wait would be about 45min, but actually ran longer (almost an hour and a quarter). The view of the kitchen was highly entertaining, however, and we spent the time going over Da Dong's 100-page menu (o_O). When we were finally sat (at a HUGE long cut-log communal table), we ordered a bottle of Chianti from Italy, and a selection of things from the menu, building a little tasting menu, finishing with the roasted duck. The restaurant's beautiful, and definitely the sort of place for conspicuous consumption with a heavy emphasis on delicacies like sea cucumber, shark's fin, bird's nest, sea horse, etc. Several items on the menu were into the thousands of yuan (when, comparatively, a complete street meal will run you about 10 yuan).

We started with bowls of pumpkin soup, with chestnuts. The top was garnished with a black drizzle (truffle, maybe?) and also a creamy white drizzle . Very delicious, and delicate, with chunks of roasted chestnut. Very indicative of the approaching autumn season. We also ordered the baby peas with Chinese ham and olive oil. Passable, if underwhelming. The peas were a bit overcooked and there wasn't enough ham, to my taste. Tasty, in any case. The next dish was a platter of jellied pork hock, braised in soy, chilled and sliced. It was served on a salad of arugula, with sliced cherry tomatoes, and these lovely picholine olives. Very tasty! The duck arrived on a metal trolley, pushed by a cook with a tall white hat, wielding a cool rectangular serrated knife. As the cook began to disassemble the duck, our server dropped off a tray of condiments (which included julienned cucumber, julienned cantaloupe, pickled ginger, cured vegetable (?), garlic paste, granulated sugar, scallion, and a house-made hoisin). The cook took the crispy skin off the breast in a single sheet, and set it aside. He then sliced the duck, making sure to slice a little piece of crispy skin with each piece of meat . He laid the little slices skin-side out in a carefully constructed pile, finishing the top with the pieces of skin he took off the breast. The whole duck made two little plates, which were served with a steamer of crepes, and a couple of sesame puffs. You basically build a little wrap of the duck and condiments on the crepe and then munch away. The meal finished with a light broth of duck, with emulsified fat, which was rich, and light tasting. Iced grapes came with the bill, but were dirty, so we didn't eat them.

As an aside, there were a couple of guys sitting across from us on the communal table, who ordered easily five times as much food as we did. They didn't finish even a quarter of it. Such waste. Really showing off, I guess. "Conspicuous consumption."

We waddled out of the restaurant, and took the opportunity to walk back to the hostel, to let things digest. On the way, we passed by the (uber-touristy) pedestrian snack market. You can buy a lamb skewer for 5RMB, which would cost you one or two anywhere else. There were busloads of tourists being disgorged, and the stall owners were shouting to call them over. There *were* a bunch of interesting things on skewers, however. Snake, silkworm chrysalis, scorpions, tarantulas, stinky tofu, all of which the stall owners take turns goading the tourists into buying. Pretty funny...but we continued on to our hostel and called it a night.

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