Beijing duck

The best-known dish in north Chinese cuisine. The duck, a local Beijing variety, is dried and brushed with a sweet marinade before being roasted over fragrant wood chips. It is carved by the chef and eaten wrapped in pancakes with slivered scallions (spring onions) and cucumber.

Hotpot

Introduced to Beijing in the 13th century by the invading Mongols, hotpot is a much-loved staple. Literally hundreds of restaurants across the city sell nothing else but. It’s a great group dish, with everybody sat around a large bubbling pot of broth dropping in their own shavings of meat, noodles, and vegetables to cook.

Zha jiang mian

The name means “clanging dish noodles” – like hot pot, ingredients are added at the table to a central tureen of noodles, and the bowls are loudly clanged together as each dish goes in, hence the name.

Jiaozi

The traditional Beijing dumplings are filled with pork, bai cai (Chinese leaf), and ginger but, in fact, fillings are endless. You can find jiaozi at snack shops all over the city. They are also sold on the street, served from a giant hot plate over a brazier.

Thousand-year-old eggs

These are raw duck eggs that have been put into mud, chalk and ammonia and left, not for a thousand years, but more like two weeks. When retrieved, the egg is steamed or hard-boiled: the white has turned a greenish-black. The eggs are cut up and sprinkled with soy sauce and sesame oil.

Lao mian

Watching a cook make lao mian (hand-pulled noodles) is almost as enjoyable as eating them. First the dough is stretched and then swung like a skipping rope, so that it becomes plaited. The process is repeated until the strands of dough are as thin as string.

Lamb and scallions

Scallions (spring onions) are a common Beijing ingredient and in this dish they are rapidly stir-fried along with sliced lamb, garlic, and a sweet-bean paste.

Sweet and sour carp

Beijing cooking is heavily influenced by the cuisine of Shandong Province, generally regarded as the oldest and best in China. Sweet and sour carp is a quintessential Shandong dish traditionally made with fish from the Yellow River.

Drunken empress chicken

Supposedly named after Yang Guifei, an imperial concubine overly fond of her alcohol. The dish is prepared using Chinese wine and is served cold.

Stir-fried kidney flowers

These are actually pork kidneys cut in a criss-cross fashion and stir-fried, during which they open out like “flowers”. The kidneys are typically prepared with bamboo shoots, water chestnuts, and edible black fungus (a sort of mushroom).

Lu da gun’r

Literally “donkeys rolling in dirt”: sweet red-bean paste in a rice dough dusted with peanut powder.

Jian bing

Chinese crêpe. Often sold off the back of tricycles and a typical Beijing breakfast.

Shao bing

Hot bread roll sometimes filled with a fried egg and often sprinkled with aniseed for flavoring.

Tang chao lizi

Chestnuts, roasted in sugar and hot sand and served in a paper bag. A seasonal snack appearing in autumn.

Tang hu lu

A kabob of candied hawthorn berries.

Chuan’r

In any area with lots of bars and clubs you’ll find street vendors selling chuan’r (kabobs). They cost just a few yuan per skewer.

Baozi

These delicious steamed dumplings are cooked in bamboo baskets. Typical fillings include pork, chicken, beef, or vegetables and tofu.

Rou bing

Cooked bread filled with finely chopped and spiced pork. A variant is rou jiamo, which is a bun filled with diced lamb.

You tiao

Deep-fried dough sticks, often dipped in warm congee (a rice porridge).

Hong shu

A winter specialty, these are baked sweet potatoes, often heated in ovens made from oil drums.