Cheap and Cheerful

Two catties of the signature Man Lou boiled dumplings

A trip to Beijing is not complete without eating jiaozi, or boiled dumplings, and one well known local place is called Xian Man Lou (馅老满).

When I lived in Beijing, a German chef friend of mine came to visit with Chinese master chef, Liu Guozhu, as they were going to open Golden Flower in Wynn Macau.

They were in Beijing to do some research, as Liu used to be one of the chefs at the famed Beijing Hotel, where he cooked for the likes of Queen Elizabeth II, former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger and paramount leader Deng Xiaoping.

The filling inside has minced pork, chives, egg, and shrimp

Liu told me in his strong Beijing accent over the phone to meet them at this restaurant and I amazingly found it in Andingmen.

It's a two-storey restaurant and I found the two of them on the second floor at the back at a giant round table, and Liu had practically ordered every other dish on the menu. He warmly greeted me and told me to just try as much as I could!

The two chefs were leaving Beijing the next day and I was left with three bags filled with boxes of leftovers. It was insane!

Fast forward to this trip, my friend and I ended up in Andingmen after we wandered through Wudaoying hutong and I suggested we go to Xian Man Lou.

About a 10-minute walk later we were there, and after a short wait we had a table, also upstairs. I was surprised to find the restaurant wasn't as busy as it used to be, but perhaps because of the Qing Ming public holiday, there weren't as many students patronizing the restaurant at this time.

We'd had a late lunch, so we only had a few dishes. We ordered a cold appetizer of "crispy seaweed" (20 yuan), which wasn't crispy, but thick strips of seaweed that were rolled up and then sliced.

The filling here features a mackerel paste and chives

Then we had two different kinds of dumplings. While the restaurant says you can order yi liang (or one cattie, which equals 500 grams or 5 dumplings), they would rather you order er liang or two catties.

The signature lao man jiaozi (21 yuan for 10 pcs) was delicious and hearty -- it was filled with minced pork, chives, eggs and shrimp. The shrimp was a bit crunchy, and we liked the combination with the chives to brighten the flavours.

For a bit of experimentation, we tried the dumplings filled with mackerel and chives (31 yuan for 10 pcs). The mackerel was made into a smooth paste and combined with chives, though coriander would have worked just as well. I'd never had fish dumplings like this before and neither had my friend and she quite liked it.

We both downed a bottle of Yanjing beer (9 yuan) and we barely finished the food.

Nevertheless I'm glad Xian Man Lou is still there, and the dumplings are just as I remembered them! And as you can tell from the prices, it was a cheap and cheerful dinner!

Xian Man Lou

Anhu Beili Yayuan, Gulou

Andingmen
(+86) 6404 6944

Checking out Wudaoying Hutong

Cars sometimes pass through here, but mostly it's pedestrians

A friend who lives in Beijing recommended that I check out Wudaoying hutong near Yonghegong Lama Temple, as it hasn't been commercialized like Nanluoguxiang hutong.

I remember when Nanluoguxiang was just starting to have shops and it had rough edges to it that gave it some charm.

Does this cat look like he could be Brother Cream's cousin?

But now it's very gentrified, and as my friend says, there are the independent shops there, but there are also ones run by the government that you can tell are trying to push Chinese arts and culture in a Friendship Store 2.0 kind of way.

Having been there twice on my trip, I can attest to that!

So I checked out Wudaoying and I remember I did go there once many years ago to a western restaurant called Vineyard Cafe and it's still there. On the whole Wudaoying is still a residential area with shops down the main strip.

Some are clothing shops selling qipao or Chinese shirts and jackets, some with embroidery, jewellery shops, there are snack shops, mostly cafes, and several pottery shops that have several throwing wheels, where people take classes.

A not very happy looking mud grass horse at Plastered 8!

One of the pottery workshops had a giant fat cat with a bowtie, lazying on the table by the entrance and he could be Brother Cream's Beijing cousin!

A shop called Plastered 8 that opened in Nanluoguxiang also has a store here, and it has pretty funky T-shirts. The store front here includes a sculpture of a caonima, or "grass mud horse", which sounds like a swear word, but it is like giving the finger to internet censorship in China. I think we all feel like that!

On a happier note, we also saw a couple taking wedding photos there, probably the equivalent of Hong Kong couples taking pictures with the tram going by.

A sign indicating the entrance but we started from the back

On the whole it was fun to poke our heads into some of the shops and seeing what was going on. Some of the prices were expensive, some were OK. Although we didn't buy anything, we enjoyed soaking up the laid back atmosphere with a dose of crafts.