Noodles & staples · Beijing
Zhajiang Noodles
炸酱面 — Beijing’s daily bowl: springy wheat noodles under a sauce of fried minced pork and fermented soybean paste, piled with a rainbow of fresh vegetable toppings.
The "fried sauce" is the whole argument: good versions fry the pork slowly in tianmianjiang sweet wheat paste until the fat runs clear and the meat tastes savoury-sweet. At the table you fold in cucumber, bean sprouts, radish, celery and soybeans yourself — a Beijing ritual called "mixing the dish".
It is lunch food, not banquet food, and the best bowls are in hutong noodle shops where the owner has been frying the same sauce for decades. Order a cold side of garlic cucumbers and consider it the most Beijing meal possible for a few dollars.
Where to eat it
- Hutong noodle shops around Qianmen and Gulou
- Any old Beijing "lao zihao" noodle counter
Named tables that do it well
- Xin Rong Ji (Xinyuan South Road) — Michelin 3 Stars
- Chao Shang Chao — Michelin 3 Stars
- Jing Ji — Michelin 2 Stars
- King’s Joy — Michelin 2 Stars
Routes that eat their way here
More dishes to know
- Chongqing Xiao Mian (重庆小面)
- Claypot Rice (煲仔饭)
- Wonton Noodles (云吞面)
- Biangbiang Noodles (biángbiáng面)
- Xinjiang Polo (Hand-Pulled Rice) (抓饭)
- Lanzhou Hand-Pulled Beef Noodles (兰州牛肉面)