i read about the noodle bar on a few blogs but wasnt planning to visit at all because it looked like one of these mysterious/pretentious places that draw all the foreigners in beijing who wouldnt know better. i was only in china for a week i didnt want to waste one of my already limited meals on something i wasnt sure about.
i was meeting up with a friend for lunch @ shi zi shan xia near sanli tun. we placed our order and waited about 50 mins and food still wasnt served. we noticed all the people came after us were already served with food so we called our waitress over and asked whats going on. turned out that she didnt submit our order so our order wasnt being prepared at all.
we were PISSSSSED and left immediately.
my friend had to return to work soon so we had to grab something really quick. the noodle bar came to my mind cuz it’s close to where we were and it wouldve been a quick lunch so we decided to pay a visit.
its been mentioned on a few blogs that the location of the noodle bar is confusing because it is located in the 1949 hidden city complex. it’s called ‘hidden’, so it cant be easily found perhaps.
i know where exactly it is cuz i live near there.
so here it is.
so this noodle bar is behind this big wood door.
very small, about 12 seats.
my friend and i were the only a few asians in the noodle bar. somehow i found that foreigners LOVEEE watching food being prepared in front of them. almost all the restaurants like this are popular, for example hibachi restaurants.
very simple menus which i love. they only offer the beef hand pulled noodles, a veggie hand pulled noodles, the november lamb hand pulled noodles, and a few other small plates.
specials
my friend got the house special beef hand pulled noodles which has all the beef brisket, tendon, and tripe.
i dont like tendon and tripe so i just got the one with the brisket.
sure it did not taste bad. BUT HEY we are in china right now, so we cant have low standards for chinese food like we are in the states. this is NOTHING special. if you walk into ANY noodle places in china you can easily get something like this and most likely something WAYYYYY BETTER.
yea this is ALL HYPE. i was right. hyped up by foreigners in beijing that wouldnt know any better. my friend was very disappointed with my choice of restaurant and said to me sarcastically ’what have u been eating in the states?!’
Address:
At 1949- The Hidden City. Courtyard 4, Gong Ti Bei Lu, Chaoyang District, Beijing
Thanks for sharing this hidden gem!
Lovely photos.
There is nothing better than a good noodle restaurant. Too bad you were dissapointed. Pics look yummy. Oh well.
Was the meal quick though? Did it serve the purpose? It was worth finding out if it was all hype – was it also more expensive because of the hype?
it wasnt quick because we had to wait for seats due to limited seatings. it’s a lil more expensive but still reasonable.
Who wouldn’t give anything to eat an amazing local food that does taste a little bit different, a little bit better than what we are used to? And you are right it seems to by hyped up a lot – and still it looks like a place that one would have passed. I think that my be another little trick to make an impression of being “undiscovered hidden treasure”. Who knows?
But looking at those pictures.. I could use some noodles right now.