Beijing eats in layers: Qing-dynasty offal counters, Hui Muslim lamb stalls on Niujie, imperial-era copper hotpots and hutong microbreweries. Three days of markets, noodle shops, tea houses and late-night crayfish, plotted stop by stop.
The wet market Beijing's embassy and restaurant chefs shop at: roughly 300 stalls of Yunnan matsutake, Hainan mangosteen, live crab tanks, saffron and imported cheese, packed into one narrow covered lane. Open about 06:00–19:00 daily.
Serving chaogan since 1961: pork liver and intestine simmered in a garlic-heavy starch gravy, eaten with steamed pork baozi. Locals rotate the bowl and sip from the rim rather than use a spoon. Open 06:00–22:30.
A 632-metre Ming-era lane opposite the Lama Temple, now lined with third-wave roasters, craft-beer taps, Yunnan coffee bars and vegetarian kitchens inside grey-brick courtyard houses. Most venues open midday to late evening.
A cramped hutong counter that turned Beijing's home dish into a queue: hand-pulled noodles under fermented yellow soybean paste fried with fatty pork, plus eight shredded vegetable toppings you mix in yourself.
The Hui Muslim quarter around the 996-AD Niujie Mosque, where halal shops sell beef shaobing, lamb skewers, donkey-hide gelatin cakes and sesame-paste candies. Niujie Qingzhen Chaoshi is the anchor supermarket for takeaway snacks.
Founded 1903, the definitive shuan yangrou house: paper-thin hand-sliced mutton swirled for seconds in a charcoal copper pot of plain water, then dunked in sesame paste cut with fermented tofu and chive flower sauce.
Beijing's jasmine specialist since 1887, scenting green tea with fresh blossoms over multiple rounds. Staff weigh loose leaf from lacquered bins and brew free tastings; the shop's jasmine soft-serve is a local summer fixture.
Ghost Street runs 1.4km of red-lantern restaurants open past dawn, and Hu Da is its loudest: woks of málà crayfish with numbing Sichuan pepper, plus grilled fish and cumin lamb ribs, served until roughly 04:00.
A canteen-style counter preserving old-Beijing breakfast: douzhi (fermented mung-bean broth) with chilli pickle and焦圈 fried rings, plus aiwowo rice cakes, tanghulu and sticky yellow lüdagunr. Opens 06:00.
Fourth-generation specialists in baodu — lamb and beef tripe blanched for seconds so it stays crisp, sorted into 13 named cuts by texture, and dipped in a sesame-and-leek-flower sauce mixed at the table.
Beijing's first craft brewery, opened 2010 inside a 100-year-old courtyard behind an unmarked grey door. Taps lean local: Honey Ma Gold brewed with Sichuan peppercorn, and Iron Buddha Blonde built on oolong tea.
The world's first bar devoted to baijiu, tucked in a Dongcheng hutong: flights compare the four aroma families — strong, light, sauce and rice — alongside cocktails that cut the 52% grain spirit with citrus and tea.