Does This Restaurant Serve The Most Authentic Yunnan Food in Beijing?
Hidden away just south of Jianguomen, on the ground floor of the Yunnan provincial government-run Yunteng Hotel, lies Yunteng Shifu, a restaurant which might just offer the most authentic Yunnan cuisine in all Beijing.
In case you didn’t know, every Chinese province has its own office in Beijing as well as its own restaurant and often also hotel. These restaurants differ from others offering provincial or regional Chinese foods, though, as all the chefs come from that particular province, as do the majority of the ingredients, which in theory should make them the most authentic.
Upon entering the hotel, a member of staff led us through a corridor to where the restaurant is, in the foyer. On the day we visited it was set up for some kind of trade expo, with various Yunnan products on display.
To give the room a Southeast Asian feel the room was adorned with plastic greenery, fake trees and even neon lights of all things, which did make it all feel rather cheesy. I was unsure whether this was just for the expo or the usual décor, but after a bit of research it seems that it does just look like this all the time.
But we were there for the food, not the decorations!
The standard menu was huge and took quite a while to work our way through, it included tons of classic Yunnan dishes along with some more unusual offerings. The menu had pictures and English, however the English shouldn’t be relied on as we spotted quite a few translation errors.
We decided to go for some classic Yunnan dishes to see how they compared to some of our other favourite Yunnan restaurants in Beijing. First to arrive was the sliced beef with mint leaves (薄荷牛肉 bòhé niúròu), which were served with the mint rolled up in the beef. Personally I prefer when it’s served more like a salad, but it was still very good and the beef was super tender.
Next we were served Yunnan cheese (乳饼 rǔbǐng), which always seems to be a firm favorite among foreigners. We decided to get a slightly different version, though, with each cheese slice also being accompanied by smoked Yunnan ham and truffle. We all found the combination to be a little too rich and I think I’ll just stick to the plain cheese with spices in the future.
We also ordered the classic pineapple rice (菠萝饭 bōluó fàn) and some pea shoots to get some vegetables into the mix, both were well made but not really anything special.
Another classic we ordered was lemongrass grilled tilapia (香茅草烤鱼 xiāng máocǎo kǎoyú) which is always one of my favorites, and didn't disappoint this time around either. The tilapia was really soft, well spiced and packed with flavor, I would actually say it is the best lemongrass grilled tilapia I’ve had.
The final dish we ordered was from their seasonal menu and was a spiced potato dish, the dish was much bigger than it appeared on the menu and was served in a huge pot, we ended up having to 打包 dǎ bāo about half of it. I’ve never had a Yunnan potato dish like this before and it was a really nice change from the usual Yunnan mashed potato.
This was definitely one of my favorite dishes, and no that isn’t just because I’m British and we love anything with potatoes, it had a good level of spiciness and tons of flavor.
To wash it all down we also ordered Yunnan rice wine (云南米酒 yúnnán mǐjiǔ) and were persuaded by our waiter to order a large jug, it came in a large bamboo spear which was decanted into a normal jug for convenience. The rice wine tasted a little stronger than others I’ve had but we definitely ordered way too much!
Overall I really enjoyed the experience of going to a provincial restaurant, however the food did not really live up to my expectations and I would saying wasn’t that markedly different than the food I’ve had at other Yunnan restaurants in Beijing. Though perhaps I just have inferior taste buds and someone from Yunnan would completely disagree!
If you’re looking for something a little bit different and more unique and want to see what a provincial restaurant is like I would say it’s worth the trip.
Yunteng Shifu (云腾食府)
Building 8，7 Donghua City Beili East Compound (Southeast corner of Ming City Wall Ruins Park, East Second Ring Road)
东花市北里东区7，8号楼 (东二环辅路明城墙遗址公园东南角）
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Images: Katie Coy
