2015 Year in Review: The Year's Biggest Dining Trends
The Beijing food and restaurant scene is ever changing, but every year some of the changes stick in our minds more than others. We've rounded up a few of the trends and phenomena that captured our attention over the past year.
RELATED: Best New Fine Dining in 2015
Pop-ups popping up everywhere
2015 was the year when pop-ups really found their feet in Beijing. Prime among them was Buena Onda, a Peruvian pop-up peddling pisco and cevice out of Cafe Flat White in China Central Place. Once the weather got too cold for outside ceviche, the team took their creative minds to The Bookworm, where they created Soul Bowls, serving healthy and hearty dishes in, well, bowls. Elsewhere, Jing-A Brewing teamed up with a number of Beijing's top dining venues for a series of "kitchen takeovers" that saw the likes of Caravan, Hagaki (EAST Hotel Beijing), and Mosto (who made some very tasty Venezuelan arepas).
Fast-casual dining concepts
Everyone from Da Dong to TRB branched out into casual dining in 2015. This partly reflects the continuing ripple effect of the government's crackdown on corruption and extravagant spending, but also the constantly evolving tastes of Chinese diners. Probably the most anticipated, and arguably most surprising, casual opening of the year was Da Dong's first fast food restaurant, Da Dong Duck. Da Dong Duck maintains the quality of the brand's famous super lean roast duck but shoves it inside a hamburger. There is only one Da Dong Duck so far, but industry scuttlebutt suggests a nationwide chain is in the works. On the Western dining side, TRB didn't quite go so far as opening a burger restaurant, but they did expand with TRB Bites, a lighthearted take on the TRB we know and love.
Farmers' markets and organic markets continue to grow
We included organic food and farmers' markets in our round up of 2014 food trends, and Beijing's farmers' markets have only continued to expand in 2015. One of the newest and most popular, Farm to Neighbors, has grown exponentially over the past year, taking up a weekend residency at the new Grand Summit complex in Liangmaqiao and expanding to including non-food stalls, charity events, and regular craft workshops. Their Christmas Market, which was held on Dec 19-20, included more than 50 vendors. One of Beijing's older markets, Beijing Farmer's Market is also still going strong, and recently held a series of three talks about farm-to-table dining in China and the US.
The more polluted it is, the less you pay
As Beijing's pollution problem continues to grab international headlines, our restaurant venues are fighting back with deals that put a silver lining inside this otherwise very gray cloud. Jing-A Brewing's Airpocalypse Double IPA has a sliding discount scale that gets you more money off as the AQI rises. In December, they even lifted the cap on the discount, meaning that if the AQI ever hits 1,000 the beer will be completely free. If alcoholic drinks aren't really your thing, Juice by Melissa offer 10 percent off their Fight Pollution juice package, packed with pollution-fighting ingredients like turmeric, ginger, beetroot, and acai) if the AQI goes over 200.
More stories by this author here.
Email: robynnetindall@thebeijinger.com
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Photos: Kipp Whittaker, Farm to Neighbors
