Glo Lights Up Beijing's Health Scene With New Menu, Beijing Women's Network TCM Talk Jul 7
Glo Kitchen and Fitness is doling out a range of innovative new healthy eats, and that’s only the beginning. The venue, which also houses a CrossFit gym beneath its two floor Guanghua Lu Soho restaurant, is also putting on a series of regular events that aim to inform and inspire patrons about nutrition and well being. Together, these facets making Glo a hub for health conscious Beijingers.
Let’s start with the next event. On Thursday, July 7 from 7-9 pm (registration is RMB 150, the event is open to all genders), the Beijing Women’s Network’s Healthy Living Series is putting on a nutrition panel and summer dinner at Glo. It’s an East-meets-West extravaganza on healthy eating, beginning with Dr. Debbie Ma (a PhD in Chinese medicine). She will speak on the numerous benefits of seasonal eating, before recommending a plethora of flavorful nutrient abundant veggies that can easily be found in local markets.
From there Glo Kitchen chef Brandon Trowbridge will present a special fixed price dinner readied especially for the Beijing Women’s Network. As the attendees chow down, he’ll also detail the nutritional strengths of the meal, before sharing some broader how-to’s about healthy eating through a laowai lens.
That dinner will also serve as a preview for Glo’s new menu. Those dishes (which will be unveiled within the next week, details to follow) are some of Beijing’s most creative nutritious fare. Many of them also boast an element of wholesome, down-home comfort. Prime example: the RMB 38 all-day-breakfast yeast risen buckwheat waffles, which can be topped with your choice of either scrambled eggs, steamed spinach, cherry tomatoes, bacon and pesto if you’re looking for a lighter flavorful touch; smoked salmon, turmeric steeped egg, capers and fig tahini sauce if you’re a protein fiend; or seasonal fruits and fermented honey for a guilt free to your craving for sweets. These waffle are soft, chewy and hearty enough to stick to your middle throughout a busy morning (or before any of your next meals, considering it’s part of the all-day-breakfast option).
Salad stalwarts, meanwhile, will enjoy the RMB 38 burdock root seaweed salad. It boasts an extra fresh zip thanks to its sprinkling of mint, which is further augmented by the inclusion of a more unique seed from mint family: chia. That ingredient is of course a highly nutritious seed, in this case rendered in the form of mango chia lime dressing (an infinitely healthier alternative to the calorie addled ranch or Cesar dressings that have drowned out far too many salads). Better still is the salad’s key ingredient: deep-water-fresh seaweed, whose bursting flavor is balanced with its fellow sea vegatable: palate cleansing pickled kombu.
Most innovative of all may be the charcoal crust lavash pizzas. These pies (which come in six varieties, ranging from RMB 42-58) are turned smokey dark by charcoal activated dust. While that additive may sound like remnants of a blazing disaster, it’s actually anything but. In fact charcoal – which is increasingly consumed in the West in pill form by people looking for the ingredient’s digestive and intestinal health boosting properties (read more about that here) – makes this pizza dough uniquely healthy. We suggest the RMB 52 avocado arugula pesto charcoal pizza option for an Italian tinged main course treat. Conversely, sweet teeth customers should instead be sure to try the RMB 48 strawberries and grapefruit with fig jam charcoal pizza variety.
These are but a fraction of Glo’s illuminatingly brilliant new dishes. If you’re looking to treat your body well, while also offering yourself some vibrantly flavorful treats, then be sure to give this venue’s new menu a try at either the July 7 event or the public debut of those dishes later this month. Anyone who samples these offerings will also be tempted to register for the venue’s forthcoming cooking classes and other such events, in order to try their hand at making such distinctively healthy fare for themselves. These aspects and more make Glo live up to its name, as it draws health conscious Beijingers in like moths to a flame.
Photos: Glo Kitchen and Fitness
