Street Eats: Humble and Authentic Tastes of Lanzhou at Topwin Center's Best Wish Niangpi

The stalls are shut down and diners are wandering around the basement of Topwin Center, even in the lull following the post-Spring Festival mayhem. Thankfully, at least one restaurant is still serving the people – popular street eat stall Best Wish Niangpi.

The owners are a Hui minority couple who have been making niangpi (酿皮), strips of steamed wheat flour, for the past 24 years. The latest step in building their humble niangpi empire is a move to Beijing to open this small stall in Topwin Center. And humble it is; the restaurant couldn’t really be smaller, with a line of 10 stools alongside a rustic wooden table, and don’t expect much service – simply order and pay at the cashier, take your receipt, and wait your turn to pick up the food.

Although the experience itself is nothing to write home about, the range of six Lanzhou specialties on offer are cheap and comforting enough to keep you coming back when you're in a snack bind. Choose from niangpi (RMB 18), glutinous barley cake (RMB 7); laozao (醪糟, RMB 16), fermented glutinous rice; huidouzi, red bean sweet soup; spicy potato wedges; and two types of drink.

The niangpi were light grey, steamed al dente and come with a sesame and chili sauce to mix as you please, giving the thick, wobbly noodles a nice garlicky and spicy with heat, and making them very easy to gulp down. The laozao – a combination of egg and milk topped with goji berries, peanuts, sugar, raisins, and sesame seeds – came piping hot and was one of the more luxurious renditions we’ve seen. It was more than comforting and wholesome enough to even replace your daily muesli in the morning.  

There are no vegetables on the menu, which makes this a carb-only meal, and the portions may be smaller than at a regular restaurant, but who expects street snacks to be sizable? Additionally, if you ordered everything on the menu, the bill would only come to RMB 80, making Best Wish a good shout if you're looking to stock up on the authentic and humble tastes of Lanzhou.

Best Wish Niangpi
Daily 10.30am-9pm. B1-12B, Topwin Center, 1 Nansanlitun Lu, Chaoyang District (400 0137 771)
最喜酿皮：朝阳区南三里屯路1号三里屯通盈中心B1层12B

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Photos: Tracy Wang