Capital Bites: Baked Treats, Bullfrogs, and Bizarre Waitress Uniforms
Divina Cakes offers traditional natural Italian cakes baked by a passionate international team: Valentina, Vivian and pastry chef Martin (Italian/Chinese/Argentinian-Italian). Try the white chocolate cheesecake, which is really divine. They also specialize in cupcakes and sweet and savory finger-food for catering requests.
At Central Park, Symphony offers some nice Western-style sweets baked up by Japanese chef Hideki Morishita. The 50-year-old holds several teaching and research posts at the Japanese Dessert Culinary School in Nagoya and the International Cooking School in Yokohama. He also participated in TV Champion, a popular Japanese TV show. Try the bacon baguettes and éclairs and the stuffed red bean buns – all are quite popular with the local office bees and residents.
San Yang Cai (三样菜) is newly opened in Gongti. This Sichuan restaurant’s name – and its cuisine – is based on three typical ingredients in Sichuan cuisine – eels, loach and bullfrogs. The owner also has another two restaurants: rabbit-head restaurant Shuangliu Laoma Tutou and Thai restaurant Laburnum.
On Lucky Street, Japanese eatery Kurazen (藏善) recently transformed its ground-floor fish shop into a 7-11-like convenience store, featuring Japanese and Korean snacks, and fresh veggies from the restaurant’s self-owned farm. The cashier girls are dressed in maid uniforms – and they’re not alone. The waitresses at another new opening in the Xinyuanli area, Garret (屋根裏), dress in identical cosplay costumes while doing their rounds. Garret serves the same classic Kyoto-style okonomiyaki (a type of savory omelet) as its older sibling Jidaiya Syun (时代家旬), but with lower prices and even less noise.
Further south on Lucky Street, Gozou Roppu (五脏六腑) is offering beef offal hot pot (Japanese and Chinese menu available) in a first-floor basement space where White Rabbit used to be. According one of the Japanese staff, the owner also runs the cocktail bar Lagoon. If you crave nicely-cooked beef intestine, tongues, tendons and tripe, Gozou Roppu seems a solid alternative to Niu Xuan An (牛玄庵).
