Feel the Burn: Dao Taphouse Love Nothing More Than Pairing Spicy Pork Belly and Beers
In the lead up to our inaugural Hot & Spicy Festival on Apr 14-15 at Galaxy Soho, we'll Feel the Burn with a few of the vendors to see what fiery wares they'll be slinging come that rapidly approaching fine spring weekend.
Situated in Wangjing, Dao Taphouse opened just over a year ago by Geezer Wang, founder of Chengdu Harvest Brewery. Although they have a limited food menu, beer is the main draw here, with highlights of their sizable 30 kinds of draft beer (over half of which are brewed onsite) including the Belgian wheat, English porter, IPA, winter ale, double IPA, and Mew wheat (ranging from RMB 50-95 per pint).
We spoke with Northy Cao, head of Dao's marketing, to discuss what they’ll have on offer at the Beijinger's Hot & Spicy Festival come Apr 14-15.
Tell us what you’ll be bringing to our Hot & Spicy Fest, and what inspired these fiery wares.
We’ll bring spicy roasted pork belly, and spicy chicken wings to the Hot & Spicy Festival. Because our team is Northeast China and Sichuan province, we have an obsession with meat and spicy food. The pork belly has 70 percent fat, which smells delicious when roasting, and comes paired with our homemade special chili sauce – a great match.
What are some of the other highlights on your menu?
Aside from the items that we'll bring to the festival, our most popular dish at Dao's Taphouse is the roast mutton chuan’r. They're made using fresh mutton, which is tender with a crispy exterior. We don’t put too much chili powder on the chuan’r because we want customers to be able to taste the flavor of the meat. We also have some cold dishes paired with mustard, which are proving particularly popular right now.
What drink do you like to pair with spicy food?
Beer! Our Belgian-style wheat beer and lager go well with our flavorful chuan’r.
What’s the hottest thing you’ve ever eaten?
The liangpi, cold rice noodles, we served last summer were made using a dressing from Sichuan, which is of course famous for spicy food. We put more chilies than sesame sauce in this dish, which made it quite tasty but also very spicy.
What’s your go-to spicy comfort food?
We also make homemade chili sauce mixed with noodles, a special dish created by our chef.
In one word, how does eating spicy food make you feel?
Delighted. Spicy food goes well with beer, so you’ll feel delighted while eating chuan’r and drinking our brews. That's especially true when it’s smoldering hot outside. Nothing can compare to eating roast pork belly with a pint of ice cold beer on a summer afternoon.
If what you're eating becomes way too hot, what do you use to cool off?
I’ve tried a few different things but settled on beer (which must be delicious and cold). Ok, I admit it – I love beer so much!
Dao Taphouse, along with 40 more of Beijing’s top purveyors of chili-infused grub, will be in attendance at our inaugural Hot & Spicy Festival at Galaxy Soho on Apr 14-15. If you have yet to grab your RMB 20 presale ticket, do so by scanning the QR code in the poster above or read more on what to expect here.
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Photos courtesy of Dao Brewpub
