Best Restaurant in Beijing

Written by Matteo Updated Jun. 13, 2025

If you're traveling to Beijing, you'll want to try the local food. But you'll also find delicious international cuisine prepared by expert chefs in this commercial hub. However, sometimes unfamiliar foods, no matter how delicious, can make a trip a bit difficult. Check out our suggestions for some great restaurants based on reviews.

Hutong's Top Restaurants

Hutong offers a glimpse into Beijing's ancient past, while at the same time enticing visitors with a wide selection of dining spots and drinking holes. We've listed a few homely stop-offs for those exploring the Hutong area.

Related Reading: Top Restaurant in Hutong

Luxury Dining Spots in Beijing

Luxury restaurants in Beijing are renowned for their sophistication, outstanding service, and quality. They offer an exciting dining experience with well-laid-out live counters and delightful chef-crafted food, encompassing a complete dedicated culinary experience with unique flavors.

Beijing's Best Vietnamese Restaurants

Vietnamese food offers a bright mix of sweet, sour, spicy, and salty, rich broths, crunchy fresh fruit and vegetables, and ample use of basil and mint. As distinct as Vietnamese cuisine is, it has been influenced by several sources: Chinese Cuisine, French Cuisine, Thai Cuisine, and Indian Cuisine.

Compared to other Southeast Asian foods, Vietnamese food offers a fresh flavor; Vietnam shares many of its characteristics with China. Vietnamese adopted Chinese food and added their styles and flavors to the foods, which makes it more exotic than Chinese food. In comparison with Western food, Vietnamese cuisine uses herbs abundantly to reach a balance between fresh herbs and meats.

Beijing Imperial Cuisine Restaurants

Fangshan Restaurant

Opened by former Forbidden City chefs, this restaurant serves the same dishes that China's emperors once enjoyed, and in a traditional setting in BeihaiPark. Popular venue for entertaining business clients.

Li's Family Restaurant

Li Family Restaurant is located beside Houhai Lake. It serves traditional imperial dishes in a cozy, informal atmosphere. The founder of the restaurant is said to be descended from the imperial court cooks of the Qing Dynasty. An English menu is available, and a reservation is needed.

Bai Jia Da Yuan Restaurant

The Baijiadayuan Restaurant lies within the famous Yuejia Garden in Suzhou Street, Haidian District, Beijing. It is famous for imperial court cuisine and the unique Baifu dishes. The restaurant is in the garden style of the Qing Dynasty. It has successively won the National Special Grade Restaurant honor.

Lin Hu Xuan Restaurant

Lin Hu Xuan Restaurant is located on the east bank of the lake in Liuyin Park. Its elegant Chinese courtyard style and water glass wall allow diners to feel the beat of the downtown city from a haven inside. Recommended dishes are: the stewed yellow shark's fin, the sansi shark's fin, the Buddhist arhat lobster, and sashimi with scallions.

The chefs are not limited to one type or style and have developed a series of unique, healthy, and modern dishes. It has become a popular place for local people looking for a relaxing atmosphere with good food.

Mei Mansion

Mei Mansion is located in Daxiangfeng Hutong. It serves fabulous Huaiyang-style cuisine. The restaurant occupies an elegant 200-year-old Beijing courtyard of about 1000 square meters, which used to be a part of a mansion during the Qing dynasty. The waiters wear traditional costumes and combine Chinese-style gardens to provide a real Chinese cultural experience.

Ritan Inn House

Ritan Inn House is located in the southwestern corner of Ritan Park and has recently undergone an extensive renovation. The restaurant has been reborn as a high-class venue for business dining or entertaining. Four specialties are on offer: Cantonese, Japanese, French-style barbecue, and Guanfu Cai ( a style derived from the kitchens of those high officials of Imperial China). The royal garden-style environment is an attractive feature.

Chinese Cuisine & Restaurants

Ba Guo Bu Yi Restaurant

Beijing Ba guo bu yi Restaurant serves some of the heartiest and most authentic Sichuan fare in town with its traditional Chinese-style decorations. Favorite dishes include dandan noodles in spicy peanut-sesame-garlic sauce, lazi jiding (chicken smothered by chilies), steamed fish served with chili-oil sauce, and huiguorou (twice-cooked pork).

Jing Mian Da Wang Restaurant (Di'anmen Branch)

Jing Mian Da Wang Restaurant is of typical Chinese style and serves traditional-style food(mainly noodle) in a active Old Peking atmosphere. Waiters clad traditionally shout and cry around the room to announce customers arriving or leaving. Having the taste of the tasty noodles, usually eaten with a thick sesame and soy-based sauce, it is very noisy! You have some real experience of Old Beijing.

Courtyard 7 Restaurant

Courtyard 7 is located in the central area of Nan Luo Guo. It's well-designed Chinese style modeling, the layout makes it antiquity and rustic. Its special featured restaurant provides new modern French dishes. Seating in Courtyard 7, you may see the fusion of eastern and western culture, and smell a mix of old and new fashion air.

Here, you can not only taste delicious gourmet food, but also enjoy a piece of pure land and a haven in such a busy city. Courtyard 7 welcomes you to stay and enjoy.

Yizhan Restaurant

Yizhan Restaurant is decorated in Yunnan style and serves Yunnan food. It provides a show named Song and Dance Ensemble Avanti with a performance every night from 19:45 to 21:30.

Jardine Restaurant in Spring

Jardine Restaurant in Spring provides Hangzhou cuisine, Cantonese cuisine, and seafood. "Bao Chi Yan" The Abalone and shark's fin banquet is the best recommended. It is decorated in a European harbor style setting.

Xin Shuang Quan Restaurant

Xin Shuang Quan Restaurant is near the Great Wall of Mutianyu section. This garden-style restaurant serves farmhouse dishes, specializing in rainbow trout, sturgeon, and salmon. Its use of natural ingredients and fabulous taste will leave you with great memories.

Karaiya

Karaiya Spice House, as the name implies, serves spicy Hunan food. Don't be put off, the spiciness has been toned down to allow the many flavors to shine through to make this a very pleasant dining experience. The bilingual menu and foreign-friendly staff make this a great destination. The trick entrance door is fun.

Guo Yao Xiao Ju

Guo Yao Xiao Ju Restaurant is a small family-run establishment, almost hidden in an alley, that serves extremely good Tan cuisine, which originates in the Qing dynasty. You will not be disappointed.

Tianshunge Restaurant

Tianshunge Restaurant has Buddhist decoration. It is complete with a collection of statues ranging from a large bronze Buddha statue to tiny Buddha sculptures, and fish tanks scattered well around the restaurant offer a sense of peace and tranquility. The food is fabulous as well, serving the best of traditional Chinese cuisine. Highly recommend Gongbaojiding and sautéed beef.

Qin Restaurant and Cafe

Qin Restaurant is named for the ancient Chinese stringed instrument. It serves Jiangnan cuisine (encompassing Suzhou Cuisine and Hangzhou Cuisine) and provides a space for people who are interested in learning more about traditional Chinese culture and music.

Si He Xuan

This Beijing-style restaurant, furnished with simple Chinese wooden tables and stools, serves hearty noodle dishes, delicate dumplings, and other snack dishes. Check out the black and white photos of old Beijing on the walls. Si He Xuan regularly features special snacks from inland areas of China, such as Yunnan and Shaanxi.

Xihe Yaju Restaurant

This pleasant courtyard restaurant, located in RitanPark, offers spicy Sichuan dishes and Cantonese cuisine. A great place to dine al fresco in the spring and summer months.

Hancang Hakka Restaurant

Hancang Hakka Restaurant is conveniently located on the east bank of Shicha Hai Lake and has a traditional Chinese environment and culture. It serves the very popular cuisine of the Hakka minority group.

Xi Bei You Mian Cun

Xi Bei You Mian Cun brings Chinese North Western cuisines to Beijing with cultures from Manchus, Mongolians, Chinese Muslims, and Han.

Xibei 99 Mongolian Yurt

Xibei 99 Mongolian Yurt is located on green grassland in Dongsheng Township, Haidian District. It is not a building but a series of Mongolian-style yurts surrounded by a flock of stone goats. It serves authentic cuisine from the steppes of Central Asia.

Din Tai Fung

Din Tai Fung is part of a worldwide chain specializing in dumplings. The quality of the service and food is high, and its Taiwan origins ensure that it is foreigner-friendly, and the prices are reasonable.

Lok Fu Restaurant

Lok Fu restaurant is located in the heart of Sanlitun North Street, in the fashionable North-South District Village. The restaurant has 12 parts serving Chinese dishes, noodles, and Cantonese-style dim sum. It is possible to buy wine off the shelf at the supermarket price to enjoy with your meal at the restaurant.

Vegetarian Restaurants

Pure Lotus

It is run by genuine Buddhist monks, making the restaurant a clear favorite with vegetarians from all over the world. It offers a serene dining experience with exquisite meat-free versions of Chinese classics made from vegetables, as well as tofu in its infinite forms. Dishes like water-boiled fish, Buddha's finger, and the stir-fried vegetables wrapped in lettuce leaves are highly recommended.

Lotus In Moonlight Restaurant

Lotus in Moonlight's well-prepared, honest vegetable and tofu dishes mark a nice departure from the imitation meat offerings that previously defined vegetarian Chinese cuisine in the city. Fake chicken and fish, engineered from combinations of soy and taro, are still available here, but with less oil and more flavor than in other meat-free restaurants.

Large front windows and skylights brighten the modern blue and yellow interior, suffused with an atmosphere of healthiness. Alcohol is banned, but the menu offers a long list of compelling and colorful herb teas, served in glass pots so you can watch the flowers steep. In the Dong Zhi Men Wai area (just outside Second Ring Road), Chaoyang Northeast. Reservation Needed.

Xu Xiang Zhai Vegetarian Restaurant

Xu Xiang Zhai Vegetarian Restaurant is located close to the Confucius and Lama Temples. It offers vegetarian food, both a la carte and buffet options, featuring mock meats, beancurd, veggies, sushi, soups, fresh fruits, and dessert. The dining room is clean, and the non-smoking environment is a plus.

Baihe (Lily) Vegetarian Restaurant

Baihe (Lily) Vegetarian Restaurant is a great place to enjoy vegetarian cuisine. It is a courtyard-style house in a traditional Hutong neighborhood, which includes both indoor and outdoor seating.

An English menu is available. Try the Suchang sausage; Baochao sanding, a stir-fry of diced carrots, meat, and cashews; Jiangxiang candou, a stir-fry of lima beans with minced meat; and Qianceng Bing, a layered pancake with thyme.

European Cuisines & Restaurants

Annie's Italian Restaurant

Annie's serves up authentic Italian pastas and pizza. Its decor is warm and cozy, with a family-friendly atmosphere. You will enjoy not only the Italian cuisine but also the romantic environment. It has special play areas for kids where kids can make their very own mini-pizzas on table mats.

Danieli's

Danieli's is Beijing's most elegant and best Italian restaurant. 15- to 20-min. Walk from the China World, Jianguo, Jinglun hotels, and 10 min. from the Changfugong and Gloria Plaza hotels.

Bavaria Bierstube

Best German food in Beijing. A quiet place for business meetings.

Big Easy

A New Orleans-type of place is notable for its Cajun dishes and other Louisiana specialties. Overlooking Chaoyang Park.

The Courtyard

Set in a newly built courtyard house, this upmarket restaurant serves fusion cuisine-French-based cooking using Asian ingredients. Excellent place to discuss business. After dinner, enjoy a smoke and brandy in the cigar divan on the second floor overlooking the moat of the Forbidden City, or enjoy works by some of China's leading contemporary artists in the basement gallery.

Maxim's de Paris

The Maxim's in Beijing keeps the style of Paris' Maxim in both its architecture and interior decoration. Many murals copied from the Louvre of Paris and the Forbidden City of Beijing, countless crystal glass mirrors, and multi-colored glass windows decorated with colorful paintings make a stunning impression as you enter this ornate restaurant. It is easy to feel you are in an 18th-century Venetian Palazzo as you gaze around the lavish decorations.

Justine's

Justine's is Beijing's best French restaurant, long popular with foreign businessmen and diplomats. Types of food served: sandwiches, pastries, and specialty coffees.

Brasserie Flo

FLO is one of the authentic French brasseries in Beijing. Aided efficient and considerate staff, customers enjoy a cozy environment and colorful countryside flavors.

La Gauche

La Gauche Restaurant is located in the central area of the CBD in Beijing, next to the embassy area and the famous Sanlitun Bar Street. The dining room can hold up to 40 people at a time. Also, there are 15 VIP rooms with different modern and multiple cultural styles, giving you a different dining experience.

Muslim Restaurants

Ju Bao Yuan

Ju Bao Yuan halal restaurant is located in the Muslim district and is a wonderful place to experience authentic hot pot. Their dipping sauces are excellent. Lunch here, after visiting the Muslim district, will be a highlight.

Kashgar Restaurant

Kashgar Fanzhuang is probably the best Uyghur restaurant in Beijing and offers all of the classic fare, including roasted mutton and hand-pulled noodles. The authentic food and the atmosphere make it almost like being in Xinjiang.

Red Rose Restaurant

The Red Rose is famous for Xinjiang-style halal food such as Dapanji (chicken with handmade noodles and vegetables), roast goat, or the popular lamb kebabs. The song and dance routines and beautiful Uyghur dancing will add to your enjoyment.

Xilaishun Restaurant

An old and famous Restaurant, Xilaishun Restaurant, was built in the early 20th century and is decorated in traditional Islamic style with arch arch-style gate. The restaurant specializes in roast duck, hot pot, garlic-flavored roast lamb, and other Islamic-style food.

A Fun Ti Restaurant

Afanti serves hearty Xinjiang cuisine from Northwest China: roast leg of lamb that almost melts in your mouth, spiced kebabs, and long, doughy noodles washed down by Xinjiang Loulan red wine. All accompanied by colorfully clad Central Asian dancers twirling to the sound of booming Xinjiang music. One of Beijing's liveliest dining venues.

Asian Cuisines & Restaurants

Banana Leaf Restaurant

Banana Leaf Restaurant has a Thai-style layout and features a performance during the meal. 5 performers from Thailand perform, sing, and dance for the customers.

Red Basil

Red Basil is the place to try nouveau Thai cuisine. Excellent place to discuss business, it is only a 5-minute walk. Walk from the Hilton Hotel, and 10 to 15 min. from the Kunlun, Sheraton Great Wall, and Kempinski hotels.

Ganges Indian Restaurant

Ganges Indian Restaurant has been serving delicious, authentic Indian cuisine since 2005, with a choice of Northern Indian recipes and Southern Indian style of cooking, or the latest from the exciting fusion style of modern Mumbai. The decoration of the restaurant is a mixture of traditional and modern design influences, which reflect the India of today.

Omar Khayyam

The premier restaurant serving Indian cuisine, Omar Khayyam, is a 20-minute walk. Walk from the Jianguo, Jinglun, Changfugong, Gloria Plaza, and China World hotels.

Sorabol

A great find boasting Korean barbecues and hot pots. Next to the Kempinski, Landmark, and Sheraton Great Wall hotels. Five minutes from the Hilton and the Kunlun Hotel.

Nuage

Located in Beijing's historic Shichahai area north of the Forbidden City, Nuage features a Vietnamese restaurant and nightclub. Nuage's stylish interior includes antique Chinese furniture as well as Vietnamese accents, such as pedicabs with comforting wood as a major theme throughout Nuage's live floors.

Enjoy the stunning views of Qianhai Lake and Coal Hill Park Pavilion to the south and Beijing's famed Drum and Bell towers to the north.

Luxury Dining Spots in Beijing

The Red Capital Club

This rustic restaurant is one of Beijing's best Chinese eateries. It is located in a recently restored traditional courtyard house and decorated to resemble a Chinese home of the 1950s. The food, described as Zhongnanhai cuisine, includes old Beijing favorites and dishes favored by China's top leaders. Check out the wine cellar, located in the old bomb shelter.

Lan Club

Lan Club is an exclusive lounge and restaurant in Beijing with a large number of art treasures and antique furniture. Designed by French artist Philippe Starck, Lan has a fresh oyster bar, a luxury cigar room, a red wine chamber, a classic English bar, and a restaurant serving some of Beijing's most delectable contemporary cuisine.

My Humble House

My Humble House is a high-end restaurant that serves Chinese fusion food. The decor is superb and the food is good.

Summer Palace

The Summer Palace is unusual among Beijing's thousands of restaurants because it serves both Cantonese and Huiyang-style dishes and does them very well. Dim Sum is one of their specialties. Decorated in 1930s Shanghai style, you won't be disappointed in any aspect.

Restaurant in Beijing to Experience Nightlife

Our recommendations feature restaurants located close to major attractions or hotels in the business district that offer high-quality food, top service, and an environment suitable for all kinds of tour groups: local cuisine, families with children, outdoor seating, bar scene, doing business, dining on a budget, and special occasions.

Dali Courtyard

This charming little courtyard restaurant is one of the city's most unique outdoor venues. It brings the fresh flavors of Yunnan Beijing, serving dishes like ru bing (grilled goat cheese), grilled chilli fish, spicy stir-fried mushrooms, crossing-the-bridge noodles (guoqiao mixian), fried shrimp, and stir-fried wild vegetables (ye cai).

Cocktails and wine are available. Advanced reservations are recommended, especially for the candle-lit outdoor terrace.

Vineyard Cafe

The Vineyard Cafe is a home away from home bar/restaurant situated in a traditional Hutong Beijing street. The Vineyard Cafe's menu has plenty of European and American dishes, including pizza, burgers, quiche, soups, salads, and steaks, while also providing a range of dishes to satisfy vegetarians.

Wine from all over the world is sensibly priced to suit a variety of palettes. For beer drinkers, there is also a good selection of beers, including choices from Britain, Belgium, and Australia.

Pass By Bar

This bar was opened in 1999 and relocated to a courtyard house in 2002. The Tibetan prints and wooden masks adorning the walls and a vast selection of reading materials make the Pass-By Bar more gathering place than a nightspot. It serves great Italian food as well as a decent range of pizzas and pastas. A separate nonsmoking area is available, which is almost unheard-of in a Beijing bar.

No. 16 Courtyard Restaurant

It is a quaint little restaurant north of the Yundian Bridge, Hutong area. This open-air courtyard restaurant specializes in Imperial Chinese Cuisine and serves abalone, shark's fin, tea shrimp, and other seafood dishes. The restaurant has only a few tables, so a reservation is a must.

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