Beijing: An Expat’s Guide to Restaurants, Neighborhoods, and Activities

If you are only in Beijing for a few days, check out our article here on the highlights. However, if you have more time (6+ days), you are an expat living in China, or thinking about moving abroad, this post is for you to see additional amazing things to do in this city! As a former expat who lived in Beijing for 3 years, it was always hard for us to find things to do if we weren’t in the specific WeChat group or in the know. So here are some of our tips and recommendations for a few more things to do in Beijing.

As we talked about in this post, the Hutongs are a magical place to explore. A hutong in Beijing refers to a narrow lane or alley formed by traditional courtyard housing. This style of housing had a courtyard in the middle shared by families who lived in the housing built around the courtyard. These historic lanes have a rich history dating back more than 700 years. These days, some of the coolest coffee shops, bars, restaurants, and stores occupy the storefronts intermixed with housing where locals still live. The winding alleys are so fun to explore as you’ll often find new places hidden among the twists and turns. Sometimes it feels like you are just walking through someone’s house but then you come upon the cutest coffee shop, bar, or store front out of the blue which makes wandering and discovering all the more fun! 

These days, some of the coolest coffee shops, bars, restaurants, and stores occupy the storefronts intermixed with housing where locals still live. The winding alleys are so fun to explore as you’ll often find new places hidden among the twists and turns. Sometimes it feels like you are just walking through someone’s house but then you come upon the cutest coffee shop, bar, or store front out of the blue which makes wandering and discovering all the more fun! 

One fun area to explore is in the Andingmen hutong. One of the first streets you should check out is Wudaoying. Here you will find a wide range of funky restaurants including Pebbles Courtyard which offers traditional Mexican food and drinks, many restaurants (Thai, Italian, tapas, you name it), coffee shops, a brewery, and even King’s Joy Beijing – is a 3 star Michelin vegetarian restaurant that is worth the splurge! Wander the street and connected alleyways to find fun art stores, jewelry and clothes. It’s just such a unique street! 

The Lama Temple is located just across the street. This is an impressive Buddhist temple built in the 1600’s in the middle of Beijing. While it’s easy to buy a ticket at the entrance, there will probably be a wait to go into any of the buildings as there are many visitors paying their respects and offering their prayers and incense. It’s a very cool experience as it’s located right in the heart of the city and definitely worth a visit to see a Tibetan Buddhist temple in the city. They have also converted one of the buildings into a museum so it’s a great stop if you’d like to learn more about the history or religion.

The next thing you should do in Andingmen is take a stroll down the main street called Annei Street. This street gives you a real feel of Hutong living as locals are going about their day shopping at the small market stores, buying clothes from small specialized store fronts, and standing in line at walk up snack shops serving baozi (steam buns), jianbing (Chinese breakfast pancake/burrito), and dried fruits and nuts. Two restaurants we’d recommend: on the eastern side of the street, look for the sign that says “The Fullest Dumplings”. Here you’ll get some of the best dumplings in town! And the second one is a couple restaurants down where you can see them cooking the lamb on open coals. It looks shady as all get out but I promise it’s delicious. You buy the lamb leg and they give you utensils to carve it off and enjoy as a group. The sides are delicious as well and served family style. 

If you’re in the area at night, we’ve got some great recommendations. From Annei Street, turn down Fangjia Hutong street and walk east. You’ll come to a complex that looks like an art district with a gate. Enter the gate. Here you’ll find a few interesting restaurants and bars. To the right, upstairs you’ll find an amazing Yunnan restaurant above a late night bar and dance club called BBB. Toward the back of the complex you’ll find a nice brewery called Beiping Machine which serves ONLY craft beer on tap. And then, go with me… walk to the end of the alley with Beiping Machine on your right side. It will feel like a dead end. But turn left and follow the alley to the end. Here you will find a hidden Tiki Bar that only opens up late. This super fun bar has a funky island vibe. I’d recommend the Volcano as it’s served in a volcano shaped bowl that serves 3-4 people and it’s lit on fire! 

Also off of Annei Street, go east on Guozijian Street. Here you’ll find some adorable shopping. There are tons of pottery shops to buy tea pots and cups, super modern home goods stores, and antique shops to find Chinese hidden gems like photos, metal door handles, and books. Finally, this street gives you access to Beijing Confucius Temple which is another beautiful temple in the area. Stores nearby sell gold offerings, statues, incense, and prayer beads. 

Gulou Street, located near the Bell and Drum towers, is well known for its fun bar and food scene. It has Side Street and Was Park for burgers, Raj for delicious Indian food and the most adorable small ice cream store called Chaos Chimney. Houhai Lake is a favorite of ours to walk around and explore. The cafes and shops near the lake make for a fun afternoon. If you are there in the winter, you can rent ice skating chairs where you can sit and push yourself instead of standing and falling on ice. It’s really fun! 

If you are looking for live music, Modernista is a 1920’s style venue and bar with a different style of live music every night from DJ to acapella to Latin. If you need a cafe to get some work done, we recommend Zara Cafe. Pull out your computer, order a delicious tea or coffee, and when you get hungry, their meals are so fresh and delicious. It’s a great place for digital nomads!  

If you are looking for nightlife, shopping, or inventive malls and restaurants, this is your spot. TaiKooLi is unlike any mall I’ve been to. It’s a complex with three different outdoor malls, each with a different style of stores. Intermixed are many restaurants and bars. You can definitely spend hours here just watching people. One thing a lot of influencers like to do is dress up and take photos at this mall. You’ll also notice paparazzi style photographers just waiting to capture the best photo. 

In the Sanlitun area, you’ll find some of our favorite western restaurants. Slow Boat Brewery for amazing brunch and brews. Try their chicken and waffles, you won’t regret it. JingA Brewery located in Sanlitun features their BBQ menu which is authentic. I recommend the ribs and beans. Las Musas has an excellent Taco Tuesday deal with all you can eat tacos. These are legit Mexican tacos. We recommend all the flavors as we’ve never been disappointed by what we ate here! Speaking of tacos, nearby you can also find The Taco Bar and Q Mex Bar & Grill for some delicious Tex Mex. Gungho Pizza has lots of vegetarian and gluten free options. Bottega was voted one of the best pizza spots in Asia! And it’s true. They have two locations. Pro tip: their Sanlitun location serves gluten free pasta and their Liangmaqiao location serves gluten free pizza. 

Speaking of Liangmaqiao, this is a perfect place to walk the canal. The city has done a great job of building up this small river walk with beautiful paths, lighting, and benches along the way. You can walk pretty far and check out multiple neighbors on this canal. The embassies are all located over here as well. 

Beijing Worker’s Stadium and Sports Complex is a great place to watch a soccer/football match. The Stadium was recently redone and it’s beautiful inside and out. The fans of the team, Beijing Guoan F.C., are wild! The energy was electric inside due to the cheers and flag waving of the crowd through the whole game! 

Down the road, you’ll find the high end mall called Parkview Green but we didn’t come here for the shopping. We came for the crazy amounts of art and sculptures that are throughout. With a focus on art, the mall has an open atrium which displays large art pieces. It’s such a sight to see. 

Located on the northwest side of the city, this neighborhood is known as the educational district of the city. So many universities and colleges are located here and many families try to live here to get their students closer to a better education. While it might not be as exciting as the other neighborhoods, we are partial to it because we lived here for 3 years.

A few things to do in Haidian are: Yuanmingyuan Park, which is the Old Summer Palace,  has a small entrance fee. The park has been well maintained and makes for a perfect afternoon to wander the paths and enjoy nature; however most of the buildings are just ruins as they had been destroyed years ago. If you like nature, don’t miss checking out Olympic Forest Park. Located just north of the Olympic Park, this massive green space is free to enter and explore. There are tons of walking and running paths, beautiful lakes and trees. It’s a great spot to bring a picnic and enjoy the lovely weather. 

If you enjoy being active, one of our favorite rock climbing gyms, Banana Climbing, has two locations: one in Haidian and one in Shangdi. And if rock climbing is your thing, check out these other awesome gyms: Rock Hour located north of Shangdi, Climb On in Wangjing, and Wen Shan Climbing Gym in Western Haidian.

You know our recommendations wouldn’t be complete without some restaurants. Ancient Sushi might be top of my list for delicious sushi spots. It’s a little more pricey but worth it. They have this fruit salad with cream cheese balls covered in almonds that I still dream about. Also the sushi is obviously delicious. 

One of the best pizza restaurants in Beijing is Pyro located right at the corner of the Wudaokou train station. 

If burgers are your thing, try Slider Nation. They literally only serve a few things: sliders, either spicy or not, and fries. The fries have a special seasoning that’s sweet and savory all at the same time. This is their second location. 

If you want an amazing Pakistani buffet, check out Zam Zam. It’s all you can eat and includes drinks (try the mint lemon drink), buffet, and deserts. Definitely worth it if you’re hungry! 

One of our favorite types of Chinese food is Chuan which is grilled lamb skewers from the Xinjiang region. We found a ton of these restaurants located just south of the Qinghua Donglu Xikou stop on the purple line 15 train.

This is a large neighborhood, think driving streets only. It’s hard to walk around and honestly, even renting a bike out here was hard due to limited availability. There’s a large expat community that lives out here due to the style of housing. This in turn has brought a lot of the international schools located out here. Also diplomats like to live out here as well. 

There are a few things to explore like a mall or two but the best things we found were Roundabout – one of the only thrift stores in Beijing and Pie Squared – Detroit style pizza restaurant. I’m not really sure why thrifting isn’t a bigger thing in China but Roundabout had it all, furniture, clothes, toys, games, etc. They had some amazing prices and it all goes to charity so it’s a huge win.

Chinese tea is a real art form. With many different styles (white, red/black, green, yellow, wulong (oolong), and pu’er) there is so much to learn about it. Beijing is a great place to start as many tea vendors come from all over China to sell their province’s tea. So you can get some delicious Anji Bai Cha or Yunnan Sheng Pu’er. 

If you have time, check out Maliandao. Located on the south west side by the Beijing West Rail Station, Maliandao is the second largest tea market in China. Not only is the main market an impressive 3 stories of hundreds of vendors, but you can walk a few blocks in all directions and find a hundred more tea stores. Here you can buy tea, pottery, cups, tables, and anything else tea related. 

One cool thing about buying tea in China is that the sellers want you to taste the tea before you buy it. So sit down, enjoy the process or ceremony of them washing the cups, brewing the tea, and serving you. You only need to buy the tea you like so don’t buy just the first thing. Taste a few until you find just the right one.

You can find these throughout the city but KTV (karaoke) and Mahjong are wildly popular. For both, you pay by the hour to rent a private room for just you and your friends. Most places allow you to order or bring your own food and drink. I thought we wouldn’t need either for more than a hour but boy was I wrong. We usually rented both for 2-3 hours minimum. 

For KTV, they give you microphones, big screen TVs, nice seating, fun lighting, and a long list of songs to choose from. Generally it’s all customizable so you can have a lot of fun laughing and singing with friends. 

For Mahjong, most places have automatic tables so with a push of a button, your tiles are shuffled and set up for you. You will have to know the rules to mahjong so look them up before you go, and since it’s only a 4 player game, there is generally seating in the room for others and when a round is over, you can swap players. 

Do be warned that in both, even if it says no smoking, it’s generally allowed so the smell can be not so pleasant.

If bowling is your thing, there are a few bowling alleys as well. On the east side of the city, located in the basement of the East Gate Mall is a super popular bowling alley so make sure to book in advance. There is another bowling alley in Ditan Park as part of their fitness center area. And there is another one in Haidan just south of the Qinghua Donglu Xikou stop on the purple line 15 train.

Chinese food is our literal favorite. It’s hard for me to give restaurant names as a lot of the places we enjoyed the most only had Chinese names and I don’t know them. They were local spots that we’d just walk into. I can however tell the types of dishes we enjoyed and you can search on DianPing or Apple Maps to find hundreds of restaurants near you that serve something similar. 

Our favorite is Xingjiang food which is chuan, or grilled meat on a stick. It most often comes in lamb but you can find other meats. Another favorite is any type of rice noodle (mi fen) soup, Guilin Rice Noodle is our favorite. Or jianbing which is a thin pancake served with egg, crispy cracker, and spicy sauce. 

Pete’s Tex Mex – Located throughout China, their location in Chaoyang serves up delicious Tex Mex food. Pro tip: they have a killer chocolate peanut butter milkshake too. It’s like real ice cream, real Hershey’s chocolate and thick peanut butter. It’s such a good treat. Pro pro tip: they serve a really cheap but amazing brunch only on Saturday till 11 am so get there early as it’s all you can eat eggs, bacon, hash browns, breakfast tacos, juice, coffee and tea. It’s an incredible deal. But hear me out, they also do a spot on tasty American Thanksgiving meal. I’m not kidding, it was like being back home in the US for Thanksgiving: turkey, stuffing, mashed potatoes, the works.

TRB Temple Restaurant Beijing (Forbidden City or Hutong). Looking for a high end tasting menu style restaurant, this place has gorgeous views and even better food. It makes for a fun fancy night. 

MOKA Bros – this healthy, flavorful, sit down cafe style restaurant serves delicious dishes. With multiple locations, we loved the Solana location as they have great outdoor seating. 

Brunches: A lot of the nicer hotels will do an all you can eat buffet for a set price which includes food and free flow drinks. They generally have some nicer western options that are hard to find around China like cheese, real bacon, and macarons. We recommend Feast at the East and Bee Brunch at Intercontinental. 

Brazilian Steakhouse – Latina in Liangmaqiao is just the place if you are craving thick delicious grilled meats. They import high quality meat from all over the world. Served all you can eat style and includes a delicious salad bar with lots of fun sides to try. 

Haidilao – The famous hotpot restaurant with locations all over the world. It’s a fun experience because they offer free extras like snacks, juice, and even a manicure while you wait and trust us, there will be a wait!

Peking Chamber – This restaurant specializes in Beijing Duck. With a few locations throughout the city, this nicer restaurant serves a delicious duck with lots of sides to choose. 

Breweries – Although China has its own brands of beer (Tsingtao, Snow, Harbin) these tend to be very light in taste and only 3-5%. However if you’re craving a stronger brew, check out Great Leap Brewery, JingA, or Slowboat. Not only is the beer good, but the food is amazing too! Great Leap has fun sandwiches, JingA boasts different styles of food depending on the locations like BBQ or pizza only served at that location, and Slowboat has amazing brunch including the best chicken and waffles. 

Annie’s Italian Restaurant – located all over the city, since they import ingredients directly from Italy, it’s pretty authentic. 

Holiland – with so many locations around the city and China, this bakery is hard to miss but their selection of baked goods is fun to try. Pro tip – if you are craving a delectable treat, spring for the Chocolava dark chocolate cake. It’s sold in the refrigerator section, two perfectly square cakes and there’s even a spoon inside so you can eat it right away. 

Tube Station – This pizza place is legit. It’s one of the most American pizza places in Beijing. If you’re going with a group or are really hungry, they have a giant size pizza which is fun to share. 

Malls in China are next level. They are not like American malls which have been on the decline for a while now. Malls in China are nice, they are new, they are beautiful inside. Some of the best restaurants are located inside malls. It’s a gathering point for society and they are treated well. I’d recommend walking around malls for a few reasons: 1). it’s a great way to get out of the weather and pollution 2). The amount of opulence is kind of stunning and 3). It’s just a current cultural thing you can enjoy. 

A few malls to check out would be: China World Mall, The Kerry Center, and The Place in Guomao, Wangfujing Pedestrian Street and all the malls lining it, Solana outdoor mall in Chaoyang, and Huaxi Live in Wukesong, Haidian.