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Eating and drinking
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Guangzhou's restaurants, the best to be found in a province famed for its cuisine, are in themselves justification to spend a few days in the city, and it would be a real shame to leave without having eaten in one of the more elaborate or famous places. While you can stuff your face from dawn to dusk, you'll need to pace yourself to stay fit for sightseeing (unless you're planning to walk everywhere between meals). Breakfast here can be anything from a quick bowl of noodles to an hour-long linger over
dim sum,
and lunch, though sometimes fussed over by the Chinese, is best kept light and quick.
Dinner
is the main session, worth setting time and money aside to enjoy in style.
If you're worried about what you might be served, there are any number of Western fast-food outlets - including KFC, Pizza Hut and McDonald's - throughout the city, and all the big tourist hotels have restaurants offering everything from dim sum through to Western meals and full-blown Chinese banquets. Hotels are also worth checking for special sittings: afternoon tea at the China (4-6pm; A?50 per person), or bottomless coffee/buffet breakfasts at the White Swan before 11am (A?20/A?85) for instance, the latter featuring the best riverside views in Guangzhou. But it's better to eat out and many of the big restaurants have English menus if you ask for them. The cooking is more adventurous and not necessarily loaded with exotic ingredients, and there's nothing to match the experience of tucking into a Cantonese spread - most Chinese restaurants here are Cantonese - while being surrounded by an enthusiastic horde of local diners. You'll find the highest concentration of restaurants spread through the waterfront district either side of the southern end of Renmin Lu, with plenty of others in the downtown area. Unfortunately, the sociable Cantonese fashion of entertaining (and impressing) family or wealthy clients with food has caused restaurant prices to soar as the population demands ever more lavish preparations. After a ten percent service charge is added, expect to pay at least A?60 a person for a good three-course meal; A?100 each would allow you to try some house specialities. You can, of course, eat for a fraction of this cost day or night at the city's numerous food stalls . Those in the southwestern corner around Liuersan Lu and the Cultural Park are particularly good, with a choice of dishes including meat and chicken dumplings, prawn balls, egg and rice snacks and battered chicken legs. Small cafAŠs serve good meat and vegetable dishes for a couple of yuan each, and evening markets deal in frogs, turtles and snails, quickly cooked to your order. Be sure and try a selection of cakes and the fresh tropical fruits sold from stalls along Yangjiang Lu; local lychees are so good that the emperors once had them shipped direct to Beijing.
Some canteens open as early as 5am and
dim sum
is usually served 7-10am, later on Sundays or if the restuarant has a particularly good reputation. Lunch is on offer 11am-2pm, and dinner 5-10pm, though most people eat early rather than late. Other useful information
for tourists (each section contains more specific sub-sections): |
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China,
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