Beijing Boyce

Q Bar won as “bar or club of the year” last night as The Beijinger magazine gave out its annual Reader Bar and Club Awards. Known for its cocktails, the Sanlitun South hot spot tied The Rickshaw with six “best” or “outstanding” awards, followed by Centro with five, White Rabbit with four, and Bed, Lush, Suzie Wong and Nanjie with three. The Saddle Cantina won as “best new bar or club.” The awards party was held at Tun.

I’ll soon post write-ups about last night’s event and the recent City Weekend dining and nightlife awards.

Despite the rain, a good crowd turned up on Financial Street last Saturday afternoon to attend the second annual Culinary Coin Festival at the Ritz-Carlton Hotel. Compared to last year’s event, this one had more food stalls, fewer wine choices, and similarly peppy music.

The more than two dozen stalls featured dim sum, sashimi, noodles, cold cuts, honey, chocolate, and more. My favorites: the cheeses from Sinodis (especially the Taleggio), the Beijing duck (juicy!) and, simply for health reasons, the wheatgerm shots. While the “spicy” ice cream was a hot topic, evoking love-it-or-hate-it reactions, I didn’t manage to get a scoop.

Wine choices were light, with five entry-level options from Signos (Argentina), Grace (China), and another brand (forgot to write down the name). There was also Champagne from Taittinger, though this ran out at least 45 minutes before the event ended.

Three hours of sipping, sampling and hobnobbing for RMB120 - a good deal.

By the way, three things that might make next year’s event even better:

- Better crowd control at the food stands. Too often, people politely lined up and, just as a new batch of food was ready, others cut in or those at the front took big portions. The servers should help prevent this. Even so, the lines moved more smoothly than last year.

- Elimination of obstacles on the floor. The hotel lined up promotional tiles (measuring 30 centimeters by 30 centimeters each) along the edges of the passageways. Given these passageways were already crowded with tables and patrons, many people stepped on these tiles and faced the risk of a serious spill.

- More wine!

See also:
An afternoon spent at Culinary Coin (2007)