Beijing Boyce

Regular contributor 8 Songs recently visited the Nanluoguxiang area and dined at Lugar. Here is his take on this bar and Vietnamese tapas joint. (Note: I will post a review of Lugar tomorrow: It’s been sitting in my “almost done” pile for over a month as I futilely believed I would hunt down the names of the foods I ate there.)

“Sometimes it pays not to have firm dinner plans when you go out for a preliminary drink. The other night while washing away the week’s troubles, a friend of mine suggested we try eating at a place she had heard about via one of the expat rags (CW).

“The place is called Lugar, in Nanluoguxiang. Not to be confused with Luga’s in Sanlitun. This Lugar offers Vietnamese tapas! Intrigued by the idea of Vietnamese tapas, and always in for a new experience, my GF and I decided to tag along.

“At first glance, you could be forgiven for thinking that you were at the wrong place. When you get to the address, you find yourself in a bottle shop. And not a terribly impressive one at that – I checked out the wine selection during the evening and found it to be pretty ordinary.

“But we were quickly escorted to a large room at the back, where we found a well-stocked bar to our left, a table of six or eight people and a pool table. Apart from that, there were one or two tables strewn around with an odd chair here or there. Since we would be a total eight or ten people, we had a choice of strong-arming the other party out of their setting, eating off the pool table, or squeezing tables together and sitting three people to two chairs so we could fit. We chose the last option, and got to know each other much more than we had planned!

“A quick word about the pool table. It looks to be good quality, with a true surface, but it’s way too big for its room. Even without us blocking one end, there were many corners where a player simply couldn’t get a good angle on the ball. (Although at my level of ability it makes no difference.)

“Since we were the first of the group to arrive, we ordered food and drink. The menu consisted of things like vegetable rolls, salads, and typical Vietnamese food, presented on a small plate… eventually. Perhaps because by the time our friends arrived the total number of patrons was double the safe limit, the food simply didn’t arrive for over an hour. Drinks weren’t much better. Although they had a reasonable selection, it still took upwards of 20 minutes to get our first drinks. Subsequent orders took longer.

“To be fair to them, we had not booked, and to rock up with a number of people roughly equal to their seating capacity and expect normal service is not right.

“The good thing was the price. Everything was two-for-one. So a RMB40 cocktail was great value. The only downer there was that the second drink had to be identical. Not equivalent or lower value. So if you wanted a lychee martini, you needed to have a friend who also wanted one, or you needed to be thirsty! The food prices were excellent as well, at RMB10 to RMB40 per plate, before the discount.

“Lugar is well worth another try.