Beijing Boyce

Phoebe Wong, former manager of Red Capital Residence and RBL, is founder of Sense Beijing, a travel and event consultancy. These are her top five watering holes:

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To be honest, it was difficult to come up with a top five, just because it’s difficult to find consistency with respect to the quality of drinks and service. My picks tend to be about atmosphere and vibe, and in Beijing, that tends to change pretty quickly. But of recent days, here are my top watering holes, which I would introduce to any visitor or newcomer to Beijing.

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Song
I’ve always had a great time going to Song, and this would have been my top pick last winter. This is where I was introduced to Manuka Honey 42 Below Vodka, which is great on its own with lime juice and soda water, or in a few of the Song cocktails. I typically like the music here and the nostalgic Canto movies they show on the wall, but the best part of this place is running into half the town on a Friday night.

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Q Bar
Just the experience of going up to Q-bar is so much fun. I always get a kick out of going in the elevator all decked up with my girlfriends and having a Chinese guy from Inner Mongolia coming in with his paper hotel slippers and pajamas. Peach Party is my favourite drink here, and they usually make them strong. Another bar where everybody knows your name, as this is a regular place for many of my friends. But at the same time, it’s also easy to be inconspicuous, as it’s so dark. I can easily hide off in the far corner, or in the summer on the patio.

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Mesh
Walking into the Opposite House reminds me of walking into the W Hotel in Sydney or somewhere I’d been in San Francisco, and I really like that vibe. This lobby bar resonates that international feel. I’ve had a great Mojito here, and they have a few other interesting (mostly girly) cocktails, so for happy hour on Thursday, this is my choice.

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1949: The Hidden City
This complex is a great hangout, ironically one of my favourites BEFORE their actual bar 1/5 Lounge opened. I like Sugar Bar in the day, and 1/5 Taverna has always served up good food and drinks, although Duck de Chine apparently has a more extensive wine list. I only discovered 1/5 Lounge last month, but I liked the outside patio, and on Thursday nights, they were playing 80s music!

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Face Bar
I really like that old China feel, but in a non-tacky and non-grungy way. Probably the classiest place one could find a pool table. As I recall, they have many house cocktails, and a pretty extensive wine list.

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Honourable mentions:

• Blue Frog: I love their do-it-yourself Bloody Mary kit
• Aria: For consistently made drinks, happy hour, and a comfortable, well-lit place to chat.
• Yin Bar: For the view from the deck on a clear summer day at dusk!
• 2nd Floor: For reasonably priced drinks. I’ve had a couple of great girls’ nights out here, hanging out with Jian, the owner/bartender. They also serve samosa!

Tasting wine in The Hidden City (photo: ASC)

Beijing consumers tasted their way through more than 100 wines from 22 producers as ASC held its Global Wine Extravaganza yesterday at 1949: The Hidden City. Representatives from the wineries, many of whom were in town after attending VinExpo in Hong Kong, did the pouring and chatted with consumers. ASC estimates that more than 300 people attended the event, which was moved indoors at 1949 due to the threat of rain. Despite it being a bit crowded and dim, the event had a nice vibe and the pours were substantial. This was the latest event to feature a good portion of a wine distributor’s portfolio at low cost (see these posts about tastings by Torres, Palette, Palette again, and GELIPU-Winelink).

Here are some of my notes on the wines, though I qualify them by stating that I didn’t make it to every winery’s table.

• Joseph Phelps. It is always a treat to drink Insignia – especially as this Napa Valley wine costs ~RMB2400 per bottle – and the powerful black fruit-driven 2001 didn’t disappoint. I also liked the finishes on the other Phelps wines, including Innisfree Cabernet Sauvignon 2005.

• Seghesio: The Sonoma Zinfandel 2006 and Old Vine Zinfandel 2005 offered lots of fruit and jamminess, with a hint of spice. These are good options for people seeking wine that offers a combination of smoothness and high alcohol (~15 percent).

• Meerlust: I liked the constantly changing aroma of the Chardonnay 2006 (honey, citrus, and more). This is a wine I will try again.

• Brown Brothers: The Chenin Blanc 2007 (citrus and melon aromas, sweetness in the body), Everton White 2006 (lots of juicy fruit), and heavily perfumed Moscato 2007 (nice grapefruit, almost soda-like, zip) are all good white wines for beginners. I noticed that many people liked the Orange Muscat & Flora 2007, thought I found it a bit sweet (think hints of Creamsicle).

I also liked the Gavi di Gavi DOCG 2007 and Barbera D’Asti ‘La Court” 2004 from Michele Chiarlo, the Reserva 2003 from Marques de Riscal, and the wines from Trimbach.

By the way, I was among several attendees NBC interviewed about halfway through the tasting. I hope my answers were coherent!

This is the fourth in a series of posts on places that I have recently toured and that are projected to open over the next few months. Previously: The new Nali Studios: The Saddle Cantina, Project H2O; The new China Doll; The Legation Quarter

In a city where some high-end venues seem intent on blinging each other out, The Hidden City, a project by Elite Concepts, is refreshing for being reserved. Just south of Pacific Century building and east of Revelations (ex-Browns), this complex of about a dozen buildings will include bars, restaurants, a coffee house, an art gallery and a private club. Red bricks walls, oak plank floors, ceiling beams, ample paths, green areas, and plenty of trees suggest a relaxed getaway in the heart of the city – which I guess explains the “hidden” in its name.

Most of the buildings are new – the striking exception being a refurbished two-story factory / warehouse that will hold 1/5 lounge bar – though they evoke a slower-paced time in Beijing’s past. 1949′s Eva Lipman gave me a tour of the place last week. Here are the key venues:

- Duck de Chine, a Beijing duck restaurant split into two narrow rustic buildings of 200 square meters separated by a green space and a glass-walled area that displays the roasting ovens; one room will include a Bollinger Champagne bar.

- Noodle Bar, a cozy spot that seats about 12 at its counters.

- Well Bar, an outdoor four-meter-wide well in which a waist-deep floor has been installed: the plan is for the bartenders to work in the well (let’s hope that flooring is secure!), the patrons to sit around it, and the house brew – “1949″ – to flow.

- Sugar, a coffee and dessert house

- 1/5 restaurant, a large space with an open kitchen, “comfort food”, Sangria, and a slanted roof that peaks at about 10 meters and allows in natural light.

- 1/5 lounge with a four-sided bar on the first floor and VIP rooms upstairs. Lipman says the music will have an “old school” theme (think classic rock).

There will also be a private club.

What strikes me about 1949: The Hidden City is its cohesiveness and modesty. The earthy tones, the beams, the green space, and the understated décor and furnishings work well. The construction materials seem frugal – in the sense of being practical, rather than cheap – and contribute to the unassuming atmosphere. Let’s hope the final product carries this same air. The question with such multi-establishment projects is whether they can fashion success from the sum of their parts. For now, the answer is – and yes, this is a horribly cheesy way to end – hidden.

1949: The Hidden City is slated to open on March 31, save for Well Bar and 1/5 lounge, which will open shortly after.

Earlier this week, I posted about recent visits to two venues projected to soon open – The Legation Quarter and China Doll (3.3. Building edition). I had hoped to start posting today about two other spots I toured – the new Nali Studio (already home to Ciro’s Pomodoro and soon-to-be-home of Project H20 and the new Saddle) and 1949: The Hidden City. Unfortunately, I got sidetracked the past two days with other projects and with getting my e-newsletter out (it’s free; to get on the mailing list, e-mail beijingboyce@yahoo.com with “sign me up” in the subject line). I’ll post about these venues by Monday at the latest. I also hope to post about another major project that has just popped onto the radar – details to come.

Many people have tales of a five hundred or thousand dollar shot of booze, but these tend to involve the consequences of having an over-the-edge-pushing drink that left them so blitzed they lost a wallet full of money or fell in a public water fountain and ruined an expensive suit.

I wonder how many of them have paid that much for the shot itself.

Such opportunities exist in Beijing for those strong of bill clip – at The Ritz-Carlton Bar. The bar stocks a dozen or so vintages of Macallan single malt from the 1950s to 1970s. A 40 ML shot of the 1950 is RMB5000, while the 1952 and 1954 are RMB4500 and RMB4800 respectively. Things get cheaper as you time-travel to the 1960s and 1970s, although no shot is less than RMB2000. Plan to get a second job to finance your drinking if you can’t resist sampling the single malts here.

By the way, I get the feeling that a slightly older vintage of single malt will appear on the scene, say, when 1949: The Hidden City opens.

The Ritz-Carlton Bar is a sedate place, one to talk in or to quietly sip a drink as you contemplate why your wine bar is going down the drain (shameless plug for my upcoming three-part post, “So, you want to open a wine bar”). Dark wood, tans, mahogany, dried mustard and other blood-pressure reducing colors govern, with hints of pool table felt green, fall leaves, and fuchsia. The long narrow bar is illuminated by ambient lighting and scattered candles, although some bigger fixtures remind me of suspended gold-plated tires with back-lit hub cabs.

The Cellar Rat described the place as “Charleston-esque, like a private member’s club in Mayfair, refined and calming, but borderline-sleep inducing. (He also called the staff uniforms “frumpy” and said he would prefer simple, classy outfits, such as those found in Aria or Redmoon.)

At the cheaper end of the menu, a 12-year-old Glenfiddich is RMB 70, while beer starts at RMB 50 per bottle for Tsing Dao, Budweiser, Guinness and Carlsberg.

The bartender, Angelo, is a friendly and informative soul.

Note: In such an upscale spot, the drinks menu would best forgo informing patrons that fruit juices “provide energy to the energy-deficient, protect the immune system” and assist a “flagging libido”, or that beer is “produced by the fermentation of sugars derived from starch-based material.” It just doesn’t fit the scene.