{Tea diaries}

My motivation to post dropped again to zilch after my last post, but was revived with the discovery of one lone reader of this blog (thanks CXB). So I now feel obliged to post a quickie here... 

I took a week off in late May to visit Beijing, courtesy of M, who was ever so kind to let me join his "ECRST Summer 06" tour group. This was my first time as a tourist there, so everything was an eye-opener. Must admit that before the trip, I was concerned with the hygiene level with the many horror stories one hear. But must admit was more than pleasantly surprised by how developed and advanced the place has become since my last visit (which was a biz trip and consisted of two destinations - airport & hotel). Of course, much of the credit goes to M, who did a great job in organising and attending to our every single whim and request. (am trying to make amend for all my complaints whilst on the trip... )

Anyway, while waiting for the other three members of our little tour group to arrive at Beijing airport, we nipped off to the basement of arrivals lounge for some lunch - since we had more than two hours to spare. After checking out the proper restaurants, we settled on the foodcourt, which seemed the most popular of them all.

The braised beef noodle looked very inviting, and did not disappoint - the beef cubes were extremely flavorful and tasty and the noodle was very well done - with plenty of texture and not too soggy. I also liked the addition of the bright red cherry tomatoes and green veg - as a sidenote, in HK, the noodle places never seem to put much veg into their noodle dishes... perhaps that's a way to make one order an additional plate of veg?! All these for a little more than Rmb10~ a very good sign of the food quality for the next few days of our trip.

Am sure I have mentioned this before - am a total dumpling fan (little did I know I would be trumped later on by D and E, my fellow travel companions), I used to order gazillion dumplings whenever we went back to Taiwan when young. In fact, one of my weekend acitivities in the UK was to make a few dozens of pork dumpling and throw them into the freezer as an easy dinner alternative. Am normally quite disappointed by the quality of the dumplings in HK, either the skin is too thick, or the fillings too measly. Our order of beef dumpling at the airport was very good value for money - less than Rmb1 per dumpling! And the quality was good too, with just the right balance.

Would highly recommend as a quick stopover if you are stuck at the airport - there were many locals around, which is always a good sign. Would have loved to try out some of the interesting dishes that the other people were having.

With D, E, and R safely landed, we began our Beijing adventures ~ stay tuned