Michelin Guide Beijing Debuts With Xin Rong Ji on Top

The MICHELIN Guide published its first selection for Beijing on 28 November 2019. The 2020 edition listed 100 establishments, among them 23 starred restaurants: one with three stars, two with two stars and 20 with one star, alongside 15 Bib Gourmand addresses and 62 MICHELIN Plate recommendations.

The only three-star award went to Xin Rong Ji on Xinyuan South Road, which specialises in Taizhou cuisine built around fish from the East China Sea. Inspectors described the meal as “a complete and extremely enjoyable dining experience made possible by comprehensive orchestration and thoughtful arrangement”. Two other Xin Rong Ji branches, on Jianguomenwai Street and Jinrong Street, received one star each.

Two restaurants took two stars. King’s Joy occupies a traditional courtyard house beside Yonghe Temple and serves refined vegetarian cooking based on organic vegetables from local farms and wild mushrooms from Yunnan. Shanghai Cuisine, the other two-star, has a Shanghainese chef reworking regional classics such as braised winter melon and stuffed field snails with contemporary methods.

The one-star list mixed Chinese institutions with hotel dining rooms and European kitchens. It included two branches of Da Dong, on Gongti East Road and Dongsi 10th Alley, Jing Yaa Tang, Il Ristorante – Niko Romito, The Georg, Lei Garden at Jinbao Tower, Family Li Imperial Cuisine and Fu Chun Ju.

According to the guide, more than 30 distinct Chinese regional cuisines are represented across the city’s restaurants. Gwendal Poullennec, International Director of the MICHELIN Guides, said: “Chefs and restaurant operators here not only inherited the true essence of Beijing taste, but also created an amazing diversity.” The guide also noted the very high proportion of starred restaurants for an inaugural edition in Beijing.