Zhajiangmian: Beijing's Noodles in Fermented Soybean Sauce

Zhajiangmian (炸酱面, zhájiàngmiàn) is what Beijingers actually eat, as opposed to what visitors are told to eat. Thick hand-pulled wheat noodles arrive in a bowl with a dark blob of sauce on top: pork belly diced small and slow-fried down with yellow soybean paste (黄酱) and sweet fermented flour paste until it is glossy, dense and very salty. Around the bowl come small dishes of raw and blanched extras — cucumber batons, soybeans, celery, radish, bean sprouts, sometimes garlic chives.

The ritual matters. You tip the vegetables in, then attack the whole thing with chopsticks until the sauce is distributed. Skip that step and you get a mouthful of pure salt followed by five of plain noodles. Done right it is savoury, a bit funky, crunchy from the vegetables, and enormously satisfying for the money.

Where to eat it: honestly, almost anywhere. This is a dish of neighbourhood shops, and a ¥18 ($2.50) bowl from a tiled room with plastic stools is frequently as good as anything else. If you want the performance — waiters in white towels shouting your order across the room, big copper bowls, old Beijing decor — Haiwanju (海碗居) is the well-known choice and charges around ¥40 ($5.60).

Portions are large and the dish is heavy, so it works better as lunch than dinner. Vegetarians should note that the sauce is pork-based and there is rarely a meat-free version, though a plain sesame noodle (麻酱面, májiàngmiàn) is usually on the same menu.