It’s summer time in Guangzhou and it is hot and dry. Stepping into the sun feels a bit like reaching into an oven. I can feel my skin crisping up under the sun, much like Guangzhou’s famous roast quails and geese.
On the bright side… (get it?), it’s lotus season in Guangzhou. If you brave the sun to visit Lotus Mountain at dawn, you can see the many types of lotus flowers in bloom and glowing in the sun. In real life, the glare of the sun diminished the colours that we could appreciate in real life, but the same lighting made the colours glow on camera.
A bee flitting in and out of the tulip flower.
Part of the mountain includes an ancient quarry which is all the rage on TikTok and likened to Zhang Jia Jie - but we couldn’t really find the spot where the videos were taken.
Here and there, you find bits of ancient architecture and of history, but much of Guangzhou had modernised. Along Beijing Road Pedestrian Street, you can see remnants of the old streets from the Song Dynasty, which was juxtaposed against the storefronts of Huawei selling the latest gadgets, alongside the sports giants of China and the latest bubble tea shops. There are a couple of old towns in Guangzhou, but they’re mainly shopping streets as well.
One of them is Yong Qing Fang Ancient Town 永庆坊, which is located near Shamian Island 沙面岛. It’s a shopping district filled with restaurants and fashion wear. We had dinner in the area, and as night fell, visited the Crescent Moon Bridge.
If you're in the area, there's a popular store Yue Nanxin Milk Desserts Expert 粵南信牛奶甜品专家 for traditional Cantonese desserts: 姜撞奶 (jiang zhuang nai, ginger-milk pudding) and 双皮奶 (shuang pi nai, steamed milk custard). They also make amazing wantan noodles.
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| One great point about coming in summer despite the heat: this is the season to shop for summer fashion to your hearts’ content. In a few months time, the summer clothes would give way to cardigans and winter jackets. |
The best way to enjoy Guangzhou is to treat it like the shopper’s paradise that it is. It is a bustling metropolis; there really isn’t much sightseeing to do. Take it easy and let the days past by. Sleep in every day and then wake up for dim sum. Shop for as long as you like. Go for dinner and a headspa, or check out one of the bars.
There’s no shortage of shopping districts when you’re in Guangzhou. We stayed in Tianhe, which is conveniently located amongst swanky malls and popular restaurants. The malls are (mostly) interconnected via a sprawling underground mall called Fashion Tianhe Plaza (时上天河), which is a good way to get around in the heat wave.
Other than Tianhe and Yong Qing Fang Ancient Town, other shopping districts would be Beijing Lu, APM Market and Dong Shan Kou. I picked up a couple of running shoes from local brands after reading and hearing good things about their quality.
Dong Shan Kou is a little more sparse compared to the rest, but the popular fragrance shop 观夏 To Summer is here. More importantly, this is ground zero for the bar scene in Guangzhou. The speakeasy Hope and Sesame (Miaoqian Shiduo 庙前士多) sits here along a nondescript street, and it was one of our highlights of the trip.
We didn’t know it at the time, but just a week before we arrived, it had just been newly minted as Number 29 of World’s Best Top 50 bars, and also Asia’s Best Bar. Read that again: Asia's Best Bar. This place isn't just the best in Guangzhou or China; it's the number one spot in Asia, accounting for the bars in Japan, South Korea and Singapore.
Don’t leave Guangzhou without dropping by.
We got a table facing the bar, and I’m glad to report back that there’s no tired showmanship here. There’s no sparklers set into your drink. No one’s setting the bar surface on fire, or spinning a large ice cube in an empty glass for a whole minute to chill the glass down. It’s an air of quiet competency and letting the drinks speak for themselves.
They were wonderful. I skipped reading the menu and ingredients and just asked for what’s popular. The drink, affectionately called Pig Trotter Vinegar, was one of the best cocktails I’d had. It’s something that I wouldn’t have chosen for myself (pig trotter vinegar cocktail???) but it was incredibly tasty. Ditto for everything else we ordered - the Ice Cream Milk Punch and the Lychee Tea Bubble. Every sip was more-ish.
They were wonderful. I skipped reading the menu and ingredients and just asked for what’s popular. The drink, affectionately called Pig Trotter Vinegar, was one of the best cocktails I’d had. It’s something that I wouldn’t have chosen for myself (pig trotter vinegar cocktail???) but it was incredibly tasty. Ditto for everything else we ordered - the Ice Cream Milk Punch and the Lychee Tea Bubble. Every sip was more-ish.
Whatever you feel like buying, you can probably find a district selling that, at a quantity and pricing that’s hard to match elsewhere. We spent a wonderful morning browsing ceramics at 枫艺陶瓷 Fengyi Ceramics in Nantai. The neighbourhood has many ceramics shop, but this is the place that we went to. (You can input 南泰批发市场 to get to the location). We spent a few hours looking through their wares, and ended up buying over 20 kilos of ceramics (Oops).
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| Our haul! They all survived the journey back home. The cardboard box was well-packed and cushioned, and we secured it further at the airport with the plastic wrapping services before flying off. |
In a similar vein, you may have seen online recommendations for the wholesale kitchenware district in Panyu. Contrary to TikTok opinions, I do not recommend going there. Have any of the influencers actually tried buying things from the wholesale centre? You’ll likely be leaving empty-handed. Each shop is a display shop for their wares. There’s plenty of designs to browse, but don’t expect to have what you like to be in stock. The businesses here are wholesalers: they cater to F&B businesses that place orders by the hundreds and thousands, and the shops place orders with their factories to manufacture the utensils. If you’re after a paltry 6 or 8 sets for home use, you’ll be restricted to whatever leftover stock in whichever odd quantity, and even then, that happened to us in one shop out of the dozens that we had walked into. Skip this location and buy your tableware from departmental stores.
Where you should be spending more time is at Funly Coffee Lab, a third-wave cafe that is just a few minutes’ walk from 枫艺陶瓷 Fengyi Ceramics. We loved this cafe. We stopped by for a drink before going into the ceramics shop. And afterwards, as the ceramic shop was packing up our goods, we came back for a second round.
Yunnan-grown coffee beans was on my list of things to try, but this year was apparently a poor harvest year and they didn’t have any in stock. Woe. But they stock a lot of other beans that were processed in novel ways, including coffee beans with notes of watermelon. The local-favourite is #8 on the menu, which had been steamed with jasmine leaves before roasting, resulting in an incredibly sweet aroma with the familiar scents of jasmine. We ordered our drinks (which wasn’t the jasmine one), but the passionate barista brought some out for us to smell the jasmine notes.
And after we left the shop, the thoughts of the jasmine coffee beans lingered in my mind. I couldn’t let it go, and well, returned to try. How could I have not?
The jasmine-steamed coffee beans taste bright and acidic from the washed process, and a firm jasmine tea accent. It took a while to get used to the flavours, but it tasted better and better as we got to the end of the pot. It was a very interesting pot of coffee.
They also make an incredible frothy iced matcha coconut latte, good for those hot afternoons.
They also make an incredible frothy iced matcha coconut latte, good for those hot afternoons.
We dropped by 清平中药材专业市场 Qingping Chinese Medicinal Herbs Market one morning. It’s a wholesale market for dried Chinese ingredients. The shops on the first floor is meant for casual consumers, while wholesale sellers take up the second level. We left with several kilos of dried ingredients, including dried scallops and danggui (angelica root). I even saw deer legs 10 years ago when I last visited. These dried foods are bulky (and heavy!), but the prices here make the extra efforts worth it.
We also spent an hour or so around 盛贤鸿运摄影器材城 (Shengxian Hongyun Photography Equipment City), where all things camera-related are stocked and sold. Think third-party lens makers like TTartisan or 7artisans (which lens go for a fraction of other makers’ prices and are quite well-regarded), or anything from tripods to filters to sturdy camera bags.
If you enjoy dim sum and Cantonese food, Guangzhou is the place to be at. (If you don’t enjoy such cuisine, what are you doing in Guangzhou?) Guangzhou is the birthplace of dim sum, and yum cha is a social tradition near and dear to the Cantonese culture. I’ve been coming to Guangzhou to visit my relatives over the years, and it has been a joy every single time. My grandaunts are retired pensioners and would meet daily in the mornings to yum cha together- to drink tea and eat dim sum.
Diandude 点都德, Tao Tao Ju 陶陶居 and Tang Ren Xuan 唐人轩 are popular names for dim sum, with branches across Guangzhou. We couldn’t get enough of them. If you stay in Tianhe Marriott, both Diandude 点都德 and Tao Tao Ju 陶陶居 can be found in the same mall within easy walking distance.
There are some peculiar dining quirks found in Cantonese restaurants. Are you puzzled why the waitress had placed a large empty basin on your dining table? Are the wait staff also giving you befuddled looks when you put food onto your plates?
Well, that's because a Cantonese dining custom is to eat out of a bowl, and only bowls. There is a plate, but it's meant purely for food waste. You do not place food onto the plate to eat from.
The large basin is meant for you to rinse your utensils with hot tea before using them. It's OCD-coded, but I like it. You don't have to follow them, but when in Rome....
Here’s how it’s done:
1. Pour the tea into your teacup. Dip the end of your chopsticks and spoon into the hot tea to rinse.
2. Pour the tea out of your teacup and into your bowl. Dip the rim of the teacup into the bowl to rinse the rim.
3. Swirl the tea around the bowl for a bit, then pour the tea out into the communal basin. Your dining set is now ready to eat with. The plate remains tea-free. You do not have to rinse it, as plates are used solely for discarding food waste.
It’s easy peasy. And a fun pre-meal ritual, it has to be said.
1. Pour the tea into your teacup. Dip the end of your chopsticks and spoon into the hot tea to rinse.
2. Pour the tea out of your teacup and into your bowl. Dip the rim of the teacup into the bowl to rinse the rim.
3. Swirl the tea around the bowl for a bit, then pour the tea out into the communal basin. Your dining set is now ready to eat with. The plate remains tea-free. You do not have to rinse it, as plates are used solely for discarding food waste.
It’s easy peasy. And a fun pre-meal ritual, it has to be said.
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| Recognising the tea side-table in Diandude 点都德gave me a jolt of happiness. It’s been over 10 years, and I’m glad some things stayed the same. There’s the golden teapot, with a kettle of boiling water set on a brazier next to it. |
Some dim sum restaurants also lets diners brew tea next to your table. This is how people do it (again, it's not rocket science!):
1. Rinse the teapot, the pitcher (known as a gongdaohu 公道壶, literally translates to “fair jug”) and the tea cups with hot water. In most cases, the serving tray should come with a drip tray.
2. Add your choice of tea leaves into the pot, then the hot water from the kettle to rinse the tea leaves. Pour out the water immediately.
3. Pour in more hot water into the teapot, this time to steep the tea leaves for a minute or so.
4. When ready to serve, pour the tea from the teapot to the pitcher. This ensures you’re pouring out homogenised tea over each brew, instead of having the last serving of the tea pot being much more concentrated than the first cup.
2. Add your choice of tea leaves into the pot, then the hot water from the kettle to rinse the tea leaves. Pour out the water immediately.
3. Pour in more hot water into the teapot, this time to steep the tea leaves for a minute or so.
4. When ready to serve, pour the tea from the teapot to the pitcher. This ensures you’re pouring out homogenised tea over each brew, instead of having the last serving of the tea pot being much more concentrated than the first cup.
We were on a personal quest to eat as many roast geese as we could during our trip. In another trip down memory lane, we returned to 海韵烧鹅海鲜酒家 Minghui Haiyun Restaurant (Address: 广州市越秀区仓边路33号富豪酒店, 3楼), and is located on the third floor of the hotel. The hotel is undergoing some long overdue renovations this year, but the restaurant is still up and running, and looks just the same as ever. It was the same layout, the same carpet, and that same stairwell where smokers congregate. How nostalgic.
The menu didn’t change either. And thankfully, the roast goose was as good as ever. The skin was crisp and meat juicy, and each bite yielded rendered fat from under the skin.
The menu didn’t change either. And thankfully, the roast goose was as good as ever. The skin was crisp and meat juicy, and each bite yielded rendered fat from under the skin.
We also had our old favourite 脆皮海珊骨, fried pork slices, which was (mis)translated phonetically into “Saddam Hussein’s bone”. Hmm. Okay. It was delicious though, and thanks for that unsolicited mental image. Other our top favourite was coconut soup with yam and sweet potato, and we were devastated to hear that they just ran out of it (Miss XS went back to ask 2 more times after).
Nearby is Dayang, a stall selling herbal soups of chicken stewed within a coconut. The summer heat, combined with the steam emanating from the steamers, led us to bring the coconuts back to our hotel rooms.
東園·廣州味·點心與燒鵝 is also renowned for their roast goose, but we came on an-off day, because it wasn’t much to write about (we were pre-warned that their standards might be inconsistent).
Tao Tao Ju 陶陶居, the dim sum place mentioned earlier, had shatteringly crisp geese skin. But the meat was dry. We much preferred their excellent roast quails, roast chicken, roast pork belly and char siew. The sweet and sour pork, served on ice, was also terrific, as was the breaded fried tofu cubes.
Tao Tao Ju 陶陶居, the dim sum place mentioned earlier, had shatteringly crisp geese skin. But the meat was dry. We much preferred their excellent roast quails, roast chicken, roast pork belly and char siew. The sweet and sour pork, served on ice, was also terrific, as was the breaded fried tofu cubes.
Another restaurant that we really liked is dagefan 大鸽饭. We scheduled dinner at 3pm one day just to avoid the queue, as the queue is otherwise impossible at regular dining hours. And you know what, I’ll have dinner at 3pm again, if that's what it takes to eat here once more. The roast pigeons served in a claypot were perhaps the most memorable dish that we’d had in Guangzhou.
One of the best meals that we got was at 小炳胜. The roast chicken was perfectly done, with a tinge of black truffle sauce. Their fried eggplant was similarly wonderful drizzled in a sweet glaze.
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| 小炳胜 |
绿茶餐厅 was recommended to us, and we also liked it well enough. The star was the vermicelli with prawns, and the gently fragrant Longjing Roast Chicken, chicken perfumed with longjing tea leaves.
On our last day, we took a palate cleanser meal, and had clear broth of coconut hotpot from 同仁四季椰子鸡. The broth is lightly flavoured, though it gets richer and richer with more food added to the steamboat.
At the end of our trip, we left sated, and our suitcases were filled to bursting. We tried many new restaurants and went to so many new malls. But as strange as it may seem, what brought the most joy wasn't the newest bars or restaurants. It was in retracing our steps in the Guangzhou that I had known, revisiting many of my old haunts and restaurants and finding them just the way I remembered. It was in the little rituals of pouring hot tea over our utensils, and brewing more tea for ourselves as we eat dim sum.
Nostalgia is a strange thing, isn't it? I'm glad some things stayed the same in this grand, proud city.
Til next time then, Guangzhou.
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