Bengfort.com

It’s not just the food, not just the price, and not just the atmosphere that makes a restaurant good. With competition growing and clientele becoming increasingly fickle, restaurateurs are relying less on the above, and more on creating the “ultimate dining experience.” They do this through theme motifs, ethnic fusion concoctions, elaborate decorations, and other such gimmicks. I have even thought about jumping on the bandwagon and starting up my own Chinese-Guyanese fusion restaurant with food served on giant water lily leafs and where customers eat with their fingers –it may not be ultimate, but it sure would be an experience!
However, what most people don’t know is that quite often you don’t find “the ultimate dining experience” on your own, but rather, it finds you. These hidden delightful dining moments can come from the unlikeliest of places, and all it takes is an open mind and maybe some nostalgia from your study abroad days.
Take for example, my dining experience last Saturday. Happy hour had ended at Beer Mania in Sanlitun, an hour earlier than what was posted on the door. The owner indignantly allowed us our last drinks as we watched him scrape off the 8 from the sign that read “Happy Hour 5-8 pm.” The little spat with the owner made us even hungrier than we originally were, and we rejoiced that there was a Chinese restaurant right across the street. It was big and bright with Chinese ornamentation, flashing lights, and fuwuyuan standing outside to greet (or pounce on) potential customers. There was a consensus that at that precise moment in time there was nothing we wanted to eat more than piping hot steamed dumplings. To the left of this gleaming big restaurant, there was a small “xiao chi,” oddly jutting out of the side of a building like a malignant tumor. It was a run-down hole in the wall with folding tables and cheap plastic stools, but there were dumplings! We saw the steaming stacks of bamboo baskets and began to make a bee-line for the restaurant–only to be literally waylaid by the big restaurant fuwuyuan. They were like ogres blocking a bridge, not letting us pass and urging us to go into their restaurant. After stating our dumpling intentions, they enthusiastically declared that they too had dumplings, sure to be tastier than the ones at the little xiao chi. My one friend was highly skeptical, and asked every fuwuyuan if they had dumplings as we were led to our table. “You, you, we have dumplings!” Was the response from every single fuwuyuan until we got to our table, sat down, got our menus and ordered, only to have the manager come over and tell us at the last minute, very sorry, no dumplings. There was unanimous uproar. They lied! Blatant, calculated lies! Six chairs were simultaneously pushed back and the table abandoned as we stampeded out the door, ignoring the manager’s cries that they have “mushurou, doufu, and lazi jiding!”
After that, the little xiaochi was heaven. The owner was very kind, we got 7 baskets of steaming dumplings right away, cold beer was on the table in seconds, and the other dishes, while not the tastiest I’ve had, were satisfying. Better yet, the other patrons were fun and friendly and came over to chat like we were old friends. Sitting on my plastic stool I realized that this was the most perfect dining experience I’ve had in Beijing in a long time.