Taste of the times

Beijing restaurants are taking full advantage of fresh spring produce, Ye Jun discovers.

Great herbs and vegetables have arrived on restaurants' dining tables on the breath of spring, and some chefs in Beijing are taking the chance to cook up tasty and healthy fare. Southwest China's Yunnan province is famous for producing wild flowers and herbs. Some of these are available only in spring and early summer. Rainbow Yunnan Restaurant at Crowne Plaza Beijing Sun Palace has taken some of these delicacies to incorporate into healthy and delicious dishes. The restaurant has drafted a wild vegetables menu featuring 16 dishes made with 15 herbs. The dishes are fried, cold assorted, or paired with egg, beef and aubergine.

"There is a reason the herbs grow in spring. And there is a reason we eat them," says Zhang Jianhui, executive chef with Rainbow. "The wild vegetables can not only help people lose some weight but also increase immunity."

Rhizoma gastrodiae, for example, is commonly used in China to dispel pains such as headaches, caused by wind, and for anti-aging purposes. But it has increasingly become a delicacy.

Zhang fries slices of Rhizoma gastrodiae to be fresh and crispy, decorating them with slices of cordyceps and wrapping the herbs in two lettuce leaves. Because of the high price of the herbs, the dish is one of the more expensive, priced at 147 yuan ($23).

Pseudo-ginseng leaves are fried with matsutake oil to taste really tender and make them a bit slippery. Pseudo-ginseng, or sanqi, can invigorate blood circulation and reduce fatigue.

Radix isatidis (banlangen in Chinese) is another herb commonly used in China to treat colds. The medicine is usually used as an electuary, but here fresh Radix isatidis leaves are fried into a tasty, though slightly bitter, dish.

Some wild vegetables are prepared with meat or eggs. Dried bracken, for example, is combined with braised beef sirloin. The bracken absorbs the juice from the beef and becomes flavorful, while the beef becomes less greasy.

Acacia pennata from Yunnan's Xishuangbanna, aka "smelly vegetable", is mixed into egg to make a delectable omelet.

An aubergine "box" of pork is accompanied by a very special dip, made with Yunnan's "tree tomato". The tomato naturally tastes very sour, but the chef adds sugar to make a delightfully sweet-and-sour sauce.

Compared to the healthy fare at Rainbow Yunnan Restaurant, Shang Palace, Shangri-La Hotel Beijing offers a new spring menu that looks rather decadent.

Malaysian chef Kam Siewtong names his starters combination "spring in full swing". It is a mixture of popular Cantonese choices - bean curd, spinach, fresh walnuts with Chinese toon leaves, salt-baked chicken, crispy suckling pig and sea whelk with homemade sauce.

There's such a variety, yet everything looks and tastes flawless.

The majority of the dishes are Cantonese. But the menu also has influences from Malaysian and Sichuanese cuisines.

The main dishes are classic foods with a clever twist. Crispy suckling pig has mashed prawns under crispy pork skin with fragrant sesame. He uses crispy candied walnuts instead of peanuts for kung pao-style prawns.

Sliced crispy chicken and crispy soon hock fish (marble goby) with sauce are both of very high quality. These are accompanied by a light and healthy bowl of double-boiled fish maw and mushroom soup with ginseng.

Even a simple stir-fried broccoli becomes something new and different, as Kam tops it with enoki mushrooms, white fungus and his own mashed corn sauce.

The chef has also prepared memorable foods that are very traditional, such as a delicious barbecue pork buns. Pork ribs with deep-fried garlic come to the table trailing a wonderfully tempting fragrance.

Another must-try lineup of spring dishes is at Da Dong Peking Roast Duck Restaurant. Recently the eatery's Tuanjie Lake branch hosted US first lady Michelle Obama's family.

Chef Dong Zhenxiang and his team always come up with something new for a seasonal menu.

One such item is a big platter of beautiful tarts topped with colorful fruits. Shrimp kebabs and bite-sized salmon appetizers both look so lovely.

A new starter on the spring menu is crayfish with a base of seaweed, which looks very natural and reminds one of a pond.

Dongguan sausage is a delicious new discovery of Da Dong. It is boiled along with traditional Beijing pickled cabbage and spring bamboo shoots to degrease it.

Mackerel dumplings are a traditional Shandong delicacy. The chef takes a classic dish and gives it an appealing new look, topping this one with tender green peas.

It is good to see a few classic dishes remain on the menu. A cold starter of sea cucumber intestines is served in an ice ball, with a strong aroma of Chinese spring chives.

The fanciest touch among the seasonal items may be an individually served steamed king crab with Shaoxing wine in a handsome porcelain bowl.

The owner says his restaurant is one of only two restaurants in the world to serve crispy duck skin with black caviar. (The other is Fat Duck, a three-Michelin-star restaurant in London.)

Finally, it is good to see the restaurant's glazed frozen persimmons come back as a dessert.

Give your spring a fresh start with a bit of these chefs' innovative creations.

Contact the writer at yejun@chinadaily.com.cn.