Am in Chengdu for a few days (which I like, and where I've been before) but I was wondering if anybody who's spent time here before knows/ has any picks on the absolute best Sichuan restaurants here. Obviously they are all very good (I could live on twice cooked pork alone) but there's got to be some that are above and beyond (and if they had an english menu it would be a plus). There's a touristy but good one down on renmin nan lu past the arena that I like, but I'm looking for someplace new.
I see good reviews for this place a lot... Grandma Chen's Doufu Restaurant 197 Xiyulong Jie, Chengdu One of my old anthropology professors agreed that for mapo doufu, that's the place to go... he also said mentioned the Yaohua Canting and the Chengdu Canting...
What are the health/cleanliness standards like over there in restaurants? I'd probably stick to Panda Express.
Well Sam, I have a couple of Chinese friends in my area who were from Chengdu, so I'll ask them about good restaurants for you. However, knowing you would only relish "twice cooked pork" (gosh I hate that name), I don't have very high hope for you being a connoisseur to genuinely appreciate Sichuan food.
OK listen up Sam, I've got several good restaurants for you, on the recommendation of my friend. Write 'em down. - Tao Ran Ju, near Yu Lin Xiaoqu, located in southern suburb; - Chengdu Lao Cha Guan, located in northwestern suburb; - Da Rong He, near Zi Jing Xiaoqu, located in southern suburb; - Han Baozi; - The one mentioned by kpsta earlier. When my friend went back to visit Chengdu last month (it had been many years since he left the city), he was taken to dine in these restaurants by his brother, so he could hardly remember their exact addresses. As such, you probably need to ask for further help from the locals (college students should have no problem with both pinyin and English, I guess). Good luck. BTW, don't tell me you look to order "Sweet and Sour Chicken" when you are there. My friend would be very pissed if he knows it. Oh finally if your next stop is Tibet, you may want to buy a bunch of MRE to go.
Make sure you hang out by the river and drink tea with all the locals, its pretty cool. If you are going to Tibet, Tali's is good in Lhasa. I dont know if the Yak Hotel is still there.
awesome, am writing these down, will get some help with the locations. btw, I do know that twice cooked pork is a working man's dish (i read that it was invented by miners, iirc) and not haute cuisine, but **** it is just so damned good. am not heading to Lhasa, have been there and done that last year. If anybody cares, it was told to me by some old tibet hands (and I agreed, having eaten in a bunch of places there including the ones mentioned in the abov posts) that the best restaurant (as well as the best, most atmopheric place to stay) is the resto at the Tibet Gorkha hotel (south of the barkhor, just a 100 meters or so west of the nunnery), which as of last year had not made it to most of the guidebooks as it only recenty re-opened. Most of the best dishes are Indian/nepali, since the staff is nepali as in many hotels in lhasa, and since tibetan food really isn't that good - but it is really good and the chef will/can make pretty much anything you want.
