Best Food In China

Location

Well known from the guidebooks, Afunti is a sanitised Uighur restaurant that has established a reputation for excellent Uighur food.
It is a bit of an institution in Beijing, and so tourists now outnumber locals.
The reputation for the post-meal dancing on the trestle tables, the Uighur music, and the...err...cabaret performance have pulled in the punters.
Sadly, the excellent food is rushed, to get the tables cleared away and so the dancing can begin. For this reason, you need to arrive early - no later than 6.30 - to allow time to eat. It also closes early, and once it is down to a handful or remaining drunken revellers, the music slackens off (you can't really whoop it up on a table to Greensleeves) and you are ushered out into the night. Houhai or Sanlitun beckons.

It is not the most typical of Xijiang or Uighur restaurants, but it is the easiest.

Roasted leg of mutton. Forget about chopsticks. Forget about cutlery. Even the plate may be optional. Just gnaw.

Unusually for Muslim restaurant (except in China) they serve alcohol and everyone drinks. This could be the reason that anyone is even prepared to contemplate dancing on a trestle table to Greensleeves.

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