W/Sa/Su at 8:30am
Duration 3 hours
350 RMB / $55 USD per adult
180 RMB / $28 USD per child
Approx. 1.5km walking
The Essentials:
Sample up to 15 dishes and several drinks across 7 locations on this walking tour of Beijing’s historic hutongs. Exploring a historic hutong best seen on foot, this tour covers everything from the history of Beijing to daily life at the market.
Stops
At least 6 food stops, with a mix of sit-down restaurants and food stalls, plus one rooftop coffee house.
Group Size
Small groups of 2-10 people per tour.
Start & End Location
This tour starts and ends at Fuchengmen Subway Station. An email will be sent with detailed meeting location details immediately after booking.
Dietary Requirements
We are happy to welcome vegetarians and pescatarians, but please let us know prior to your tour date as same day requests cannot be guaranteed. This tour is not recommended for gluten free or vegan diets. Please message us prior to booking if you have any questions.
WeChat ID: Lostplate
Beijing can feel like a fortress, and we’re not talking about its massive walls or population. In a city that feels endless, with a formidable history and sizeable language barrier, it’s tricky to get a glimpse of real life here.
For a few hours, pull back the curtain and live in the real Beijing. See the sights and smells that have been a long-time mainstay in Beijing’s hutongs, and start your morning the way millions have for generations. With at least 7 different stops, you’ll get a broad taste of the real Beijing, from super-traditional breakfasts to our trendy coffee house scene. See a local market, eat in tiny holes in the walls, and try over a dozen different breakfast items Beijingers love.
Discover how varied Beijing's breakfast staples are, from sweet Beijing yogurt to distinct mungbean soup - a Beijing-only pastime for generations.
Walk through a neighborhood built over 700 years ago, and hear the unique stories behind doorway art and stone relics centuries old. You won't find any tourists here.
Try Chinese donuts that are a popular breakfast for Beijingers at a tiny shophouse that sells out daily. Another favorite here? Soybean milk.
Visit a local market street and sample popular street foods like baozi and Halal beef soup.
Jianbing is taking the world by storm, but we think the best is found right here in Beijing, so we'll visit one of our favorite stalls in the entire city.
End your morning at a local coffee shop overlooking iconic hutong tiled rooftops and revel in one of the most historic areas of the capital.
"Beijing's Hutong Breakfast Club!"
The first foodie stop was only around the corner, taking our seats in a former temple like building we waited for our first slices of a Beijing breakfast. We all tried a series of weird tasting Beijing snacks, each obscured tasting bite held secrets from Beijing's past!
"Visit Beijing and its Essentials"
I certainly would not have tasted all of these dishes if I had not taken part in the tour - and obviously, I would not have learned as much about Beijing and its old districts. Each place visited is super local and absolutely unknown to tourists.
YouTube
Take a close look at our Beijing Hutong Breakfast Food Tour and what you’ll experience in our own Lost Plate produced video.
YouTube
Watch the Fung Bro’s video about our “Very Traditional Chinese Breakfast Food Tour in Beijing, China.”
“We had an awesome tour with Kelly! The food was very delicious, well-chosen and authentic. We enjoyed it a lot and will definitely recommend this great tour. Our lovely guide Kelly made this tour a special experience in our daily Beijing life :-)”
Isabelle
October 2021
“After 2 years of living in Beijing I signed up for this tour to do with 2 of my local friends and we had SUCH a great morning! Our guide Kelly was incredible – she was friendly & professional and had SO much knowledge of local culture, history AND the food! My local friends learned new things & tried new restaurants they’d never been to. I loved the selection/range of foods that we sampled – I wasn’t a ‘fan’ of all the dishes but I tried everything & discovered some delicious new dishes! The Hutong area that we toured was beautiful & full of history. Kelly spent some extra time with us making our experience above & beyond what we had expected. I would highly recommend this tour to anyone!”
Amy
July 2021
The Lost Plate Beijing Breakfast Hutong Tour was awesome! It was great to see so much local food and taste a good number of popular breakfast items. I definitely wouldn’t have gone into some of the restaurants unless someone guided me in, so I’m really grateful for getting this opportunity to enjoy some local food with a great guide. I highly recommend this food tour for anyone who is curious about the variety of breakfast foods in Beijing and wants to try more than 10 items. Prepare your stomachs!
Irene
April 2021
“We had a great hutong breakfast tour with our guide Evon. She was very knowledgeable about Beijing hutong history and the various food stops. All of the food stops were delicious and filling! All were unique. This tour is a MUST if you’re visiting Beijing as a tourist or even if you live here and want to try something new.”
moniquecover
March 2021
“Great tour, professionally organized, and well worth it. Even as a resident, some local foods are a little harder to discover and try, so the guided tour, explanations, and background made a huge difference to being able to experience local Chinese cuisine and some of its culture and history. Lost Plate is super professional, from initial contact, to confirmation, and follow-up; they truly want to help out. Food was great, varied, and there was more than enough to eat, beverages are included if/when you want them, and we were stuffed at the end. If you don’t discover and learn to eat Chinese food, you are missing a major part of the history, culture, and experience of living in / visiting China. We are currently signed on for the Hutong Dinner Tour and are planning the Four Corners of China Restaurant Tour with Lost Plate as well. Highly Recommend, would eat again!’
Le Moustache
March 2021
“My friends and I had this breakfast tour on a cold winter morning, but everything is beyond our expectations. We strolled in an interesting Beijing hutong area while trying so many tasty food including street snacks and a good coffee at a lovely Cafe. We had great fun! Kelly, our guide, is so great! She told us so many stories about the food as well as the hutong. If you want to try authentic local food, the Lost Plate breakfast tour is highly recommended.”
Melanie
January 2021
We are not a tasting tour, we provide much more than a full meal’s worth of food so we recommend you come prepared to eat. We are just tickled by the share of reviews we get that warn other guests to pace themselves. Even our guide training covers tips and tricks for guests to pace themselves. It is our professional recommendation to wear your Christmas pants, or its equivalent.
Our tours have been designed to accommodate as many diets as possible while still remaining stupid delicious. This tour is vegetarian and pescatarian friendly, but please let us know prior to your tour date as same day requests cannot be guaranteed. This tour is not recommended for gluten free or vegan diets.
When booking online, you’ll have the opportunity to let us know if you have any dietary restrictions or special requests. Please use this field to let us know about your requests and we will follow up if there are any problems or questions.
This is a walking tour; let’s just get that out of the way. But with this tour, it is certainly best seen on foot. Hidden museums and relics litter the hutongs and there is so much to see. Dogs are out picking each other up for play dates, uncles are taking their birds for walks in their cages, doorways with old horse ties and shrines tell you about the family history of residents… It’s best by foot so you can really take in the local Beijing hutong life.
That being said, we’ve designed the route to be easy on your feet. This tour covers about 1.5 km / 1 mile by foot. In total, you’re going to be walking about 20 to 30 minutes, a figure that has already been adjusted for full tummy walking speeds towards the end. Over the course of 3 hours, it will be a welcome digestion break.
Our child pricing is valid for ages 4 through 15. Children ages 3 and under are free.
The tour starts at 8:30am at Fuchengmen subway station which services subway line 2. You’ll get the exact address, directions, and transportation details immediately after booking.
The tour ends a short walk away from the start location. Your guide will point you in the right direction for wherever you need to go next, or you are welcome to stay at the coffee house as long as you like!
Our minimum is 2 and maximum is 10. There’s no flag to follow, or megaphone, or tacky uniforms. It’s small enough to be intimate, but big enough to get away with trying several dishes at each stop. You’ll get plenty of face-time with the experts. Bottom line is, you’ll follow the guide through a super-local experience and make friends along the way.
This tour lasts about 3 hours and between 7+ stops it also depends a lot on how the group is eating and walking. If you have any other concerns or needs about the end time, don’t fret, just let us know if you are worried about time and we’ll let you know what we can do.
All of our tours are rain-or-shine, so we suggest you dress for the weather. In rare cases of extreme weather, your guide will cancel the tour and provide a full refund.
During times of extreme air pollution (AQI over 400) our tours will run but refunds will be provided if you are unable to join due to health concerns.
Yes we do! If you would like to book a special tour for your organization or group, just contact us and we’ll take care of you.
We have many happy customers who do more than one of our tours in Beijing and across China! We have designed our tours to focus only on food from each city. This means that each dish, story, and vibe is unique to each tour and there aren’t any repeats.
Most people are very surprised how much the cuisine changes as they travel throughout China, and our tours are a good way to discover those differences. We encourage you to pick the tours that best fit your itinerary and we offer a 10% discount if booking more than one tour.
We sure do! If you decide to do more than one tour with us we are happy to offer you a 10% discount off your total amount. It doesn’t matter if the tour is in the same city or a different city, we want to keep feeding you as long as you let us. Our online booking system will automatically deduct the discount from your total if booking online at the same time. If you decide to add more tours later, your original confirmation email will include a promo code to use on those bookings. Also, children ages 4 through 15 receive a discount on all tours (3 & under are free).
Bookings cancelled 2 days (48 hours) or more before your tour are fully refundable (100% refund). Bookings cancelled within 48 hours notice are not refundable. Cancellations must be communicated by email to info@lostplate.com or by phone. If you would like to reschedule your tour with less than 48 hours notice, we will need to charge 50% of your total since we are unable to fill your spots at short notice.
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