City's food and catering business sees unprecedented growth last year

Haidilao, a Sichuan-style hotpot restaurant, has topped the list of "50 popular restaurants in Beijing" with 610,000 reviews on a popular food rating website.

The list, complied by Dianpin.com and based on consumer reviews, said Sichuan cuisine, hotpot and western restaurants are most sought after by Beijingers.

The popular mini hotpot, spicy Chongqing hotpot and the traditional Beijing shuanyangrou (boiled mutton), were top of the tables in Beijing, and pizza and steak dominated the western food categories.

Buffet restaurant chain Jinqianbao (Golden Jaguar) was ranked second, with Sichuan speciality Meizhou Dongpo close behind.

Western restaurants also take up seven of the "best 10 restaurants for dating" in Beijing, recommended for their atmosphere and service.

"Having a lit candle standing on the table with soft music playing in the background seems to make the food less important," wrote a customer in her comment about an Italian restaurant in Sanlitun.

Zhang Tao, the CEO of Dianping.com, said the report revealed the trend of the catering business and customers' habits.

It also pointed out that Beijingers are now spending more on eating out than last year.

The statistics covered 8,000 restaurants in Beijing and noted that the average price per customer is 75 yuan for a dinner, a 6.8 percent increase from 2008. It added that the restaurant industry in Beijing has grown by 40 percent last year with 20 new restaurants opening every day.

No more do diners seek out only a few main commercial streets for culinary choice. The city now has a large selection of dining hotspots in every area with Di'anmen, Sanlitun and Wudaokou as popular destinations. And new restaurants are also opting for business around popular shopping malls.

The growth of the industry is exceptional. Last year, about 6,000 new restaurants opened in Beijing and only 2000 closed.

In order to attract the limited numbers of customers, restaurants have been forced to introduce new dishes and marketing strategies. Beijing saw several Thai and Vietnamese restaurants open last year, and fresh local cuisines from other parts of China also set up business in the capital.

And the use of electronic coupons is another trend in the catering industry. Dianping.com said electronic coupons were downloaded 2.04 million times on its site, 30 percent more than in 2008.