It’s no secret that the many of us in the jingkids editorial team loves Commune Reserve. Situated behind the classy shopping district of SKP and sporting high ceilings with chic interiors, the restaurant offers one of the best burgers in town, amazing service and also a pet-friendly patio.

KEEP READING: Commune Reserve Offers a Welcome Addition to Beijing’s Food Scene

Then, Commune X opened its doors earlier this year in Sanlitun’s popular Taikooli. Located on the fourth floor of the East building where Element Fresh used to be.

I’m surprised it took me this long before I set foot in it just last week, at the end of summer, for a taste of their new offerings.

Here are 3 reasons why you should bring your family and friends to Commune X in Sanlitun, or just watch the video!

1. Pet-friendly rooftop patio

While Commune Reserve has a spacious patio on the ground floor, Commune X elevates you literally to the top floor of Taikooli. In the late afternoon during summer and autumn, there’s just enough shade, sunlight, and a breeze for you to truly enjoy this brand-new patio space. And yes, it is pet-friendly!

2.  Brunch menu, Lunch Promos and Member specials

I don’t know about you but I didn’t know that Commune offered brunch! I cannot wait to bring the family to try, well, practically every thing on the menu!

Shopping at Sanlitun Taikooli can be tough on the wallet, so we save where we can. Commune X can help with its weekday lunch deals at just RMB 68! If you join the membership, you’ll also be entitled to enjoy buy-1-get-1 free pizzas on Mondays from 2-10pm! In fact, when you scan the QR code below to activate your free membership, you’ll get a 10oz beer on the house next time you visit.

3. New and specially designed menu items

Commune X and Commune Reserve are both updating their menu to offer some new culinary treats! You probably already know their burgers are mouth-wateringly delicious, so it’s no surprise that their new Classic Bacon Cheese Burger similarly hits the spot with a piece of thick, juicy miso-maple bacon and french fried onions! Pizza and truffle lovers can rejoice with the Tartufata pizza (RMB 98), which instead of using too much truffle oil as too many truffle dishes tend to do, perfectly blends cheesy with mushroom-y with authentic truffle paste.

And even though it’s not technically new, the Commune Crispy Chicken Wings (RMB 65) is absolutely a show stealer with its true-to-name crispy skin, tender meat, and fried garlic chips that meld wonderfully with the unique Asian seasoning of the breading.

Vegetarians and vegans have not been left out either! The Veggie Tacos are loaded with green and yellow zucchini, pico de gallo, and fried onions – which really make every dish pop! I was also very satisfied with the Vegan Coconut Smoothie which is made with VAI Creamery coconut ice cream and vegan milk – a delightful summer treat!

Speaking of VAI Creamery, Commune X offers 250g tubs of their ice cream in 9 flavors for dessert! Wanna bring a few tubs home with you? Get 20% when you pick up 4 flavors from the store!

Last but not least, editor Mina Yan and I have both brought our kids to Commune restaurants and have always been treated with good and attentive service.

Want to find more family-friendly restaurants? Join the Jingkids FamFriendlyEats WeChat group. Add TBJButler on WeChat to request to be added.

Images: Commune X and Commune Reserve, Vivienne Tseng-Rush

With the grey skies clearing and the weather warming, we’re all looking for pretty places to wander out into where we can enjoy springtime with the family. Well, we have just the place for you.

Just within the borders of Shunyi, past the Fifth Ring Road, lies a hidden gem of a restaurant – The Orchard. This lovely piece of property has seen many a wedding reception and banquet dinner, due to its ability to blend the beauty of nature with the cozy comfort of its terraced restaurant, plus, of course, its offering of a high-quality, organic farm-to-table menu. There’s also an authentic boutique hotel on the grounds featuring rustic and culturally-themed rooms, but let’s focus on the namesake restaurant itself.

When you dine at The Orchard, you are welcome to walk through the entire property to explore its lush greenery, lake and orchards, where they pick apples off the trees and juice them up for you (though that comes at a rather high price of approx RMB 150 for a carafe).

The food at the restaurant is fresh and tasty, with a good mixture of Western and Italian flavors. Children’s menus offering pasta and mini burgers are also available at decent prices around RMB 50. They also offer an indulgent Sunday brunch from 11.30am to 2 30pm, priced at RMB 210 for adults, RMB 100 for children ages 4-10, and free for kids under 4. So far, everything we’ve tried on their special menu has been delicious, especially their salads, seafood dishes and heavenly desserts.

This upcoming Easter weekend, The Orchard is partaking in the festivities with an Easter egg hunt on Sunday between 11.30am and 2.30pm. Entry will cost adults RMB 398, and the fee is RMB 198 for kids under 11, while kids under 5 are free! The price includes access to the self-serve buffet, games and of course the Easter egg hunt itself.

At the same time, it’s a great chance to see the stunning spring blossoms on the manicured grounds. Though you are able to just show up, you can WeChat the restaurant on their official account (TheOrchard果园）or call ahead to make sure they still have available spots.

Find it:
Shunyi, Shunbai Rd, Hegezhuang Village, Cuigezhuang Township
顺义区顺白路何各庄村红砖美术馆对面
Tel: 13911211965

KEEP READING: The Best Easter Brunches in Beijing

Images: Vivienne Tseng-Rush, Dianping

In the last 48 hours, any time someone’s asked “How are you?” I’ve replied, “Freezing, thank you.” That answer isn’t going to change for the next couple of months, as we head into what I feel will be the coldest winter yet, even if I mutter that every year. Which is to say, winter is well and truly here, people, which also means it’s hotpot season! If you’re looking to change things up from the usual Haidilao hotpot, but are unsure of how to select from the many other hotpot restaurants around town, we’d like to help. Here are some of the best family-friendly hotpot places as recommended by Beijing natives. Oh, and the following restaurants all have a rating of 4.8 or above (out of 5) on Dianping.

Having Luck 行运打边炉 (xíng yùn dǎ biān lú)

This popular hotpot franchise has outlets across Beijing, all of which will take you on a trip down to the fragrant harbors of Hong Kong. Each of the stores is decorated with iconic Hong Kong sights such as MTR – aka Hong Kong’s metro system – station signs, famous street names, and neon store fronts. The lively visual setting enhances the flavor of the restaurant’s signature chicken hotpot, which is creamy and flavorful. Another recommended dish is their new roasted pork and seafood combination hotpot, which has received some rave reviews from local food vloggers. The restaurant also offers Hong Kong-style dim sum and kids will love their cute bunny-shaped pudding for dessert!

Search 行运打边炉 (xíng yùn dǎ biān lú) on Dianping to find the nearest outlet to you!

Fu Lu Wa Family Hot Pot 葫芦娃一家人火锅 (hú lu wá yì jiā rén huǒ guō)

Got that one person in the family who loves spicy while the rest of you do not? Have no fear, for at Fu Lu Wa Family Hot Pot, you’ll be able to satisfy both with a special vessel that cooks two different soup bases alongside each other! Their spicy soup base is definitely a must-try for spice-lovers. The restaurant also offers one of the largest condiment bars I’ve seen, allowing you to mix up your own saucy concoction to better flavor your meats, though the restaurant has its own special house sauce which they also bottle and sell in the most adorable gourd shaped containers. Incidentally, fu lu refers to gourd, which is why that shape appears everywhere in the interior decoration of the place.

Search 葫芦娃一家人火锅 (hú lu wá yì jiā rén huǒ guō) in Dianping to find the nearest outlet to you!

Phoenix House 囍风楼 (xǐ fēng lóu)

Also known for its Hong Kong style offerings of dim sum and hotpot, Phoenix House is a well-respected name around town. Its menu is so thick it can easily take at least 20 minutes to peruse completely, and just about everything we’ve tried there is delicious – from the aforementioned dim sum to fresh sashimi slices and of course, the must-try chicken hotpot, which has a rich soup base full of collagen that’s also known to have beauty benefits. Their fresh vegetables go great in the yummy soup base, such that even kids will eat their greens without much protest here. There are two locations, one close to SKP and the other in CityWalk at Universal Studios Beijing, and both are very well-kept and clean.

SKP address: Xifenglou, No. 1 West Dawang Road, Winterless Center Block A, Chaoyang

KEEP READING: Time to Huddle up Indoors at Our Fave Kid-Friendly Cafes

Images: Dianping

This Sunday, January 19, local Mexican favorite Q Mex will be debuting a new kid’s menu at their CBD location. To celebrate, they will be hosting a launch party from noon-3pm, which will feature 20 percent off the new menu, a magic show, a balloon artist, and more.

Additionally, for RMB 25, kids can participate in a cookie baking class that begins at 1pm, and includes, of course, fresh baked cookies to take home, as well as a free drink for the parents.

For those adults who don’t have a kid participating in the cookie baking class, don’t worry, you’re not to be left out of the fun! Q Mex is offering classic margaritas for RMB 40 and Coronas for RMB 25, so that the whole family can indulge in a little afternoon delight.

After successfully introducing a kids menu to their Shuangjing and Taqueria (Xin Yuan Li) locations, the team decided it was high time they expanded this much-loved option to the families in CBD as well.

As co-owner and executive chef, Marcus Medina told beijingkids, “We cater to a lot of families at Q MEX and we see our CBD location as a very family friendly environment. We’ve gotten great feedback from our other locations for our kids menu. We see many familiar faces that come because they enjoy it so much and we’re glad to have the opportunity to bring it to the CBD area.”

To reserve a spot for the cookie baking class, and for more info, call 6500 8220. QMex CBD is located at Building E, World City, Chaoyang District.

Photos: Courtesy of QMex

“Put your phones away!” “No phones at the dinner table!” You constantly hear parents tell their kids to put their phones away and to focus on enjoying the moment, but is it really that easy to do? Even for us adults the idea of being away from the digital world for just a few hours is sometimes a tough task.

Caravan has been a Moroccan comfort food favorite amongst Beijingers for years. Owner Badr Benjelloun introduced a new concept to his restaurant: Anti-Social Mondays, where if you don’t check your phone for the entire duration of the meal, you get 50-percent off your bill.

You’ve been doing the Anti-Social Mondays at Caravan for a while now. What made you want to start it?

Actually, we started the “Anti-Social Mondays” which were previously called “Social Sundays” back at CuJu over three years ago, in the summer of 2016.

The story is simple: I was busy and stressing out from planning my three weddings in three continents over one month and one day, as I was on my laptop looking at logistics and bookings, I noticed a couple sitting outside on the terrace. They had ordered a set meal for two and a beautiful bottle of wine. Every time I looked at them, I noticed that they were just looking at their phones and not touching the food or drinks. This went on for about 30 minutes. I watched as their food got cold and their white wine got warm. I felt that as the restaurant owner, it was my duty to go over and maybe try to defuse whatever situation was happening: tell them a joke or whatever.

When I walked over to say hi they both looked at me like I had just interrupted the best conversation they ever had and were overall pretty rude to me.

This made me rethink what the role of a social space is and that’s how Social Sundays (as we called it back then) started.

We had a few issues with people trying to take advantage of it over the year and took it away until I sorted out a better implementation and brought it back as “Anti-Social Monday”.

What has the feedback been like from your guests?

People are hesitant at first and worried that there’s a catch. There isn’t! Once they realize that, it’s a very positive experience. We have regulars that come by every Monday just for that and a lot of couples also struggle with one or both of the partners unable to just commit to a meal without interruption so they end up here with a forced “phone time-out”. But, at the other end of the spectrum, we’ve also caught people checking their WeChat under the table or even in the bathroom on a second phone. It’s so interesting seeing how dependent some people are on technology.

Why do you think that it’s important for families to spend time together without phones?

I think it’s important for people to remember the human contact, families, and friends. The art of conversation is being lost with too much screen time and I am as guilty as everyone else. For families with or without children, I do believe there should be a time where no screens are allowed, like in the old days. Take a walk in the park, cook, play social games, anything. Just build a bond that’s outside of the digital world.

What’s something that you’ve personally discovered from these Anti-Social Mondays?

People have a love/hate relationship with their devices in general, even when they’re not aware of it. The slightly older generation deals with it better because they grew up without smartphones but the younger ones look like they’re almost having withdrawal symptoms the first time they’re without their devices.

What are your thoughts on children’s use of technology?

There’s nothing wrong with that, especially in the modern day and age. Everything revolves around technology, but maybe every now and then, instead of limiting screen time, we need to look at the other side and increasing non-screen time. Get the children involved in activities that do not involve screens: sports, cooking, games, whatever.

Most parents keep their toddlers entertained at restaurants by giving them an iPad to play with. What’s your alternative recommendation for them?

That’s a hard one! I actually think that’s not a bad use for the iPad if it involves educational apps as opposed to just mindless cartoons. The good old approach of paper and color pens is still good and I have a few friends with children that still do just that. Ultimately, I don’t have children yet, so it’s a little harder for me to talk about it from a real-life perspective. I just know how I would approach it.

Caravan 驼队餐吧
Moroccan Food, Live Music, Craft Beer
44 Guanghua Lu, Across from Embassy of Brazil.
光华路44号，巴西大使馆对面
eat@caravanbeijing.com

Photos: unsplash, Badr Benjelloun, giphy