Sichuan-style restaurant is hot

Dollops of Romanian add unexpected spice

It's Friday morning and the 33-year-old restaurateur Catalin T. Ichim is sitting in the cozy courtyard of a big Beijing house. With homemade New York-style bagels in one hand, and a cup of espresso in the other, he is waiting for another profitable weekend.

He is the owner of Le Jardin, an alfresco cafe, and Transit, a boutique eatery, both located in the north section of Sanlitun Village. The restaurants are part of a courtyard that is filled with high-end restaurants and luxury boutiques.

Ichim is a living history book of the area as he has witnessed Sanlitun evolve from just a bar street into a cosmopolitan destination over the past 12 years.

In 2002, the Romanian entrepreneur opened his first restaurant, Transit, near the Worker's Stadium. His take on a staple cuisine helped shape Sanlitun into a hot pot of creativity, creating a fusion in the capital's landmark.

He says the tipping point for transforming the eastern area of Beijing was Henry Lee, who opened Club Vogue in 2001. There were already bars and clubs popping up, but the core of Beijing's nightlife was Club Vogue, the city's first internationally recognized club, he says.

"But I like the Sanlitun of today. Its old label was bars and nightlife, and now it has turned into a Sanlitun experience, full of creativity. What I am doing is an example of what is happening in Sanlitun. "

He moved to Beijing from Romania in 1999 to learn Chinese. While attending the Beijing Language and Culture University, he opened Transit with a Chinese partner.

Upon graduation in 2002, he took a job as the marketing manager at a gallery in the 798 Art Zone. After a few months, he realized he really loved and cared about Transit so he quit his job to focus full-time on his own business.

Ichim says he has injected all of his passion to realize his dream: To refine Sichuan cuisine. This particular way of cooking, which comes from Sichuan province located in Southwest China, is known for its spicy ingredients. But he wanted to modernize the traditional Chinese cuisine, an idea that sounded new and promising to Ichim.

"We're also taking the risk by trying to refine the classic. A lot of people just don't buy the concept. But I am convinced that it is worthwhile."

Sichuan cuisine has become popular in recent years, almost taking over the restaurant market. But today, more customers often think twice before entering a Sichuan restaurant, under the impression that the oily and strong-flavored foods might be harmful to their health.

This perception spurred Ichim to present the traditional dishes with a twist.

Transit's menu, described by Ichim as "contemporary Sichuan cuisine", contains dishes with top-notch ingredients.

For the well-known dish koushuiji (spicy chicken cold cuts), Transit tested seven types of chicken. Ultimately, a free-range, organic chicken was selected for the dish, whose Chinese name means mouth water chicken.

But most importantly, Transit doesn't add monosodium glutamate and uses very little oil, both of which are traditional Sichuan ingredients.

"But still, you have to let the fragrances remain," Ichim says. "That's not easy. It becomes a healthier, more balanced and delicate cuisine. Refinement makes Sichuan cuisine as nutritious and healthy as the intricate Cantonese cuisine. But most of the restaurants do not try to go that way."

In the many years he has devoted to learning about Sichuan cuisine, he can easily distinguish the origins of each dish just by the minor differences in flavor. He knows that dishes originating from Zigong, Luzhou and Yibin (all cities in Sichuan province) have more emphasis on spiciness than numbing than other places in the province.

Ichim's hometown, Bucharest, is near the Romanian-Bulgarian border. His mother taught him to cook using Balkan techniques, which mainly involves fresh lemons. The fragrant fruit gives an intriguing cut through the classic spicy Sichuan flavors.

"It's an unlikely combination, but it works beautifully," says Time Out magazine's critique of the restaurant, which lists Transit as one of Beijing's best Sichuan restaurants.

"He's got talent in connecting not only West with the East, but also the traditional with the modern. He is like a brick builder, building up all his beloved bricks to what he wants," says Leon Guan, who has known Ichim for more than 10 years.

In 2006, his restaurant was demolished as part of Beijing's beautification drive before the 2008 Olympic Games. But after a few years out of the restaurant business, he was lured back to the kitchen.

He reopened Transit last December in Sanlitun Village, about a 10 minute walk from the old location. In addition, he wanted to try his hand at an al fresco cafe.

Service is an important aspect for Ichim at Transit, which costs an average of 200 yuan ($31) per person for a dinner and drink.

"People are no longer satisfied with simply eating with their families or friends in a very noisy environment. A satisfying dining experience is all about the things you hear, you see, the people you are with and even the service itself."

His understanding of good service is not intruding during the dining experience. "The service, at its best, is when you are served without knowing that you are served."

To add to the originality of his dishes, Ichim is thinking of cultivating vegetables in the outskirts of Beijing. "By doing our own farming, the source of our food is reliable and guaranteed organic," he says. He also hopes to open a second location soon in Shanghai.

Ichim says he is fortunate to have witnessed and experienced all those changes and the upgrading process of the Sanlitun area.

"Sanlitun makes me love China even more. Sanlitun, as a leader, has its own responsibility. It is not only about what brands it brings in, but also about how to integrate the social trends, be open to charity and promise people a greener future."

(China Daily 09/09/2011 page15)