PRICE:
Frommer's Very Highly Recommended

This restaurant serves the best upscale Italian fare in the city. The waitstaff wear sleek pinstripe suits and are incredibly attentive, zipping over to your table at the merest hint of a frown or inquiring look. Lorenzo Maraviglia, the upbeat restaurant manager who used to manage Le Cirque in New York, knows his wines and dishes inside out. Seek him out if you want serious recommendations. This a place to indulge in a leisurely meal. You must order a pasta dish, as the noodles are perfectly al dente and freshly made each morning. We also highly recommend the water buffalo appetizer -- it's wrapped in slices of eggplant, lightly fried, and served over a bed of fresh tomato and basil. The decor is contemporary, with an open kitchen housed behind a giant silk screen of a portobello mushroom. There are romantic, semi-private nooks with curtains and leather chaise lounges alongside the back wall. Jazz music and, every now and then, an upbeat Laura Pausini song plays in the background.

Copyright: Excerpted from Frommer's Beijing, 5th Edition, (c) 2008, Wiley Publishing, Inc.

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