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As Chinese travel around the country more and the demographics shift from country to city, Beijing is enjoying a wave of regional cuisines it has never tasted before. CJ Henderson looks at traditional Yunnan food brought to the capital.

The restaurant is spacious without seeming cavernous, and has tables to suit dining parties large and small. The decor is modern-chic, with careful lighting and dark wooden tables.

Southern Barbarian serves Yunnan food from the province in China's southwest, but it has a large bar to go with an equally extensive drinks list, including several pages of hard-to-find imported beers from Australia and Germany.

But the food is the real reason to brave the winter chill to root out the restaurant at Baochao Hutong, and savor Yunnan food with its irresistible combination of spice and herbs.

Their menu is long and varied; you can get wild with a bug platter or stay safe with noodles.

It just depends on what you're looking for. Our party went for a tasty, wholesome meal, and we got just what we asked for.

Their crispy shredded potato pancake is a great way to start off the meal. Crunchy, slightly salty, and topped with chives, this Chinese hash-brown pizza was snapped up in minutes, chased down with delicious ice-cold beers.

The salt and pepper fried Yunnan goat cheese, though perhaps under-seasoned, is soft, hot and had that characteristic flavor that fresh goats cheese should - creamy but with a certain tang that lingers on your tongue.

What is also great about Southern Barbarian is that each dish has a spice rating of zero to five chilies, a good marker for both spice lovers and pepperphobics.

We ordered the chili beef on toothpicks with crispy fried mint leaves that came with a three chili rating. A classic Yunnan dish, the beef was tender and lean, surrounded by chilies and crispy mint leaves that added just the right amount of freshness to the fried dish.

The wild mushroom and chicken casserole appeared plain and unassuming at first, but the stock is one of the best I've ever tasted, bringing out the excellent rich flavors of the wild mushrooms, combined with the tender pieces of chicken.

Since mushrooms are a must at any Yunnan restaurant, we ordered another dish that included them: fresh seasonal boletus mushrooms with peppers. It was a simple dish, relying on the red bell-pepper and the fresh mushrooms to carry it along. A little spicy, the rich mushrooms were well balanced by the sweet peppers.

The signature cross-the-bridge noodles came with homemade chicken broth, pork slices, chicken, kidney, ham, crispy pork, quail eggs, vegetables and mushrooms. It may be Yunnan's most traditional noodles but at Southern Barbarian, the modern presentation made it a total dining experience.

The homemade chicken broth, pork slices, chicken, kidney, ham, crispy pork, quail eggs, vegetables and mushrooms were brought out separately and mixed at our table. Delicious, and easy to share, this dish brought a touch of theater to our table.

With great food, great drinks and spectacular service, Southern Barbarian is a place we will definitely revisit soon. Maybe by then, we will have worked up the courage to order some honey bees and grasshoppers.

Contact the writer at [email protected].

(China Daily 02/17/2013 page14)