Shanghai — Places to eat
Yesterday's Bund and tomorrow's skyline, one river apart.
- Da Hu Chun (Middle Sichuan Road) — Shengjian fried in iron pans since 1932; listen for the lid
- Qiao Ai Lai Lai Xiao Long — Tiny side-street shop for pure crab-paste xiaolongbao
- Lan Xin (Jinxian Road) — Cramped converted house serving honest Shanghainese home cooking
- Cheng Long Hang — All hairy crab: three crabs' meat and roe in one shell under meringue
- Lao Zheng Xing — Since 1862: lazy Susans, three generations, classic Shanghai plates
- Nanxiang Steamed Bun (Yu Garden) — Xiaolongbao since 1900, plus a giant bun you sip through a straw
- Old Jesse (Tianping Road) — Fish heads under mountains of scallions on every cramped table
- Jianguo 328 — The fried-scallion smell beats you to the table; come for the noodles
- Fu 1088 — 16 private rooms in a 1920s townhouse; polished Shanghai cooking
- Wu You Xian — Twenty-plus crab xiaolongbao, each with its own dipping sauce
- Starbucks Reserve Roastery Shanghai — A two-floor coffee factory where fresh beans rattle through pipes overhead
- Manner Coffee (North Bund riverside) — A ¥15 flat white with the Pearl Tower dead ahead across the river
- Captain George Flavor Museum — A coffee shop dressed as an old apothecary, run by a world champion
- Luneurs (Hengfu Art Center) — Salted caramel ice cream in a 1929 Spanish-style villa
- 13DE MARZO Café (Anfu Road) — An Anfu Road takeaway window where every drink comes hugged by a teddy bear
- Guangmingcun (Middle Huaihai Road) — The year-round queue for fresh-from-the-oven pork mooncakes
- Shen Da Cheng (East Nanjing Road flagship) — Glutinous rice sweets from a Nanjing Road shop that's been at it since 1875
- Park Hotel Deli — The Park Hotel window where a line for butterfly pastries forms every day
- Ningbo Tangtuan Shop (Yu Garden) — Black sesame tangyuan, made in the Yu Garden bazaar since 1945
- Xinghualou (Fuzhou Road flagship) — 120 Cantonese snacks, and a sugar puff you'll only find here
- % Arabica Shanghai Roastery (Rockbund) — Kyoto latte beside a glass-walled roaster in an old Bund-side building
- Blue Bottle Coffee (Yutong, Suzhou Creek) — Blue Bottle's first mainland store, on an old flour-mill site by Suzhou Creek
- Metal Hands (Yongjia Road) — The Beijing roaster that invented the fried-egg latte
- Mi Shang Prada Rong Zhai — A Prada-logo latte in a 1918 mansion Prada restored
- Heytea Lab (Fengshengli) — Heytea's four labs, tea, cake, gelato and bakery, under one roof
- Baker & Spice (Anfu Road) — The Anfu Road corner bakery-brunch spot, open since 2010
- O'Mills Sourdough Bakery & Bistro (Yongjia Road) — A sourdough bakery-bistro that mills its own flour
- Goodbai Cafe (Yanqing Road) — A café-concept store run by actor Bai Jingting
- Zhong Yao Tang (South Xiangyang Road) — Black-sesame tangyuan gelato and other herbal, less-sweet scoops
- Gelato Dal Cuore (North Shaanxi Road flagship) — Gelato by a Singaporean couple, down to a Shanghai scallion-noodle flavour
- Lu Bo Lang (Yu Garden) — Shanghai dim sum and red-braised pork in a red pavilion over the Zigzag Bridge pond
- Shanghai Lao Fandian (Shanghai Classical Restaurant) — Cooking Shanghai's home-style benbang food since 1875; the star is a whole stuffed duck
- De Xing Guan (Guangdong Road flagship) — Boiling noodles since 1878; slurp braised-trotter noodles on the ground floor
- Yè Shanghai (Xintiandi) — Red-braised pork and Peking duck behind a grey-brick front inside a mall
- Yuan Yuan (Huaihai Road) — Famous for one dish since 1999: red-braised pork, ¥168 a plate
- Lao Di Fang Noodle House — Toppings wok-fried to order; get the cuttlefish noodles
- Jia Jia Tang Bao (Huanghe Road) — Thin-skinned soup dumplings and a ¥89 crab noodle by People's Square
- Yang's Dumpling (Huanghe Road) — Pan-fried buns that squirt soup at the first bite, ¥13 for four
- Wan Shou Zhai (Shanyin Road) — A Hongkou backstreet dumpling-and-noodle shop that opens at 4:30 a.m.
- Laoshi Dabing Youtiao (Middle Zhejiang Road) — All four Shanghai breakfast staples from one street window, a few yuan each
- Moose | Lu Yuan (Xinhua Road, Changning) — Michelin-starred eight-treasure duck and lion's-head meatballs in a century-old villa
- Haidilao Hot Pot, People's Square — Hot pot until 7 a.m., with a noodle-pulling show on the side
- Sichuan Citizen — Mapo tofu and basil cocktails upstairs, steps from Wukang Mansion
- Dian Dou De, Super Brand Mall — Dim sum on the 6th floor by the Oriental Pearl, known for crisp red rice rolls
- Siji Minfu Roast Duck, Hong Kong Plaza — A Beijing duck house's Shanghai branch, carved right by your table
- Lost Heaven on the Bund — Yunnan and Burmese-leaning dishes under red lamps, a few minutes from the Bund
- Yershari, Super Brand Mall (Xinjiang) — Forearm-length lamb skewers, big-plate chicken and a dance show
- Huanghe Road food street — The street from Blossoms Shanghai: neon, soup dumplings and old-school restaurants
- Grandma's Home (Jing'an Joy City) — Hangzhou home cooking at snack-bar prices
- Flair Rooftop (The Ritz-Carlton Shanghai, Pudong) — A 58th-floor terrace bar with the Oriental Pearl Tower almost close enough to touch
- VUE Bar (Hyatt on the Bund) — A 32nd-floor bar where the Bund's curve and the Pudong skyline fit in one frame
- Sir Elly's Terrace (The Peninsula Shanghai) — A 14th-floor terrace at the Bund's north end, with Pudong straight ahead at sunset
- Long Bar, Waldorf Astoria Shanghai on the Bund — The Bund's old Shanghai Club bar, rebuilt inside the Waldorf Astoria
- Speak Low — A multi-floor cocktail bar behind a bookcase in a bar-tools shop
- Sober Company — A café, kitchen and cocktail bar under one roof by Fuxing Park