Holiday Savior: 24-hour Noodle Heaven

It's holiday season, and for those of us far away from home, it's likely that we'll spend the next week or so drinking and dancing the night away rather than partaking of cozy family time. So at 1am (or 6am), after another night of holiday drinking festivities, we all have the munchies, and it's decision time. The obvious bets would be to grab a Stadium Dog, or perhaps a jianbing or some chuan'r from a street vendor. But as for me, nothing feels better for a late-night, post-drink chowdown than a giant bowl of noodles.

Yellow River (Huanghe Shui) Shaanxi Noodles is a 24-hour noodle heaven, right at Gongti East Gate. The jolly chefs there make giant, greasy and immensely satisfying bowls of noodles around the clock.

The noodles are all made inhouse, and if you order the pulled noodles (chemian), they won't even make them until after you've ordered, guaranteeing you a fresh, chewy bowl each time. Their pulled noodles come as dry mixed noodles (youpo chemian), which is simply blanched fresh noodles topped with chili oil, leeks, scallions and a handful of vegetables (bean sprouts and bak choy). Simple, and amazingly fantastic. The soupy version (shaozi chemian, or spoon noodles) has the same noodles floating in an aromatic pork broth, with diced potato and carrots adding additional flavor. The rolled egg noodles (qishan shaozi mian) are skinny and lustriously long - the egg makes them even more fragrant than the pulled noodles, if less satisfyingly thick and chewy.

If this is carb overload and you need some grease to take the edge off the next day's hangover, they also serve a mean "Chinese burger" or roujiamo - a flat bread stuffed with chopped braised pork. The pork is fragrant and moist, but the real flavor comes from the brilliantly high ratio of pork fat to meat - the chef will slice off equal chunks of lean meat and fat, mince them together with a ladle of the soy braise. It's salty, it's dripping with lard, and you don't even need to mess with utensils.

All noodles are just RMB 12 a bowl, and a roujiamo will only set you back RMB 8 - considering a hot dog next door is more than double that, I do believe I've found my new favorite place satisfy the munchies after a drink or five this holiday season.

Huanghe Shui Shaanxi Mianguan 黄河水陕西面馆
24 hours. 6 Workers' Stadium East Gate (inside the east gate on the north side of the stadium), Chaoyang District (5842 6260)
朝阳区工人体育场东门内6号看台北侧