 Wow, ooh, yo David you smell that? You smell that? Oh my god, you have roast peaking duck, seafood combo, stuffed durian calzone. You ever wonder what a pizza hut, subway, burger king, or Starbucks tasted like overseas? Well on a recent trip to Beijing, we found out the good, the bad, and the smelly. What's going on everybody? Welcome to another international episode of FumRos Food. We are in Beijing, the capital of China right now, but what we want to do in this episode is actually check out all the different items that the Chinese versions of these chains have that is different than America. As you guys know over the past 30 years, American chains have rushed into China, biggest market in the world, biggest country in the world. People really want to establish a foothold. What do these chains serve in China that they don't serve in America? Unique fast food in China. Let's go. Okay, we have made it to burger king in China, aka humba wang. Burger king is not that big in China, but they have some aggressive plans to expand moving forward. But you know, they're not going to be able to expand unless they deliver the goods. Right. Let's see what's different here. First off, they have the Texas Angus Burger. They do not have this in America from what I know. Definitely not. Okay, so this is legit pastrami. Let me taste this first. Marque pastrami Texas Angus. Pretty American. After that one bite from Burger King, I can only tell that Burger King is going super hard with the burgers in the American culture. Like looking at their menu, there's not that many Asian things, but there's going to be items that they don't have. They've upgraded steak fries. Steak fries. Not bad, but just no flavor. It's no more than a mention that Burger King is even more expensive than the dollars. Here, David, we have the mushroom bacon burger. I think the picture looks really different from the plain mushroom bacon. That's just a grilled mushroom. That's a cream of mushroom. It's starting to taste a little bit different than I think they would do in America. That cream of mushroom flavor, definitely not something that we would put on a burger in America. Burger was a little bit too like savory. Like there was nothing else but savoriness, cheesiness, creaminess, but actually overall, I kind of enjoyed it. But what I got with that were these mala wings. This is a Chinese flavor right here because this should be spicy and numbing. Mala chicken wings. This is interesting. I can smell. I can smell the mala. Whoa. I like it. A hot pot right now. I mess with it. That was really like a hybrid, but if you made me say it tastes more Chinese, these onion rings. Oh man, these look like they're not very good. Oh, I think the Burger King Boba. Clearly Asians and Chinese people specifically love Boba because you can get Boba everywhere. Oh, this blue drink is really good. It's like a blue raspberry. Bobas are pretty firm. They're kind of like gummies. Not super chewy and stretchy. Milk tea, I would say is six out of 10. Not impressed with the Boba. Let's get in this chicken box, bro. There's mala. I like this wing though. They need to add this that buffalo wild wings. You know me. I'm a big fan of the chicken drumstick. Go for it, man. That's all you. Is it better or worse than the mala wing? It's worse. Okay. But it has the same Shang La type of prickly ash oil flavor on it. Chicken nugget. This has white pepper in it. It tastes different. I don't like it better. I wasn't with it. I could get why they localized for the China market, but for me personally, I'm can't get down with the white pepper in the chicken nuggets. Chicken fries. It might be different too. It's definitely a kind of chopped up chicken, but it has like a different tint to it. It's got some more flavor. It's a little bit spicier. I wasn't impressed with the chicken box overall, other than the mala wing. This is a double prickly ash oil spicy chicken sandwich. Wow. That sauce is really good. They're leaning heavy on the prickly ash oil flavor. There's no prickly ash oil. It's different from mala. It's missing the pepper. It's just extra. Yeah. For me, I am a fan of a little bit of that numbing prickly ash flavor. I personally kind of like that sandwich. Last but not least, guys, we've got the spicy chicken whopper. They love this in China. I have no idea how it's going to taste. Is it the New Orleans chicken? No, it's better. It's better. It's better. I wouldn't say it's amazing. Amazingly decent. It's a decent sandwich. I'm very thankful that you go with the New Orleans style. It visually looks like it. It's got a boba dessert. There's boba in here. That's like a mocha. Coffee, ice cream with syrupy boba on top. Gotta try the pie. Try the pie to have a pie. Pretty artificial. I wasn't the biggest fan, to be honest, of all the recipes, but I thought the quality of the ingredients in the recipes was strong. You know what I was impressed by? Because in Asia, a lot of the portions are smaller, but these sandwiches are huge. They're American-sized. They are big. Yeah, they're just like you would get them in America. But beyond, some of the prices are almost pretty much like American prices. I know Burger King's trying to make a move on China. Like you said, it seems tough when they rely on mostly beef sandwiches and beef is not the thing that people eat out here. I wouldn't bet that Burger King becomes super dominant in China. No, I don't think so. I agree with you. I'm not against it. I'm just saying, just based off what I saw, I don't see it. Yo, just get the mala wings, okay? If you come to Burger King for sure, get those things. I would order a whole serving right now. All right, you guys, on to the next spot. We have our first unique items here at the Starbridge Reserve in Beijing. This is a stewed beef wrap. This one is a Portuguese chicken curry wrap. Right off the bat, I like the taste. Kind of a lot of lettuce though. The lettuce is a little bitter. The beef bites I did have, I really enjoyed them. Let me grab this beef bite. That is way better than the Portuguese chicken curry. I'm not that into the Portuguese chicken curry. I know you really like Portuguese chicken curry. That is not good. The beef wrap though was good. We have a chicken ciabatta with zucchini, truffle chicken. Actually, it tastes like kind of like a pesto chicken pasta. That's very unoffensive. You cannot hate that sandwich. This is ice cream in cold brew with grapefruit syrup on top. Yeah, but go ahead and try it. Whoa, that has a very weird flavor. That's not bad though. You guys know about grapefruit. It's not like orange zest. Yeah. It's like bitter. Matcha muffin with red bean, baby. Would you say this is probably the most unique item where you're like you would never find this? I think it's cool because the matcha is saucy. It's like melty. That's really good. Wait a minute. I think it goes in coffee. We have an interesting dish here. You have okra, two different types of soba noodles, and then you have some sort of like chicken salad with mandarin oranges. David, why would they probably not serve this in America? I could see soba noodles being in there, but they wouldn't look like this. They would not have the okra. It's healthy. I'm not gonna lie, these noodles have very little flavor. In my hand, I have a sparkling fruit cold brew. Kind of weird. I think fruit and cold brew, I'm not used to it. I actually like this. It's not bad. I think that was way better than the avocado. Starbucks quiche. Very cold. I thought they were gonna warm it up. I'm not with it or against it. It kind of tastes like a Chinese stuffing you would get during a very Chinese American Thanksgiving. This little mini pie. Look at that. It doesn't warm you up, man. It's not bad. It's almost like a pulled pork. The cold chicken pot pie. Now, kind of wrapping this up. What were the items that most surprised you about the Starbucks in Beijing? The grapefruit mixed with coffee. It's a strong grapefruit flavor, essence mixed with a strong coffee flavor. Chinese Starbucks, they love fruit and coffee. In America, they're not really all about it. The local flavor profile of these chains in China is actually moving closer and closer to a globalized skin. Chinese market is also demanding more of the actual western menu items. You know, obviously as they travel out more and they see that's what they're eating. There's a lot of people with laptops here that are working on projects in English. Right, they're actually the manager who had colored contacts. Her English was actually really good. I'm excited to see the other items that other chains are offering that are localized to the, you know, Chinese population. Okay, so our next spot is Yoshinoya. Yes, like a fast food Japanese spot started in Japan. It's all across the world now. They got a huge menu in Japan and they've got a gigantic menu in Hong Kong and across Asia, but the American menu only has really like four or five things on it. Let's see what Yoshinoya is offering out in Beijing. Yoshinoya also opened up a salad chain. It's called Ye Life. Only in China does KFC have a chain called K Pro. A Pro is like a brand new, pretty much like salad slash healthy sandwich chain. Only serves grilled chicken, no fried chicken. Probably the easiest way to see that the way they've incorporated Yoshinoya is the chicken in the grilled chicken salad. Look at all the different sauces they have at Yoshinoya. This is definitely something they would not have at the States. They have ginger, they have green scallions. They have some spicy bean paste. I think this is garlic. This is sesame sauce. This is kind of almost like hot pot. The chopstick cleansers right here. This is really different than Yoshinoya, especially in the States. Let's try this beef. Yeah, some beef and pepper. Beef and pepper on rice, which is actually a pretty classic like Beijing northern dish. I'm actually really enjoying it. You know, it's not as spicy as I thought. I was hoping that the peppers was going to give it a little bit more heat. I actually give that 4.5 out of 5. I give it a 4 out of 5. I thought it could have had more spice. Panda, the Majan Chicken Landry. Very classic Beijing dish. Definitely better than the convenience store. Simlet flavor actually has a little bit of molasses in it. This chicken leg, this chicken leg, I'm not lying. It did not look like the picture. You know what's really interesting, Andru, all these three things you can find prepackaged out of 7-Eleven. Oh, this stewed chicken leg is really good. Onto the most daunting section of the skewer is the blood sausage skewer. Bra. Mushrooms and fish cake. These fish balls I give. Not bad, but we're going to try that Beijing sauce next. Got a couple of different types of fish balls here. Conjac. I would say the most impressive part was the sauce bar. I mean dipping in both sauce. Yo, did you try the fish sauce with this one that I made? Oh my goodness. This one's an interesting one. I think that's blood cube layer. Egg is very hard to pick up with your chopsticks. Root of Baker, I think. Sometimes you'll have it in the beef brisket dish where it's chopped up into squares. I would say the most impressive thing was maybe this top hot. Wow. I might have to say this cranberry side. Was the most impressive? This is really good. This is really trendy. The two-faced drink. This yo shinoya maintains that feeling where it's solid. We're not going to feel bad eating this, but it's not the most delicious menu. It was really interesting to see Andrew that yo shinoya localized to the you know to the Beijing flavors by pretty much providing the same things that 7-Eleven might provide, but at an elevated level. Yeah. Yo shinoya out here is just like a gourmet 7-Eleven. Up to the next pot. I'm about to turn the hot pot station here at yo shinoya. Sweet yo shinoya. This is a different day. People would be shocked in America to know this with yo shinoyas are like overseas. It's like a pretty different restaurant. It's like a yo shinoya America. They just take the two cheapest dishes that you can get here and that's the whole restaurant. While here it's like next level. You could go get ramen and noodle soups and then we even got, I think we got the most expensive thing you can get here, which is hot pot. Yeah hot pot. That smells like we're at a such one restaurant. Oh of course double boba. These are black squidding jowd's. I'm actually not a big fan of fish dumplings. Oh. Yo I gotta say this was about 11-12 bucks. This is a ton of food. Here's the beef. Wow. Wow. Really strong. Like just good. Fish getting there. Yo let's toss in the noodles and throw in these green ones. Bam. Yo I gotta say and so far this has been delicious. Hot pot's good man. This is really the way to go man. Taddies flavors but with a Japanese format. I'm actually really glad we got this Andrew because I would feel weird about coming to Beijing and then just getting like you know like the regular shopping right. Damn I think this fish is ready. Oh man. Hand of the raw egg just going in. You know I'm just assuming and this is safe because it's yo shinoya. Well I guess David will see in a few hours. I have been kind of surprised to see in you know quite frequently out in Beijing is durian flavored things and okra. Durian thing really comes from this movie lost in Thailand man. You know what I love about this spot Andrew and specifically the fact that they have these like very Chinese lao beijing flavors in the shabu-shabu format. Right right. Is that it really allows people to like live their life the way they want but still get the flavors that their parents or their grandparents like. Because you can't force everybody into the hutos. It's not an international life to live in a hutom. Shout out to the people who love it. But that's just not the way human progression works. Yeah. By bringing the Japanese chain here and doing traditional Chinese flavors in a shabu-platform it kind of allows you to get both. I think it's the future not of everything. This is not like the main way that people are going to eat hot pot but I think it's a it's a great way. Any chance you get guys this is my recommendation before we head out is if you're out of yo shinoya in Asia and they have the hot pot shabu-shabu option get it. Were you surprised at how much the subways feel. Even the architecture feels almost exactly like a subway back in the west. Yeah you know you went to some of the other chains and they were an upgrade. The interior looked completely different. We're trying to change their branding. Dude that picture probably came from like Wisconsin. Yo like literally we're back in Alhambra. It's crazy. Okay already I can tell you the roll is falling apart. The bread I noticed the bread is not as fluffy. No it's not as chewy. I am trying a black pepper steak sandwich. China exclusive. The ball of beef. Soy sauce mustard in here. Tastes like a black pepper steak sandwich. It's actually pretty good. I really enjoyed this. Do you think it would be successful in the Chinese market. I think this would work. I'm trying an Italian sausage subway sandwich. China exclusive. Okay immediately the bread tastes different. How good is it. I probably like yours better. You know what switch up man. I really like the black pepper steak. Yeah I don't know if the Italians would be impressed by this Italian sausage. Those chunks of steak are really big in there. So I appreciate that. That's like that's pretty good. Really tender. Subway was fascinating because they directly poured it over their whole brand. I think that this product would be really tough to sell to anybody outside of that global citizen class. Yeah it might even be more popular in five to ten years. All right you guys that wraps up Subway on to the next spot. Aren't you guys our next spot that has unique items only here in China is Ajisen ramen. Ajisen ramen is in the US market originally from Japan just like Yoshinoya but they have Ajisen China. Now the image of Ajisen ramen in America that's like a lot of people's first time eating ramen. No first time eating non instant ramen. Yeah it's considered decent but it's not the most authentic. Would you say it's the KFC of ramen. It's the thing that brought it global. Here they have some Beijing exclusive dishes. Let's check them out. All right Andrew first up we have these soft boiled eggs. I do not think you can order this individually at Ajisen America. Soft boiled egg. A little bit of soy. It tastes like peed on. Yeah. Okay so they got enoki wrapped beef. Andrew I believe in Japan it would have been grilled on a skewer. Yeah. You like pan fried now. I like it. Ajisen USA does not have a single chicken wing on a skewer. Look at that immense amount of pepper bro. Wow it's actually really good. I don't know if I ever had a chicken wing that tastes like that. That's like lemon pepper but sweet. Obviously some influence from the Xiao Cao culture. So far that's probably the best thing I have. You guys we are looking at two Beijing only ramen. Let's try the tomato first. You know they love tomato flavor things. Tomato and egg. David that's like one of your favorite dishes to get at Chinese restaurants in the States. Tomato ramen. Do you have a couple reasons why they might not serve this in the States? Is this another broth to worry about? Ajisen's crowd is not a typical like purely Japanese ramen crowd. You know what I mean? It appeals to all different types of people. They're novices. Yeah they're novices. This is like a beginner's ramen spot and I think for a beginner this might taste kind of like ketchup. Actually I really really enjoyed that. I give that 3.5 out of 5. We have a Su Tai meaning a vegetarian one. It's not bad. Would they bring this to the States? Chinese spot could like ramenize ancient worker soups. That could work. Check out this grilled fish. This is a cheap fish. It's a cheap fish but with slits cut into it. Flavor's not bad. That's a river fish. The most fresh skewer. Meat is a little bit like it's sitting there for probably at least 10 minutes. Last but not least. The Yen is the aka the coconut. Wow. It tastes natural. I don't know if Ajisen actually makes this coconut themselves but this is fire. Fire. What was better this or the chicken wing? Chicken wing was actually better. I'm gonna go with this. This is the best coconut ice cream I've ever had in my life. Alright Andrew this video is about American chains in China so we're not necessarily going to cover this but I've eaten here. We have to mention this spot. This spot is probably top 5 biggest fast food chains in China. This is called Kung Fu aka Zhen Gong Fu. Gotta have this Bruce Lee character. Shout out to Kung Fu because this is the most Chinese fast food chain. Even Dikos the food there is not as Chinese. No this is literally just Chinese food. So they actually have some pretty cool steamed dishes here. I really like their steamed mushroom chicken. I like their eggplant dish. About a $4.50 US. One of these days we get a chance while we will review Kung Fu and Dikos. Someone told me Pizza Hut just came to represent an awesome place for Chinese consumers to get Western food. It's not necessarily just focused on pizza because their name doesn't mean pizza. It's almost like a Pizza Hut combined with the Denny's with the iHop and the share. Well it makes sense because obviously we're in an eastern country without a lot of Western food. The few Western food chains that do exist have an opportunity to take care of a wider range. Let's go. Pizza Hut in China it's considered an upscale restaurant. You can see how busy it is. There's a lot of families here. You know people with pretty solid jobs are eating here. You can see that their breakfast menu is really different. They have kanji, dumplings, radish cake, tea. When you're transferring a brand to a market that has very few Western brands they saw a huge opportunity. This was called a dirty milk tea. 24 Kwai. Dirty milk tea forever. And if you know 24 Kwai that's like a $3.50 that's expensive for a boba. I gotta say that's one of the class of your bobas man. Boa. Are you saying? I never had a boba to taste like that. Oh that's delicious. There's quite a big difference between the pictures and the reality. Yo man. The picture looked like a legit regular like American steak. What it looked like at the steak cost like $30. So I guess I was surprised that it was only 88 Kwai which is about what 11 bucks and this definitely looks like $18. Let us not judge. It's fine. You know what? Because maybe the flavor is out of this world. Pizza Hut prime rib. It's not bad. I got a funny name for it David. That's not prime rib. That's slime rib bro. Wouldn't you say it tastes like a $4 steak in America? I give the steak. I was gonna say 2.5 but I enjoyed it so much a 3 out of 5. I give it a 2. I've got a clam chowder cooked English style. You know with the taste of garden kept it. Clams in it though. Like not diced. No I can see it. It ain't bad. That's not bad. This about a 3. Yeah. Beef Wellington crust was executed pretty well. I thought this tasted a little bit more like something you would get at the States. This is the viral almond rice when you slice it and then it folds over. Were you impressed by the presentation of the almond rice the way you cut it? Dude at Pizza Hut they're coming over here cutting your almond rice for you. Shout out to that. About the almond rice I give that like a 3.5 out of 5. It's pretty solid. I enjoyed it. Does this food taste almost exactly like garden cafe in Alhambra, California? Yeah the whole tradition of Hong Kong cafes is to interpret western food in kind of like a affordable Chinese way. As crazy as it is that Pizza Hut has essentially become a Hong Kong cafe with pizza. David the big dogs have arrived. I believe we are looking at the three most unique pizzas on the menu. You have roast peaking duck. You have seafood combo with the stuffed stuffed durian calzone. This is really good. This works because actually if you think about it cheese is kind of a funky cheesy creamy thing anyway. True cheese. That's what real cheese is like. So you're kind of mixing these two almost similar flavors during being fermented type. I give it a 4 out of 5. I give this 4.5 out of 5. You know a lot of people probably feel like their taste buds would not align with the Chinese person's taste buds in China. There's some truth to it but I think universally anybody would think this was good. I actually think that if you just didn't tell people what it was and there were open minded to try it. I don't think that many people would hate it because there's a durian funk but it's not that bad and then it's just sweet and cheesy and creamy on the inside. It actually tastes almost like a dessert. Here you have shrimp. You have squid. You have crab meat. You have pineapple. You have cheese. Imitation crab meat. Imitation crab meat yes. Seafood stuffed crust. You know it doesn't really taste seafood. I was a little bit scared at first because I saw the squid and oftentimes squid gets a little too chewy. This looks actually super good. It doesn't taste that different from the Hawaiian. I actually forgive that. A 5 out of 5. We often talk about how the food in the 6u6 is really good. Sometimes very comparable even better than China for certain dishes. Peking duck is one of the dishes I will tell you. It's very labor intensive. It's very technique intensive. It is much better in Beijing than it is in America. Real quick let's break down the elements here. So you have Peking duck. You have the Tianmian Zhang. The sweet sauce and then you have cucumbers and some spring onions. Peking duck pizza. They straight up replace the sauce. Everything else about it I like but I'm not getting a strong Peking actual duck flavor. This Tianmian Zhang I think it's modified which makes sense. I think it tastes a little. It's a two notches more towards a barbecue sauce. This is essentially your barbecue chicken pizza Chinese version. The durian pizza was the most surprising. Peking duck pizza was the most universally enjoyable to westerners and my favorite was the seafood. I'll add on to that and say to no surprise at Pizza Hut the pizza was the best. If people were to pay attention to what's happening in China I think Pizza Hut China would actually help the brand of Pizza Hut America at this point because it's so much better and it's so much nicer. It would almost be like Pizza Hut platinum in America. Yeah if you're a foreigner and you really want to see China come to Pizza Hut on a weekend. It's just a segment of the Chinese population and I saw a bunch of interesting stories that I was editorializing in my mind. And I think you can tell by the popular chains that we went to like a McDonald's, a KFC and Pizza Hut they don't want exactly what they're eating in America. This Burger King is exactly what they serve and it's not good out here. They want western things and the good parts about being the west but they don't want to be western. Hey man even if you think you're at Pizza Hut you can see that you're somewhere else due to the details. David do you realize we've been drinking semi-warm lemon water this whole time? This is something that they would never serve in the United States. Over our China fast food crawl we noticed a few things. Number one the younger generation was definitely eating a lot more fast food than the previous one. Number two the price points were definitely relatively higher than America due to them being foreign import brands in China. And number three we noticed that even though there definitely was still some heavy localization I think that the menus at the restaurants were getting closer and closer to their American counterparts. What do you guys think? I think that people have been selling these potatoes maybe in China for at least as long as America has been a country. David this is the original Chinese fast food. Oh gee I'm talking about ancient Chinese fast food.