Guangzhou

Guangzhou's vegetarian food is everyday vegetarian food — it is not staged for anyone. In morning tea the steamed chicken feet give way to steamed radish cake, the barbecued pork bun becomes a dried-tangerine-peel vegetarian bun, and you still sit over one pot and two pieces for the whole morning. That city temperament — being vegetarian without ever noticing — is rooted in two thousand years of Buddhist life in Lingnan: the refectories of Guangxiao and Liurong temples have been running from the Southern Dynasties to the present day, and the foundation of Cantonese vegetarian cooking sits on those great stoves.

We take you to the old streets of Xiguan for a vegetarian morning tea, and to the Guangxiao Temple refectory for a midday meal, to watch the monks' mealtime ritual. In the afternoon there is a bowl of ginger milk custard on Wenming Road, then a turn into Baohua Road for the few old houses that have passed through two or three generations. If appetite remains, there is vegetarian late-night food. What is rarest about this city is this: vegetarian food does not need a reason here.

Guangzhou works all year round, with October to March the most comfortable; June to August is hot and humid, so pick an air-conditioned old tea house for morning tea. Keep the itinerary to Liwan and Yuexiu districts — Guangxiao Temple, Liurong Temple, Baohua Road and Wenming Road are all within walking or metro reach, and a full day needs very few taxis.