Warm meals for workers comfort both stomach and heart

As Beijing's chilly winter deepens, some restaurants are extending warmth by feeding the unheralded, and often low-paid, workers who keep the city going — including delivery drivers, taxi drivers and street cleaners.

Offering free dishes for those who sometimes can't even afford discounted meals, the restaurants are making a difference in the lives of many.

For example, Wang Hong, the owner of Jingchengzhiziwang, a Beijing-style barbecue restaurant in Chaoyang district, has been offering free drinks to delivery drivers and street cleaners since 2012. More recently, he started a free meals project with the assistance of the neighborhood. For him, it's personal.

"When I first came to the city, I had nothing. I was a youngster learning the ropes in a restaurant. People helped me even though they didn't know me," he said. "This is my way of giving back to society and teaching my child to be grateful."

It welcomes anyone in need, no questions asked. The meals are simple yet hearty — a bowl of soup, with rice or steamed buns, or homespun dishes like braised noodles and dumplings.

"We try to serve food people like," he said. "A plate of fish-flavored pork and scrambled eggs with tomatoes — there's always something to satisfy."

Wang is not alone. Yushiji, a chain of restaurants specializing in lamb soup is helping by offering discounted meals to the needy. For just 12 yuan, customers can enjoy a hot, hearty meal that usually costs much more.

According to the chain's regional manager, Li Jun, customers in need can get either lamb offal soup with a Chinese pancake or stewed noodles with mutton. Noodles are refilled free.

"The founder Shi Shuai once encountered trouble filling his stomach when he wasn't paid his salary as a young security worker," Li said. "This motivated him to help others when he started his business."

Delivery workers like Fan Xingang, 41, who has been riding for 10 years, are among the regulars. During a 10-hour-plus working shift in frigid temperatures, the hot meal is often his first real break of the day.

"My colleagues told me about the place offering discounted meals. It's not just good for the low price," Fan said. "It's the respect and kindness they show us."

Another delivery worker, surnamed Zhao, 45, who often works more than 12-hours a day, came across the discounted meals by happenstance.

"A man told me about the discounts at all the chain's branches. It's such a relief on my tight budget. It's hard to support my life here, as well as to provide living expenses for my family in my hometown," Zhao said. The meal deals save him for at least 10 yuan ($1.37) a day.

"Many of us riders are short of money. The support helps a lot," he said.

Generally, around 100 discounted meals are sold daily in each branch of the lamb soup restaurant, which also occasionally donates food to needy residents nearby. With a special budget and donations from customers whose hearts are touched by the initiative, the project has been running smoothly for six years.

Song Jingzhi, manager of the restaurant's Dengshikou branch in Beijing's Dongcheng district, some customers even prepay for meals that are then given to those in need. Receipts left on the wall serve as markers of the many kindnesses.

Beyond Beijing, a stream of similar initiatives has sprung up in Shanghai, Tianjin, Heze and Yinchuan. The kind embrace of a warm meal on cold winter days are enveloping ever more people in need, one meal at a time.

Guo Yanqi contributed to this story.