Panxi Restaurant

This guide to Panxi Restaurant in Guangzhou traces the water beneath it back fifteen centuries, to a private pleasure garden the Southern Han ruler Liu Chang carved out for himself, and forward through the Ming dynasty when Lychee Bay opened to dragon boats, opera, and street vendors. It follows the modest wooden eatery a cook named Li Wenlun opened on the bay's edge in 1947, and the architect Mo Bozhi, who rebuilt it grander in the late 1950s across rockeries, corridors, and fish ponds. Look down from the walkway at the koi and lotus pads before heading in to eat.