Stay Here

The Verdict

If you're weighing up Chao Zhou options in Guangzhou, Stay Here is the answer at the ¥¥ price point. It has earned back-to-back Michelin Bib Gourmand recognition in 2024 and 2025, which means the inspectors have twice confirmed that the value-to-quality ratio here outperforms most of the city. For the same cuisine at a higher spend, Imperial Treasure Fine Teochew Cuisine exists; but Stay Here makes the stronger case for most diners who are not on an expense account. Book it.

About Stay Here

Stay Here has been holding its own in Tianhe District long enough to collect two consecutive Bib Gourmands, which is not an accident. The Michelin inspectors award the Bib to restaurants that deliver above-average cooking at below-average prices, earning it two years running in Guangzhou; a city where Chao Zhou cooking is taken seriously and competition among casual restaurants is fierce, signals that Stay Here is not coasting. It is cooking to a consistent standard that the city's more expensive Teochew rooms have not made irrelevant.

Chao Zhou cuisine, for context, is the culinary tradition of the Chaoshan region of eastern Guangdong. It sits in an interesting position relative to Cantonese cooking: lighter seasoning, a strong emphasis on seafood and offal, precision broth work, a preference for letting ingredient quality speak rather than dressing it in sauce. In Guangzhou, you find it at everything from street-level stalls to formal dining rooms, the gap between a mediocre Teochew meal and a sharp one is wide. The Bib Gourmand places Stay Here firmly in the latter camp.

The restaurant is located in Tianhe District, Guangzhou's commercial and residential core. For food-focused visitors staying in Tianhe or travelling in from further afield, the address on Haiyue Road is reachable without difficulty. Parking in the district can be congested during peak hours, so arriving by metro or ride-hail is the practical choice. For broader orientation across where to eat and stay while you're here, our full Guangzhou restaurants guide is worth consulting alongside this, our full Guangzhou hotels guide covers accommodation options near the district.

The Space and the Counter

The spatial experience at Stay Here shapes the meal as much as anything on the table. At the ¥¥ price tier, Chao Zhou restaurants in Guangzhou typically run toward the functional end of the design spectrum: tile floors, fluorescent lighting, laminate tables. Stay Here does not pretend to be a luxury dining room, it doesn't need to. What the space offers instead is proximity. The counter or close-set seating configuration that characterises restaurants at this scale means you are not separated from what is happening in the kitchen by distance or ceremony. You watch, you overhear, you eat food that has not travelled across a large dining floor.

For the food-focused traveller, this kind of arrangement is often preferable to a formal table at a grander address. Counter seating in a tight Chao Zhou room means the pacing is dictated by the kitchen's rhythm rather than a waiter's choreography. Dishes arrive as they are ready. The experience is direct. At Stay Here, that directness is appropriate to the cuisine itself: Chao Zhou cooking at its most honest does not benefit from theatrical presentation. It benefits from arriving at the right temperature, in the right sequence, in front of someone paying attention. The compact scale of the room makes all of that more likely.

For diners who have eaten at Chao Zhou counters elsewhere in China, at Chao Shang Chao in Beijing or Fleurs Et Festin in Xiamen, the format here will feel immediately familiar. For those coming fresh to the cuisine, the spatial intimacy at Stay Here is a genuine advantage: the lack of pretension makes it easier to ask questions, adjust pacing, eat at the kitchen's pace rather than a formal service schedule.

Booking and Practical Details

Booking at Stay Here is rated Easy. Given the Bib Gourmand recognition and the presumed capacity constraints of a smaller Tianhe restaurant, booking ahead is still sensible, walk-in availability at dinner on weekends is not something to rely on. That said, you are not navigating the reservation scarcity that defines Michelin-starred tables in Guangzhou. Calling ahead a few days before your intended visit should secure a spot on most nights. The restaurant does not currently list a website or phone number in public records, so the most reliable approach is to book through a local concierge service, a hotel front desk, or an app such as Dianping, which handles reservations for most casual Guangzhou restaurants of this profile.

The ¥¥ price point means a full meal for two, ordering properly across multiple dishes, will stay well within what you'd spend on a single main course at Imperial Treasure Fine Teochew Cuisine. If you are building a Guangzhou food itinerary and want to understand how Chao Zhou cooking sits relative to the broader regional picture, pairing a meal here with a visit to one of the Cantonese rooms in the city gives useful context. Suyab Courtyard, Dai Yong Town, and Hai Men Yu Zi Dian (Yanling Road) each offer a different angle on how Guangdong's cooking traditions vary at the accessible end of the price spectrum.

If Chao Zhou cooking interests you across cities, the tradition is well represented at award-recognised venues elsewhere in China. Xin Rong Ji in Beijing and Xin Rong Ji in Chengdu cover the Zhejiang-adjacent end of that tradition, while Chef Tam's Seasons in Macau and Dai Yuet Heen in Nanjing represent the formal Cantonese register for comparison. Smart casual is more than sufficient.

How far ahead should I book Stay Here?

• Booking is rated Easy, but with back-to-back Bib Gourmand recognition, weekend dinner slots fill faster than the difficulty rating might suggest.
• Aim to book 2–4 days ahead for weekday meals and 5–7 days ahead for Friday or Saturday dinner.
• There is no listed website or phone number in current records; use Dianping or ask your hotel concierge to make the reservation.

Does Stay Here handle dietary restrictions?

• Chao Zhou cooking centres on seafood, pork, offal, so carnivores and seafood eaters are well served by the cuisine's natural range.
• No confirmed information is available about how Stay Here specifically accommodates vegetarian, vegan, or allergen-related requests.
• Given the absence of an English-language website, diners with serious dietary restrictions should arrange for a Mandarin-speaking contact to confirm options before visiting, the kitchen at a smaller Bib Gourmand restaurant may have limited flexibility on short notice.