Chocolate ball with black garlic, cheese, roasted sweet pepper and matcha sauce.[Photo provided to China Daily]

The woman behind the jieqi menus is Sakashita Kiyono, 36, the Chinese-Japanese owner of Claret, and also the mother of two Chinese-German children, whose multicultural background may well be an imprimatur for the fusion that brings east and west together.

"Whether it's a Chinese dish, Western dish or Japanese dish, the ingredients should comply with the solar terms," she says. "For example, the grain rain period is a golden time to eat spring bamboo shoots."

Dishes on the guyu menu are unconventional, incorporating traditional Chinese ingredients, and with a Japanese twist, such as the starter of teriyaki spring bamboo shoots and black goji jelly, white asparagus soup with euryale seed and shepherd's purse.