So what is Beijing cuisine? Almost every native would say--old Beijing small eat (老北京小吃). Those can not be called cuisine, just some snacks that can fill one up.
The great disparity between the rich and the poor in ancient China can be observed in the food itself. As Marco Polo states in his The Travels: " the meat is eaten by the rich and upper classes. And the others, the lower orders, do not scruple to eat all sorts of unclean flesh". Some snacks were only for the emperor or the royal family, and some were consumed by the ordinary people. Now, those once hierarchical snacks are all available for the general public to have both a taste of ancient luxury and necessity.
Here is a menu of Old Beijing Small Eats.
Sweet pease pudding (豌豆黄， Wan-Dough-Hwang)
Rolling donkey (驴打滚,Lu-Da-Gung)
Ai Wo-Wo (艾窝窝，Ai-Wowo)
Candied hawthorn (冰糖葫芦， Bing-tang-hu-lu)
Boiled tripe(爆肚， bao-du)
Fried sweetpotato starch (炸灌肠，Ja-Guan-Chang)
Fried pork liver (炒肝, Chao-gan)
lǔ zhǔ huǒshāo (卤煮火烧, Lu-Ju-Hwuh-Shao)
Fried wheaten pancake （褡裢火烧, Da-Lien-Hwuh-Shao)
Mutton Skewers (羊肉串, Yang-rou-chuan)