Soup as winter remedy (and other food news)

Staying warm: Shanghai's #$@#! lingering cold weather means that it's still appropro to hunker down with a hot bowl of soup to keep warm. Enter Tian Yuan Ge (天缘阁), a Jiangxi restaurant that is responsible for the delicious clay bowl of chicken soup on the right. They've got an extensive menu of affordable broths that all come piping hot and full of well-stewed flavor. Most of the soups are in the 6-10 RMB range, so pop in at either of their two locations and do some sampling.

Book Cook: The Edible Books Festival is coming to Shanghai. It will be hosted at M on the Bund on March 22nd. If you're like us and had no idea what this festival is all about, you can check out organizer Books2eat's website here. Those of you who want to compete can e-mail here by February 20th.

Quick openings/closings: Thanks to Twitter we were notified that Shanghainese restaurant Yin will be closing down on February 20th (@jeffdelkin) and that Hong Kong franchise Tsui Wah will be opening its first Shanghai location at the Mansion complex that houses Cantina Agave and Dolce Vita (@terencelau).

It also looks like Citizen Cafe is branching into Sichuan food with Sichuan Citizen at No. 30 Donghu Lu, currently in its soft opening phase. Discount coupons on its lunch set are available at Citizen Cafe.