After a few minutes waiting on the Beijing street outside what should have been the Cantonese restaurant recommended by Hung Huang for lunch, my phone rings. "It doesn't exist, does it?" she laughs, a little ruefully, as it had been in turn recommended to her by the listings editor at one of the magazines she owns, a Chinese version of Time Out. I never quite worked out whether the restaurant had been knocked down or simply not built. After all, either can happen in the blink of an eye in today's China. Pressed for time, we take the easy option and agree to meet at the St Regis Hotel, just across the road in the city's embassy district.

Hung (pronounced "Hong") Huang is sometimes labelled as China's Oprah Winfrey, a description that both flatters and underestimates her. She has an agony column in her listings magazine; an internet blog offering advice that is a little racy - at least by local standards; an expanding stable of magazines; and a television show, all cleverly leveraged by her own high-profile personality.