Enjoy Chongqing Cuisine—Be the Happiest Foodie

The Sichuan and Chongqing area has always been praised by new and veteran foodies as the best place to awaken the taste buds. Chonqing is famous not only for its wonderful sceneries and beauties, but also for its delicious food.

Indispensable delicacy waking up the sleepyheads in the morning: Chongqing noodles

A bowl of piping-hot and delicious Chongqing noodles after you get up in the morning will awaken everything left over from the night before.

The praise for Chongqing noodles as I have heard can definitely compete with Chongqing chafing dishes widely known in China and even the world. Noodles serve as a sort of breakfast of the Chongqingese. Handsome boys and belles in a hurry, gentlemen and ladies will stop in front of a humble store. It doesn’t matter if there is no vacancy. Standing on the curb or sitting on a stool, they can still make a good chew and enjoy the satisfaction brought by the delicious noodles. They will be overwhelmed by happiness for the entire morning and work more efficiently.

It is said that the ranking of top 50 Chongqing noodles has been listed online. Miscellaneous Pea Noodles in the flower fair diagonally opposite the office building of Marriott Hotel at No.77, Qingnian Rd., Yuzhong District stands as one of the top 5. Its business is fairly good and many diners stand on the curb and enjoy the special treat just as I mentioned.

It’s a long story to talk about the most popular Chongqing noodles. It originated from the local special noodles which were spicy vegetarian noodles with soup cooked in Chongqing flavor. The noodles are now more diversified after development and improvement. In addition to the usually seen noodles made from wheat flour, there are also noodles made from pea flour. The seasonings are the key to the most authentic Chongqing noodles and the oil chili is the soul. You can also ask the shop owner to cook the noodles of little soup with the seasonings heavily covering the noodles, stew the noodles harder or add more vegetables or oil chili according to your taste.

Whether you are a traveler to Chongqing or a returning local Chongqingese, if you cannot enjoy a chafing dish, you must have a bowl of Chongqing noodles to satisfy a craving for good food.

Fanjianghu Restaurant: Taste the feeling of travelling through time

The Chongqingese seem to be born gourmets. Either the restaurants or ordinary households can cook amazing delicacies. Many appealing famous dishes initially came from the dining table of the common people. To the gourmets, the special folk Chongqing dishes refer to a special cuisine popular with the folks cooked in diverse techniques with composite seasonings so as to offer you a surprising experience of

taste. Fanjianghu Restaurant in Hunan & Hubei Club of Chongqing is a restaurant hidden on the riverside.

The gate to Fanjianghu Restaurant is rather secluded. Walking out of Hunan & Hubei Club and making a turn, you will find it. But without the lead of local friends, I could not have found it. I felt we entered the restaurant from the back door after crossing the narrow lane along the kitchen. Several women were processing red chili in pots and placing the pots on the stone platform. Well soaked chili was also placed on the short walls. On the tables we passed by were the remaining chili delicacies with staple food. The chili was commonly seen everywhere! The air was permeated with savory chili. If we had exerted our strength to breathe, we would have sneezed incessantly!

Fanjianghu Restaurant was decorated like an ancient courier station or wharf. The seemingly humble dining hall well matched the circumstances then. The antique decoration style, simple and unvarnished wooden tables in the dining hall and the benches of the tinge of the underworld highlighted the style of the underworld. No wonder the boss named it as “Fanjianghu Restaurant” (meaning “restaurant of the underworld”).

After we took seats, a waiter presented the menu of the same style of the restaurant to us. Looking at the genteel dish names with the tinge of the underworld, we were about to directly faint onto the dining table. Though I was a bit interested in the underworld, I entrusted the restaurant owner to order the dishes. When we waited for the dishes, the waiter placed the tableware on the table. Looking at the representative tableware, I instantly thought of the scene of glutting with meat and liquor. At that moment, I really felt the sense of travelling through time.

We chose to dine in Fanjianghu Restaurant because of its high popularity, flavor, characteristics and originality as well as the landscape of Chongqing along the Jialing River. Fanjianghu Restaurant was full of the tinges of the underworld. If you enjoy yourself to the full, you can write calligraphy with a brush and display your demeanor of a swordsman.

During such a long interval, the dishes were served on the table. The waiters shuttled and in an instant various dazzling Chongqing delicacies were placed on the long table. Accidental Encountering in the Bamboo Forest, the Four Precious Articles of the Writing Table and Poaching in the Underworld... Don’t get confused! Just as you see, they are all dish names. Hearing these dish names and watching the delicacies of pleasant color, aroma and taste, we felt a “vehement” battle with the dishes. As for the taste of the dishes, please allow me to hide it from you. Only when you come to taste them can you personally experience the “vehement” chewing of the dishes.

Just as the comment online: Fanjianghu Restaurant supplies food of cultural tastes and culture about the underworld is talked about in the restaurant. Fanjianghu Restaurant of Hunan & Hubei Club in Chongqing was definitely a restaurant featuring characteristic delicacies of the underworld.

Chongqing chafing dish: Failing to taste it, you would have seemingly not been to Chongqing

How many people or foodies go to Chongqing simply to taste the Chongqing chafing dish of boiling and brimming red chili oil? I believe at least nine out of ten will answer “Yes!”

Many people favor Chongqing chafing dish. But I’m afraid only a few know its history. Dating from the late Ming dynasty and the early Qing dynasty, the boatmen and boat trackers at the wharfs along the bank of Jialing River and in Chaotianmen bought beef omasum, pig tracheas, duck intestines and ox blood beancurd etc, washed them clean, sliced them into small pieces and steamed them in the squared- up soup pot with edible oil, fermented soya beans and chili etc. The economical, practical, clean and healthful way of eating won popularity among the laboring people and spread farther and farther. It was not until the Republic of China era that the first eatery in Chongqing supplied Chongqing chafing dish as a high-end dish.

Chongqing chafing dish today has become a classic delicacy favored by various foodies from all corners of the world. From the squared-up soup pot at the very start to the later big copper pot; from the spicy chafing dish
of Chongqing to
diverse healthcare
chafing dishes
evolving everywhere
else; from the simplex
condiment sauce to
various seasonings;
all kinds of the chafing
dish drive the diners to glut themselves with the delicacies and enjoy the food to their heart’s content.

I have been wondering why Chongqing chafing dish is so popular. After meticulous consideration, I have concluded the following reasons: 1. Its taste. The savory and mellow spicy chafing dish of red chili oil is appetizing. 2. Its effects to promote interpersonal emotions. Just think about it that the diners eat harmoniously from the same pot and all the displeasure will dissolve in the toast in the strong friendly atmosphere. 3. Its possibility to satisfy the favors of different gourmets.

The delicacies of Chongqing are not merely what I have mentioned above, such as Chongqing snacks of Hongyadong stilted house complex, sumptuous meals in Chongqing cuisine. You are bound to get fatter in Chongqing. And you will feel reluctant to leave.

So, if you love someone, take him or her to Chongqing.