Chongqing Hot Pot

Chongqing is a birth place of hotpot. If you come to Chongqing, you should not miss this famous food during your Chongqing tour. Chongqing local people consider the hotpot a local specialty, which is noted for its peppery and hot taste.

First dinners of this dish

You may be surprised that the first diners of this dish are poor boatmen of the Yangtze River in Chongqing area. During the past time, the poor had not enough money to enjoy a meal that consisted of various dishes. So they found a way to eat full. They could not afford dishes one by one, but if inadequate food were cooked together in a big pot, they could also enjoy a feast as well. That was the original hotpot which cooked all the food and ate them in a big pot.


Nowadays, it is a very popular local flavor and can be found at every corner of the city, even all through the country.

The most representative and famous types of Chongqing Hotpot

• Cattle-gut Hotpot
Hotpots are the traditional famous course of Sichuan, of which Chongqing hotpot is specially noted, characterized by hotness, heavy flavors and dense soup. The traditional Chongqing hotpot's materials include cattle guts, cattle waists, beef and other vegetables, being a real self-help course. Hotpot enjoys an age-old history in China.


• Yuanyang Hotpot     
Yuanyang hotpot is characterized by its unique flavor. In fact, Yuanyang hotpot is a mixture of the hot soup of traditional cattle-gut hotpot and the bree of mum hotpot. Thus it is honored Sichuan Innovative Hotpot. The pot is divided into two parts by a copper slice in the middle. One side is the container of hot soup, the other side is bree. The option of hotpot's materials is decided at your will.

• Ma La Tang – a similar food to hotpot
The other famous local food is hot and spicy Ma La Tang, which is similar to hotpot in some way. Literally, "ma" means numbness in the mouth, "la" is chili hot and "tang" means piping hot.

Ma La Tang, with various raw ingredients cooked in a communal pot of steaming stock blended with spices, originated in Sichuan's largest city, Chongqing. The double-sided soup pot, placed on a central table burner, is the focal point of the meal. Ingredients include fresh sliced abalone, sea cucumber, hog tendon, Beijing cabbage and beef dumpling, prawns, carp fish fillet, bean curd, chicken fillet and vegetables. The excellent dipping mixture of sesame oil, chili sauce, peanut sauce, chopped chilies and garlic combine to make magic. Savory titbits are appetizingly tasty -- egg coated glutinous square, crispy spring roll, fried buns, eight treasure black rice and water chestnut jelly. Diners cook their food right at the table in steamingMa La Tang, a savory broth blended with the spices found in abundance in Sichuan