🍽️ Chongqing Spring Chicken

Fresh chicken boiled in spicy spring water.

Chongqing Spring Chicken is a famous rustic dish from the Nanshan area of Chongqing, a pillar of the city's bold mala cooking. Free-range roosters are freshly killed and cut up, then cooked with local spring water and stir-fried with pickled ginger, pickled chilies, dried chili and Sichuan pepper in heavy oil before a brief simmer. The chicken is tender, deeply infused, and numbingly spicy-fragrant, in a glossy red broth that can be reused to boil vegetables, a two-course dish. Bird quality, aged pickled chili and the spice balance are key, and the spring water name points to clean water and fresh poultry. Nanshan's Spring Chicken Street is a local pilgrimage; eaten with rice or beer, it is a full-throttle representative of Chongqing's rustic spicy cooking.