Qiaojiao Beef (Cross-Legged Beef Soup)

Qiaojiao beef is a traditional hotpot-style soup from the Suji area of Leshan, simmering fresh beef bones and offal with more than twenty herbs and spices such as angelica, cardamom and cardamom-seed for three to five hours until the broth runs clear and fragrant with medicine and the offal turns tender, embodying the Sichuan notion of food and medicine sharing a single source.

The dish arose in the village of Changchun (known as Zhoucun) near Leshan's Yangwan more than a century ago. At the old country fairs vendors would set up pots of offal soup, and farmers resting between markets would sit with legs crossed and bowl in hand, giving the dish its name of "cross-legged beef"; Suji town is now hailed as its first home.

Served as a shared hotpot, diners first sip the clear broth to warm the stomach, then dip the offal into a dry bowl of chilli and Sichuan-pepper powder, often with a bowl of rice and freshly stir-fried vegetables on the side; it is a beloved cold-season meal for Leshan people, and Suji's old town draws pilgrims of the dish.

The herbal clear broth, the layered aroma of more than twenty spices and the cross-legged folk origin set qiaojiao beef apart from other Sichuan beef soups.