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Chinese cookery, with thousands of years of refinement, files food into a series of tidy taste classifications, like sweet or sour. Sichuan peppers claim a category all their own: mind-numbing
Sichuan people are famous for their hot food in China. People in Sichuan like to cook their food with many spicy condiments.
Because of the Sichuan Province is located in the basin, there is a moist climate in this area for most time of a year. The autumn lasts longer than the other three seasons. Moreover, the temperature is very low during the whole autumn. So, people at Sichuan like to eat pepper to dispel their cold, because there is an ingredient that can expel cold, according to Chinese traditional medicine.
Sichuanese cuisine can have that impact on visitors. But after one's palate cools, and the fire-alarm peppers are soothed by Sichuan tea, one begins to sense the subtlety and intricately-layered flavor of what many consider among the world's finest cuisine.
Even with the diverse cookery across China, Sichuanese restaurants have found a niche in every city. Nothing, though, compares with the taste and inventiveness at the source. China is the place for food, goes an old saying, but Sichuan is the place for flavor.
That proves to be the case in my romp through the region. I gorge myself on exotic dishes like bull frogs and chili-fried snails, as well as traditional fare like fish-fragrant pork slivers and the student favorite, "ants climbing a tree" (bean-thread noodles laced with chili bean paste and sprinkles of minced pork or beef).
Gradually, they apply peppers into their food, making Sichuan Cuisine famous for being hot.