The intriguing tastes of Shuicheng's 'three pots'

Lao guo is a feast that comes from famine. It's a contemporary culinary celebration that hails from deprivation over four centuries ago. The delicacy is one of "three pots" — along with goat meat soup and Cichong chicken hotpot — now gaining growing acclaim beyond the borders of its origins in Shuicheng district, Liupanshui city, Guizhou province.

Lao guo is said to have been created 400 years ago, when Wu Sangui, a Qing Dynasty (1644-1911) general, sent troops to suppress an uprising by the Yi in what is now Shuicheng. The soldiers ran out of food and had to hunt game and forage for vegetables, which they grilled atop roof tiles heated over open flames.

Over the years, people switched out the clay tiles for circular black-iron domes. Their shape allows the juices to drip downward toward the round edge and oil poured on the top to cascade over the morsels of meat, vegetables and tofu that sizzle on the metal.