Shimian Caoke Chicken 石棉草科鸡
Shimian Caoke Chicken is featured among the local specialties of Sichuan.
Shimian Caoke Chicken (石棉草科鸡) is a local chicken breed named for Caoke (草科), in Shimian County (石棉县). In local cooking it appears as a simply seasoned chicken soup or as a whole bird roasted over charcoal.
How it is made
Ya'an Daily (雅安日报) visits the restaurant of breeder Feng Zicheng (冯梓诚), who stews the chicken using only water and salt. The broth is golden and clear, and the meat is firm and chewy without being dry.
Another local cook, Jiang Yixun (姜以勋), roasts whole Caoke chickens over qinggang charcoal (青钢炭) and fruitwood charcoal. This preparation produces crisp skin and a dry, aromatic meat texture.
The chicken
At Feng's breeding base in Baima Village (白马村), the birds range beneath orchard trees and mainly eat maize, supplemented by insects, grass seeds and fallen fruit. Ya'an Daily records that the breed was identified during an agricultural resource survey in 1982 and named after its place of origin.
Sources & reading
Written from the linked sources and checked sentence by sentence against quoted extracts by a separate reviewer on 2026-09-30. Recipes and servings vary between kitchens.