It is said that when Emperor Qianlong first went down to the south of the Yangtze River, he had a meal in a small restaurant somewhere in Wuxi. Shopkeepers use home-cooked rice crust, which is fried and crisp, and then carefully selected shrimp, cooked shredded chicken and chicken soup to make marinade. When served on the table, the marinade was poured on the rice crust, and suddenly there were "wow" and "squeak" sounds, and the fragrance came to the nose. It is said that Emperor Qianlong was startled by this sound and asked, "What's this dish called?" The chef replied, "Spring thunder scares the dragon!" After tasting it, Qianlong thought it was fragrant, crisp and delicious, so he praised it and said, "This dish can be called the best in the world." In fact, cooking with crispy rice was in existence in the Tang and Song Dynasties in China, but at that time, as a general folk snack, it did not have a good name. Unexpectedly, hundreds of years later, this kind of ordinary crispy rice was cooked skillfully by the chef in the store, especially after being tasted by Emperor Qianlong, and it was worth a hundred times and won the reputation of "the first dish in the world".
In 1930s, Shanghai Restaurant began to operate this dish, making it more famous by improving its production.