In Shaanxi, when it comes to mutton steamed buns, women and children all know it.

The locals regard it as a delicacy and never tire of eating it; foreign tourists rush to taste it first to satisfy their appetite.

According to legend, when Song Taizu Zhao Kuangyin failed to succeed, he lived in poverty and wandered on the streets of Chang'an (today's Xi'an City).

One day, I only had two dry buns left on my body, which were too hard to swallow.

It happened that there was a mutton shop cooking mutton on the roadside, so he went to ask for a bowl of mutton soup so that he could soak the buns until soft before eating.

Seeing how pitiful he was, the shopkeeper asked him to break the buns into pieces and pour a ladle of hot mutton soup over them.

Zhao Kuangyin took the soaked steamed buns and started eating them. His whole body became hot, his head sweated, and his hunger and cold disappeared.

Ten years later, in 960 AD, Zhao Kuangyin became the founding emperor of the Northern Song Dynasty and was called Taizu.

Once when I was on a patrol in Chang'an, I passed by the mutton shop from that time. The aroma was overwhelming. I couldn't help but think of the scene of eating mutton soup and steamed buns ten years ago. I stopped the car and ordered the shopkeeper to make a bowl of mutton soup and steamed buns.

The shop owner panicked. They didn't sell steamed buns in the shop, so what should they use to make them? He quickly asked his wife to bake some buns right away.

When the buns were baked, the shopkeeper saw that they were made from unfermented noodles and were not very cooked. He was afraid that the emperor would get sick after eating them, so he had to break the buns into small pieces, pour mutton soup on them, boil them again, and put a few pieces on them.

Large pieces of mutton, carefully prepared with seasonings, and then served to the emperor.

Zhao Kuangyin praised it greatly after eating it, and immediately ordered his entourage to give him a hundred taels of silver.

This incident spread like wildfire throughout Chang'an.

As a result, more and more people came to the store to eat mutton soup steamed buns, forming Chang'an's unique flavor food.

Su Dongpo, a great writer in the Northern Song Dynasty, once wrote a hymn in praise of "Long cuisine has bear wax, and Qin cuisine only has yolk soup".