Where Have all the Taxi Drivers Gone (For Dinner)?

Here, at this unassuming restaurant near the Lama Temple (141, Yonghegong Lu). Every evening, a queue of uniformed Beijing cabbies lines up to fill their bellies with the restaurant's signature dish, luzhu huoshao (卤煮火烧), a warming witches cauldron of cheap offal cuts, bread, tofu and lots more besides. This lucky dip peasant meal, with a history dating back to the Qing Dynasty, is riding a new wave of popularity of late, along with other austere local eats like madofu.

The USP here is the lao tang (old soup), a rich meat stock of which part of it is saved at the end of the service and added to the next day's soup. In theory, this giant cauldron could hold soup stretching back years.

Diners can watch the chefs in the open kitchen fish out and chop up the bing, tofu, stewed pork lung and chitterlings (pig's small intestine) that's been sitting and stewing in the soup broth. Finally, a ladle of the broth is poured over the ingredients and topped off with a handful of cilantro.

Tastier, better looking and not nearly as scary as its roll-call of budget meat cuts would suggest, it's no wonder the locals love a bowl of it at this time of year. Add vinegar, chilli sauce and crushed garlic to taste.

On a final note, an alternative theory on where all the taxis have gone. Delicious 'old' soup full of mystery meat? A queue of taxi drivers going in every night (but has anyone counted how many actually make it back out)? Maybe that's the answer. For some time, we've been eating our taxi drivers, organ by organ, limb by limb, at this and other restaurants. Anyone got any better ideas?