Snakebite dish banned

By Ben Blanchard  |   2009-6-2  |     NEWSPAPER EDITION

HEALTH authorities are putting a stop to restaurants serving chickens that have been bitten to death by poisonous snakes and cooked up for a supposedly detoxing meal.

The dish, served by a small number of eateries in the southern province of Guangdong and the southwestern city of Chongqing, has generated a storm of publicity and controversy in the Chinese media and among the nation's Netizens.

A video showing a cook holding a snake and forcing it to bite a live chicken until it dies has been widely circulated online, generating mainly angry comments.

"It's disgusting and really cruel," wrote a Netizen on the major Chinese Web portal sina.com.cn.

"Not only is it cruel and blood-thirsty, but totally amoral," the Chongqing Business Daily cited a neighbor to one of the restaurants as saying.

Health authorities in Guangdong have already told restaurants to stop serving "poisonous snake-bitten chicken" and now those in Chongqing have joined in.