With the cloth bag ready, they could begin braising things.
Qiao Duo'er washed various seasonings to dry them off. During this time, she needed to crack the tsao-ko and chop the green onions, ginger, and garlic.
Then she added a bit of lard into a small pot to fry the seasonings until fragrant, before stuffing them into the cloth bag for later use.
Next, she washed various kinds of meat and cut them into pieces. She cut a rack of ribs into three large sections and put pig's trotters, pig's tail, and wild chicken whole into a pot, added some cold water to boil, then removed the meat and rinsed it with cold water.
She repeated this three times until the meat was clean, then put all ingredients except the pig's tail into the big pot.
Pig's tail cooks quickly; if it is boiled too early and becomes too tender, the texture would be unpalatable.
