Roast suckling pigeon — crisp golden skin, juicy meat, a sweet-savoury soy-and-spice glaze — is the dish Zhongshan is famous for across southern China. Locals trace its origin to the 1930s, when a Shiqi chef refined a technique for roasting young pigeons over lychee-wood charcoal that quickly spread across Guangdong.
You can order it almost everywhere in town, but the older specialist houses around the Shiqi quarter and along Sunwen East and West Roads are the safer bets. A single bird, served whole and chopped for sharing, is the standard portion. Eat it with your hands.