In Lanzhou, Gansu province, the day begins a hot bowl of beef noodles.
According to a recent archaeological (discover) in Qinghai Province where a 50-centimeter-long noodle was unearthed, the noodles have a history of about 4,000 years.
Recently the first recipe (菜谱) for Lanzhou beef noodles was discovered in unusual form of a poem (古诗) by the late 18th century scholar Chen Weijing. Few (write) recipes survive from the Qing Dynasty, because cook (consider) a lower-end profession (职业) then, which hardly attracted educated people. The poem listed two ingredients per line, although without further (instruction) such as the amount of each ingredient or the cooking time.
The second person (improve) Lanzhou beef noodles was a cook named Ma Zilu, lived in the early twentieth century. By that time, hundreds of beef noodle restaurants had opened in Lanzhou, and the taste in each location differed (significant). After achieving a form of unity among the different restaurants in Lanzhou, Ma later opened a small food cart and traveled around China, (introduce) the dish all the way to the southeast port city of Guangzhou.
