Our drug of choice is Szechuan peppercorn, and Sichuan Cuisine’s hot pots are a terrific source of it. We fiends sit around bubbling cauldrons of fiery broth, heaping plates of raw flesh into it for about an hour and a half. (Show up much later than 8:30pm, and you may not get to indulge in this communal ritual.)

The menu is rife with other mouth-watering, authentic dishes like ma la, crispy intestine, and a tea-smoked duck that’s sometimes exceptional and sometimes oversalted and dry, but if you’ve got 3 or more, go hot pot. You first must specify yuanyang (divided into half spicy and half mild), all spicy, or all mild broth. “Spicy” is an ass-kicker, but yuanyang will give you all the clove-anise flavor you want. While you wait for your broth to boil, head to the back table for a cold snack of garlic cucumbers, sliced beef, and jerky; or mix your own sauce from sa tsa (Chinese barbecue sauce), raw egg, cilantro, chilis, and soy sauce.

When you choose your vegetables, noodles, and meat, consider that head-on shrimp or thinly sliced beef or lamb must be fished out quickly or they’ll overcook. You can opt to have a live fish brought from the tank to boil to death in your cauldron. But dude, some things you should never see while high on Szechuan.