The invention relates to a food preparation method, specially relates to the preparation method of hot and sour Chinese cabbages. The ingredients to be salted comprise the following raw materials in parts by weight, 70-100 parts of Chinese cabbages; 5-10 parts of Chinese prickly ash; 20-50 parts of hot red peppers; 1-5 parts of cinnamon; and 1-5 parts of fennel. The preparation method includes the following steps of: 1. slicing Chinese cabbages after cleaning; 2. packaging Chinese prickly ash, hot red peppers, cinnamon, and fennel into a voile bag, and putting the voile bag into water to boil for 15-20 minutes, then hauling the voile bag out for later use; 3. putting the Chinese cabbages into a container, and stacking the Chinese cabbages until the stack is 5-10com far from the container port, then pouring the hot water obtained by boiling Chinese prickly ash, hot red peppers, cinnamon, and fennel into the container, and pouring acid juice into the container until the mixed liquid of the hot water and the acid juice are 1-2 cm above the stacked Chinese cabbage; and 4. sealing and then keeping the container under the temperature of 20-28 DEG C for 3-10 days, and obtaining pickled Chinese cabbage. The Chinese cabbages prepared by the method are hot and sour with a good taste.