she, the epicuriousgirl.

in continuation of my gastronomy adventure in taipei;

My friend brought me for breakfast of vermicelli soup (米粉汤) at a nearby shop, a branch of 台北通化街米粉汤. I was having quite high expectations as I could see a Good Food Cert (最佳小吃奖) by the Taipei government on the wall. The vermicelli is served plain, with soup stock and you can order accompanying dishes. His faves include the pork flesh by the jaw (嘴边肉) , large intestines (猪大肠), tofu and boiled radish. My verdict? The accompanying dishes were more tasty than the vermicelli soup itself. Hehe.

Another breakfast regular that we had was Pan Fried Buns (生煎包), available in 3 flavours - cabbage (高麗菜), chives (韭菜) and pork (生肉). Thought I’d love the pork one the best considering the fact that I love meat but it was the cabbage filling that stole my heart. Had julienned carrots and glass noodles in it too. Yum.

the perfect blend of taste of “豆浆油条” (doujiangyoutiao/ soya bean milk with yau char kwai) inspired singers to use this term to symbolise how perfect a union can be. bearing that in mind, we decided to try out how “perfect” these two can taste when partaken together. the famous breakfast shop in taipei is 永和豆浆 and though i think the soya bean milk is decent (thick enough), i didn’t like the yau char kwai at all. m’sian ones win hands down.

There’s a famous mee sua shop in Ximending, the Harajuku equivalent of Taipei. Ah Zhong Mee Sua (阿宗面線) serves the vermicelli with large intestines instead of oysters. The stock tastes heavily of dashi, and is transformed as soon as you add the chilli that’s provided. the chilli makeths the dish indeed. And everyone just stands around the shop, slurping the warm goodness.

Squid Balls (花支球) for sale at Ximending. You can ask for it to be flavoured with the many powdered flavourings they have, including mustard, pineapple, curry etc. We opted for the original, salt & pepper. It tasted ok only… a bit chewy. Generally, snacks made with squid in Taiwan was a bit of a disappointment to me.

another thing we tried around the Ximending area was the braised duck tongue from Lao Tien Lu (老天祿). I quite liked it as it had a nice bite to it. But it was quite pricey at NT450 for 500g.

Spring Onion Pancake (蔥油餅) from a stall on TongHua Street (通化街). Just so yummy that I didn’t care about the fact that it was on the oily side.

Xiao Long Bao and Suan La Tang (酸辣汤) from one of the stalls behind Nova. Possibly one of the worst tasting food I’ve ever tried. The XLB was dry and hard and the soup, bland at best.

my lunch at yang ming shan (陽明山), Braised Beef rice (红烧牛腩饭). At NT100 per plate, the rice was served with a substantial portion of braised beef, a whole egg, stir-fried greens, stir-fried cabbage, and tomato stir-fried with egg. Seaweed soup was also given on the side.

French fries with melted cheese, drizzled with gravy from Poutine House. It was quite nice, but very filling. At NT110 per portion.

mister donuts are everywhere in taipei. Decided to try some of its donuts to see what the hype is about. Had the Pon De Macha (蜜糖抹茶波堤), a chocolate something and Strawberry Ring (草莓). The Pon De Ring series were probably the best, with quite a QQ (chewiness) bite to the donuts. Was also happy about the fact that it wasn’t too sweet. The others were just mediocre tasting.

Hungryintaipei has a better, more concise review.

another chain of stores that we meant to try was Mr.Baoz after seeing their creative baos. Choose the baos of your choice and they steam it on the spot for you, so a little waiting time is involved. chose 3 of the more attractive looking ones - Squid Roll (墨魚三星卷), Beef (精燉牛肉包) and Yam (蒸籠芋頭包). The squid roll has a bit of a wasabi mayonnaise at its topping and I didn’t really like it that much. The beef bao was better as the beef bits in it were soft and tasty. Love the yam filling too as it’s not the artificial kind, but made of mashed real yam.

Desserts at Meet Fresh (鲜芋仙). my friend had the tofu jelly (芋圓豆花) while I had the signature dessert, which is not too different from the one i had on my first day in taipei. The signature dessert “鮮芋仙招牌” has the grass jelly, yam balls, shaved ice and fresh milk 仙草凍+仙草沙+芋圓+鮮奶油) in it. Much bigger portion here, and very good! but the waiting time was so long it was absurd. lucky we had time to spare.

Next up, eating out in Taipei…

the first part of my absence was spent gallivanting around Taiwan for a week, which saw me gorging on the much talked-about taiwanese cuisine. we roughly knew what we wanted to try based on the many tv shows we have seen introducing their yummy looking food. and i’ll start off with the food in Taipei (台北), the capital itself.

my first bite in Taipei was in Sanchung district (三重市), where i was bunking with a friend. he brought me to the neighborhood night market and we ended up at this stinky tofu (麻辣臭豆腐) place. i was given the signature dish (招牌肠旺臭豆腐), a wet mix of fermented tofu, pig large intestines, goose blood, and mushrooms in a sichuan spicy soup. despite it sounding really weird, it actually tasted okay. the stinky tofu was manageable and i don’t think it’s really stinky. the goose blood was the thing i had to get used to as i don’t even take the blood cubes in penang curry noodles.

Next up was desserts from 豆府花城 (www) where i had the 芋圆仙草冻, a cincau dessert with yam balls which i truly enjoyed. the small tub of milk added quite the oomph to the dessert itself. my friend had the mixed fruit dou hua. the taiwanese are really quite creative with their cold desserts.

met up with the rest of my friends at Shilin Night Market (士林夜市), which is a tourist’s must visit for taiwanese snacks. of course a lot of people have commented that snacks in other night markets are better but we still decided to go as it’s so famous.

Stuff that we ate;

deep fried spare ribs (排骨酥). flavourful batter.

baked potato with ham & cheese, soft and creamy.

whole potato cut into chips. presentation better than taste.

roasted corn with a rice wine & herbal coating (烤珍珠玉米).

the famous gigantic deep fried chicken chop (炸鸡排). it was only NT50 each and so big that 7 of us couldn’t finish it. and sure we were quite stuffed from trying all the other snacks.

spring onion pancake with cheese & egg (葱抓饼). tasted similar to our roti telur, only with an extra piece of cheese. not too bad, though a little on the oily side.

array of taiwanese sausages… including the jumbo ones. we also had the squid ink ones, along with those wrapped on rib bones. all tasted quite juicy and yummy.

oyster omelettes (蚵仔煎.) the taiwanese version has no starch in it, and has a very eggy taste.

Lamb kebabs (羊肉串). Delicious with a smoky taste.

Oyster vermicelli (蚵仔麵線), a sticky, gooey bowl of mee sua with oysters and large intestines. this one was not good at all in compared some other versions i have tried in m’sia.

of course we were pretty stuffed by then, and hence saw many other snacks but couldn’t try them….

Cow tongue biscuits (牛舌饼)

Small sausage in Large Sausage (大腸包小腸).

<
Quail’s egg (烤鸟蛋)

Fish balls (鱼蛋)

Pan Fried Buns (生煎包)

Braised Snacks (鹵味)

Part II coming up…

it’s been a while,eh? i’ve been travelling a bit and haven’t really had time to plonk myself in front of a computer to regulate updates. plus i’m off to another more rural bit of the country where internet access is rare and handphone signals nonexistent. so it looks like i’ll be back only next week, with some food posts, hopefully.