taipei cheap eats and other wonderful things

A street vendor selling cooked water caltrop (菱角), a nutty starchy fruit that looks like goat horns.

Oops. I was supposed to finish up and publish this post months ago. Instead, I got carried away with another big multi-month Asia trip, and... here we are. I'll talk about these new adventures as soon as I can, but for now, let's get going with the final installment of my 2014 Taiwan travel blog series! (And you really should read this one, even if I do say so myself!)

A random snap of a street vendor (I didn't try their wares).

I have to admit I didn't really do a lot of research on the best places to eat in Taipei, but somehow, we stumbled upon many excellent places just sauntering around! And looking them up on the internet later, I find that many of these accidental finds are reputable, popular places with great reviews. How's that for awesome luck?

A picture of a dog in a pram, just because.

Some of the best snacks I've had are often casual street eats from unassuming stalls. Chen's wine cakes (陳記京滬酒釀餅) fall into this category. You can get these pancake-like treats in original, black sesame and peanut, red bean and green bean flavours. I think there is a savoury veggie and beancurd option as well.

Chen's wine cakes (陳記京滬酒釀餅), 30 NTD each.

Despite the moniker, you don't really taste any alcohol in these filled pastries. We had the black sesame one and I loved loved loved it. Crispy, toasty, warm, fluffy, it was everything, Just thinking about how delicious it was makes me yearn for it again!

Black sesame wine cake with peanuts.

I always knew going to Taiwan I would be sampling their beef noodles. I feel fortunate that I gave Piaoxiang beef noodle restaurant (飄香牛肉麵館) a go - we went there because it was in the vicinity of Ningxia night market (寧夏夜市), and the crowds were crazy at the market, so we escaped here instead, where at least we could get a seat and there was some breathing space! It turned out to be an excellent decision.

Piaoxiang beef noodle restaurant (飄香牛肉麵館).

Piaoxiang literally means "wafting aroma", and the beef noodle soup here is indeed fragrant and slurptastic. There is a hint of spiciness in the broth too, making it extra-appetizing!

Piaoxiang's beef noodle soup, 100 - 120 NTD.

Another beef noodle restaurant we tried in Taipei is the Lin Dong Fang restaurant (林東芳牛肉麵). This place is considerably more well-known (and also more expensive, but still affordable), and it was one of the few places that lazy me had actually jotted down as a place to visit.

Lin Dong Fang beef noodle restaurant (林東芳牛肉麵).

Here, the broth skews towards the clearer side of the spectrum, but the modest appearance belies the strength of the flavour that lurks within, with a hint of traditional Chinese herbs providing an additional dimension. This is quite a different style of beef noodles to the other one, so it's hard to say which is better. Try both!

Lin Dong Fang beef noodles soup, 140 NTD - 170 NTD.

For buns on the go, we found Lao Cai's Shuijianbao (老蔡水煎包) to be pretty reliable quality. The buns are steamed, then pan-fried to achieve a nice crispy crust on the bottom, while other parts remain soft and tender. The shop is open morning to night, but we tend to go for breakfast. A couple of buns and a drink here, and you're ready to take on the day!

Lao Cai's Shuijianbao (老蔡水煎包) shop, great for takeaway buns.

Old Cai's pan-fried steamed buns come in the flavours of cabbage (高麗菜), garlic chive (韭菜), or pork (鮮肉). You can also get beverages such as black tea (紅茶), soy milk (豆漿), or peanut rice milk (米漿) to accompany your buns.

Cabbage bun (高麗菜包), 13 NTD.

Garlic chive / Chinese chive / Chinese leek bun (韭菜包), 13 NTD.

Pork bun (鮮肉包), 13 NTD.

Occasionally we do brave the crowds at the night markets in Taipei. We were thankful that we didn't have to wait very long to get our teppanyaki chicken at this stall in Raohe night market (饒河夜市). If you understand Chinese characters, you'll be amused by the name of the stall - it's a puntastic twist on the movie title Farewell My Concubine, with the word "chicken" replacing the word "concubine", a perfect fit as the two words sound exactly alike.

Bawangbieji teppanyaki chicken stall (霸王別雞三星蔥雞腿板燒) at Raohe night market (饒河夜市).

Anyway, we enjoyed this! The chicken was succulent, and the accompaniment of sauce, spring onions and sweet corn intensified the juiciness of this dish. It's great value for money too, so the vendor should be saying farewell to many of his chickens at this rate!

Spring onion teppanyaki chicken leg, 60 NTD.

Speaking of night markets, you may spot these intriguing little bouncy cool jellies that they keep chilled on ice (QQ涼圓) making an appearance from time to time.

Miss Wang's QQ jellies (王小姐QQ涼圓菜燕).

Typical fillings are red bean or green bean paste. They make a simple, light and refreshing dessert.

Ice jellies (QQ涼圓), 10 pieces for 35 NTD.

Very importantly, towards the end of our stay in Taipei, we stumbled upon pepper buns (hujiaobing 胡椒餅), and wow, are they scrumptious.

Charcoal baked pepper bun stall.

Behold this gloriously seasoned meaty filling encased within a crispy golden brown pastry. It was quite the revelation.

Charcoal-baked pork and pepper bun (碳烤赤), 40 NTD.

The spring onion buns from this stall (whose name I do not know) were actually not half bad either, even though the pepper buns are hard to beat.

Charcoal-baked spring onion roll (碳烤蔥花燒餅), 25 NTD.

So that's it for the food stuff! I'll share a few other things while I'm here, to give you some idea of other aspects of Taipei. Starting off with a dog pic, just because.

These little dogs look like Sherlock and Watson to me! Too adorable!!

There's the famous Taipei 101 tower, of course...

Taipei 101 (台北101) view from Elephant Mountain (象山) hiking trail.

The love sculpture...

A big LOVE sign.

The rather magnificent Ciyou temple...

Ciyou temple (慈祐宮), dedicated to the sea goddess Mazu.

The Moon Bus, an art installation of some sort. We just happened upon this without knowing such a thing existed, and the unplanned, unexpected discovery made it all the more delightful.

The Moon Bus in Taipei (月亮公車).

And... it's a wrap! While I haven't been blogging very frequently or consistently this year, I do hope you have enjoyed the posts that I did manage to put up, even if some of them are, um... extraordinarily delayed. And I will definitely try to continue to keep at this. Having said that, I can't promise when my next post will be, but I'd like to say January. So in the meantime, happy holidays, stay safe, and I'll see you around next year!

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a stay in puli; a day trip to sun moon lake

Views of Sun Moon Lake (日月潭).

After traversing the east coast and southwest coast of Taiwan, it was time to head to central Taiwan. The main draw there is the famous Sun Moon Lake in Nantou County, of course, and we decided to stay in the nearby Puli Township as a base for our sightseeing.

Dumplings from an unknown shop in Puli, Nantou ( 埔里鎮，南投縣).

We spent two days and three nights here, and we would spend our days outside of Puli - the first day visiting Sun Moon Lake, which I'll get to in a moment, and the second day exploring the Jiji Railway Line, a wonderfully charming escapade that I look forward to sharing with you in my next post.

Our nights are spent in Puli, and every night, without fail, we would get bubble tea from Mr. Wish. The drinks are delectable, and the staff there are so friendly. I don't think they get foreigners at their shop very often, as they seemed quite enthusiastic about Simon's presence.

We loved getting drinks from the Mr. Wish bubble tea shop in Puli.

It goes without saying that we visited the night market in Puli. It is here that we got a glimpse of a totally unexpected scene in these backwaters of Taiwan.

You get charming sights, such as children playing the magnetic rubber duck fishing game. Cute, tame, and innocent so far, right?

Innocent fun and games at Puli night market (埔里夜市).

And then... we couldn't believe our eyes when we saw this. I can only describe it as some kind of strange, medieval cruelty.

So, you know those claw machines where you put in a coin and try to grab a toy and drop it down a chute? Well, this is similar, but instead of a claw, players control a disk, which they use to try to scoop up an actual live fish from the water in the claustrophobic tank and plonk into the chute, thereby winning themselves a prize. The poor tormented fish are clearly distressed and I feel so bad for them - this is next level insane and disturbing stuff.

Last I heard, the Taiwanese media found out about this fishy arcade game and have reported it on the news with an appropriately disapproving tone. I can't find any further updates in regards to whether it has since been shut down or not, but you'd hope so! Or if they could covert the setup so that it uses fake toy fish instead, that would turn it from a horrible game to an agreeable one.

Catching live fish arcade game (撈活魚遊戲機).

But I do want to say that while this is an awful thing, it doesn't define Puli. There are many nice things about this town, and other than this crazy atrocity, the rest of the night market was perfectly pleasant, and we did our usual thing of walking around and purchasing whatever took our fancy.

A stall selling deep-fried mushrooms and tofu.

I've mentioned before that the Taiwanese love their deep-fried food, and here's another example of how they're very adept in this arena. That's a graceful little cluster of deep-fried mushrooms!

I think these are deep-fried golden oyster mushrooms / pleurotus citrinopileatus (珊瑚菇).

The deep-fried tofu is also fantastic. These are appetizing snacks for vegetarians and non-vegetarians alike, that's for sure!

Delicious deep-fried tofu.

And for the main course, sizzling noodles with steak and egg on a hot plate. So hearty, so satisfying.

Sizzling steak and egg and noodles.

For dessert, I stopped by this stall that sells douhua (soft tofu in sweet syrup) and tangyuan (glutinous rice balls in sweet syrup). It also offers aiyu jelly, tapioca pearls, red bean soup, and green bean soup.

Dessert stall. Yeah!

I opted for the sweet potato tangyuan, and it was really lovely. The tangyuan had a bouncy chewy texture and sweet gentle flavour. I liked it a lot.

A simple yet exquisite cold dessert of sweet potato tangyuan (冰地瓜湯圓) with beans, 35 NTD.

For one of the nights, we did the rare thing of venturing outside of the night market for dinner. We stumbled upon this steamboat or hotpot restaurant (called O God in English, though their website address is oldgod.com.tw), and figured we'd give it a go.

It was an enjoyable hands-on experience as we each get our own little pots to cook our selected menu items at our table.

This is the seafood hotpot, I think, though as you can see, other than the fish, clams and prawns on the side, it has other bits and bobs in it as well.

Hotpot exhibit one, from O God spicy hotpot restaurant (老先覺麻辣窯燒鍋).

And this, if I recall correctly, is the pork hotpot.

O God hotpot exhibit two.

And that's all for our time in Puli. Now we move on to our visit to Sun Moon Lake!

You can take the bus from Puli to Sun Moon Lake; it takes about 40 minutes to get there. Not too shabby!

The scenery here is indeed pretty.

The loveliness of Sun Moon Lake in full force here.

I will say that not all parts of Sun Moon Lake is as tranquil as it might appear in my photos. The fact is, this is a popular tourist destination, and you get tour buses offloading what can be overwhelming buckets of tourists at various points in the area.

However, all you have to do is take some initiative to get off the beaten track, and it's not too difficult to get away from the crowds at all if you want to.

A quiet aboriginal village in the Sun Moon Lake precinct.

We found our peaceful place in this sweet and sleepy little aboriginal village.

An older man relaxing outside his home.

And the best thing was, this adorable dog came up to us while we were taking a break on a bench in the village, so obviously we lavished him (her?) with loving attention and yeah, we gave a bit of our food as well. Look at that cute face! You just can't say no to a face like that. It's impossible.

How can you resist this doglet?

I can't remember where we saw this winsome cat sign, but anyway, I'm sharing it here.

Careful! Cat comes and goes. (小心！ 貓出沒).

We eventually made our way back to a busier part of Sun Moon Lake, the street market area.

Thao's/Shao's Authentic Grilled Wild Boar Skewers  (邵族正宗烤山豬肉串), 1 stick for 35 NTD, 3 for 100 NTD.

When I saw this stall selling grilled wild boar skewers, I knew it was something I had to get. I have had wild boar only a few times in my life, it really is a treat. Here, the wild boar meat had been marinated in a sweet-savoury sauce, and the end result is a very tasty skewer.

A grilled wild boar kabob.

Sun Moon Lake is a picturesque attraction for sure. It didn't quite knock our socks off, but admittedly we didn't get there in time for sunrise, and we didn't stay for sunset, either. Moreover, while we hopped on the shuttle boat, we didn't take the cable car ride, which probably would have been quite awesome. It's also supposed to be good for cycling and hiking. Thus, there is definitely a lot of potential here that we didn't completely seize. So, for those of you who are curious about Sun Moon Lake, perhaps when you go, you can try out some of the activities we neglected - and I'd love to hear you report back on your experience!

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tainan: old-world charm, fish noodles, and cat cafes

Eating out, with a side of geese, in Tainan (台南).

So look, I have pretty much good things to say about every place we visited in Taiwan, but I'm going to come right out and play favourites here: I am particularly fond of Tainan. This city has so much character - it's just such a beautifully warm blend of old and new. On one side you may see little shops that look like they have been around for centuries, offering traditional goods and services that are increasingly rare in the modern world. On another, you might come across youthful, trendy stores and eateries with cosmopolitan vibes and experimental twists.

Just to give you an idea of what I'm talking about, this traditional puppet parade was one of the first things we stumbled upon on our first day exploring Tainan city. I think it's part of some Taoist ceremony, but that's my best guess. I asked a local bystander, and she didn't know, either!

Giant puppet parade in Tainan.

Soon after that, we strolled by a roadside setup where you can try your hand at making a traditional Taiwanese candy with sugar and baking soda, a crunchy treat similar to what you might know as honeycomb, hokey-pokey, or cinder toffee.

Cooking candy in the streets of Tainan (煮碰糖).

One moment, we'd be eating "top scholar" cakes (狀元糕) - traditional little rice cakes steamed in curious contraptions that look like mini totem poles, with ground peanuts or black sesame...

Top scholar cakes, also sometimes translated as champion cakes, from Wang's stall (王家庄狀元粿).

But another moment we'd be eating mini Belgian-style waffle ice cream sandwiches.

Belgian waffles with ice cream from Gold House (金色小屋比利時松餅).

We'd slurp down delicious douhua (豆花) - tofu pudding - from well-established shops that specialize precisely in this type of dessert. You can get it in the basic original flavour, which is simply sweetened, or you can get it with toppings such as red beans (adzuki), green beans (mung), tapioca pearls, lemon, and barley. You may see tofu, or bean curd, with a subtle grayish tinge - these are made from black soy beans instead of the usual yellow ones. Some shops add charcoal, making the gray colour way more distinctive and prominent.

I am partial to getting my sweet soybean curds with red bean topping,

Black soy bean tofu pudding with red bean topping from Mao's Black Sweet Tofu. (茂記黑豆花大王赤崁店)

While Simon can never seem to resist getting them with black tapioca pearls.

Tofu pudding with pearls from Tong's Anping Bean Jelly (同記安平豆花).

And we'd indulge in sweets from this sleek Japanese dessert shop - at the time we went, it also had
a casual photo exhibition in the upstairs dining area, and I think the pictures were from the shop owner's travels - so that was pretty interesting.

This fish-shaped cake, known in Japan as taiyaki, has an exterior that is made with a batter similar to what is used for pancakes or waffles.

Red bean and matcha taiyaki (紅豆抹茶鯛魚燒) from Hanami UJI Matcha WA-Sweets (宇治花見), 25 NTD.

The filling is part red bean paste, part matcha cream, and it is absolutely divine, especially when the whole thing is still fresh and warm. The sweetness of the red bean paste and the gentle bitterness of the matcha cream complement each other wonderfully.

The taiyaki's crisp exterior and lush fillings are a seriously fabulous combination.

And if you feel like something cold, there's the combination milk-and-matcha soft serve.

The soft serve milk-and-matcha twist, 80 NTD.

One thing I really wanted to try in Taiwan are fish noodles, which are not noodles and fish, but literally noodles made from fish. It's not terribly common - there's supposed to be a fish noodle stall in Cijin Island of Kaohsiung that's excellent, but it wasn't open when we went there. So it was to my delight that I found that there were two shops in Tainan that do handmade fish noodles!

At both places, I tried the fish noodles, as well as fish dumplings. As I've mentioned, the noodles are made from fish, but the cool thing is that the dough for the fish dumpling skin contains fish as well. Meanwhile, it seems that the dumpling filling is typically pork or a combination of fish and pork.

We went to the Xia Family Handmade Fish Noodle Shop first.

Behold their fish noodles...

Xia's fish noodle soup (夏家手工魚麵), 45 NTD for a small bowl, 70 NTD for large.

And their fish dumplings.

Xia's fish dumpling soup (夏家魚餃湯), 30 NTD.

Then we sampled the fish noodles from Zhuo Family Shantou Fish Noodle Shop...

Zhuo's fish noodle soup (卓家汕頭魚麵), 45 NTD for a small bowl, 75 NTD for large.

And also their fish dumplings.

Zhuo's fish dumpling soup (卓家魚餃湯), 35 NTD.

Honestly, it's been so long that I can't remember if one of the fish noodle shops was obviously better than the other one. In any case, they're both well-regarded and are located within a 10-minute walking distance to each other, so if you're in the area, it totally makes sense to try both anyway.

After eating fish noodles, relaxing in a cat cafe with a drink is a good idea. We went to two cat cafes in Tainan, and we found them to be superbly pleasant. We were entertained by the cats, and the cats seemed content and comfortable with the cafe setting and can easily choose to engage with guests or peace out in a safe space, which is so important, and exactly how cat cafes should be.

(AT) Cats & Tea is the more elaborate one, with a generous number of cats, and lots of space.

The bright orange sign was very effective in getting our attention.

(AT) Cats & Tea (茶飲輕食) cat cafe in Tainan.

We found this cute grumpy cat amusing. Despite the disdainful expression, it was amenable to being patted.

Cat with grumpy face at Cats & Tea.

And how about this adorable tabby being all loaf-like on a chair?

A tabby loaf at Cats & Tea.

Oh, my heart.

Fluffy blue-point cat taking a cat nap at Cats & Tea.

The other one we went to, Cafe Moment, is a very modest setup in comparison. It's more like a cafe that happens to have a couple of cats hanging around all casual-like, rather than the expected style of cat cafe that has more of a playground element to it, if you know what I mean.

Cafe moment (貓門咖啡).

I think we saw two cats while we were there. This cutie was there by itself for awhile before another one made an appearance.

One of the cats at Cafe Moment.

The menu has such a sweet personal touch, and the coffee here is so very pretty!

Cafe Moment menu and coffee.

I didn't mean for this post to end up being so long, but seriously, it could have been much longer, with way more pictures, more thoughts. There are many things I enjoyed in Tainan, and this is but a mere glimpse of what it has to offer.

Dragon fountain at Koxinga Ancestral Shrine (鄭成功祖廟).

So I say, if you get the opportunity, go stroll the streets of Tainan, and experience its charms for yourself!

A walk in Tainan.

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