Monday, October 5, 2009

More food adventures in Taiwan! This time, Ma La Guo, Mango Shaved Ice, and much more!

I love how Taiwan's food come in cute boxes like these.

Look at the deliciousness that was inside! More Dan Bing (Egg Pancake) 蛋餅 with Pork Sung 肉鬆

I had breakfast with my mom and she had this clear noodle soup with these yummy side dishes. It was seaweed and this marinated sliced pork dish with ginger. And hot sauce to dip in, of course.

My mom's cousin owns this cute little bistro with fusion food.

It's alfredo pasta! With a side of corn soup.

This one had salmon in it. What you see on top is nicely melted cheese. YUM

This one had beef in it. Too bad it's under the cheese so you can't see it.

Zhong He Ye Si 中和夜市, a night market near where my grandma lives.

One of my FAVORITE things at night markets!! I ate 3 while I was in Taiwan. Candied Tomatoes. YUM. I think it's called Bing Tang Hu Lu 冰糖葫蘆

Strolling through the night market... I dislike mopeds at night markets. Lazy bums. They should just walk. Plus it makes it smell like engine exhaust. -___-

They even had a Halal style street stand!

Adorable puppies in the store, also at the night market. I'm sad I only got a picture of their backs. :(

There's a bunch of fried food/chicken stands in the area too. They offer different seasonings for the chicken and they are all sooooooooooo good!

The Taiwan Metro (Jie Yun) 捷運 Coin to get in.

My sister and I on the Metro (Jie Yun) 捷運. Gosh, I wish SF had a better metro system.

This is probably my FAVORITE thing EVER in Taiwan!! It's called Egg cakes (Ji Dan Gao) 雞蛋糕 I wish I could make them here, but they have those special metal grill things to shape it like that. I've seen animal shaped ones but these egg shaped ones are the BEST!

The street stand I purchased it for. A mere 30NT! ~$1.

臭豆腐 Stinky Tofu. We stopped at a street stand and got something that you absolutely have to try in Taiwan! It was nice and crispy on the outside and hot and steamy on the inside. Served with hot sauce of course.

My cousin and his gf took my sister and I to a yummy Ma La Guo restaurant. These were the veggies and miscellaneous goodies that came with my Ma La Guo (Hot and Numbing Hot Pot) 麻辣鍋.

The sauce I made to dip my cooked veggies and meat in. Green Onion, Chinese BBQ Sauce (Sa Cha Jiang) , raw egg yolk, minced garlic, cilantro, and soy paste.

My Ma La Guo Pot. Look how spicy my soup was! My stomach burned a whole day after I ate this!

My meat that came with the Ma La Guo.

The little area where you make your sauce to dip the veggies and meat in.

My Cousin and I, with our table full of food!

The aftermath of a 4 person Ma La Guo session. Everyone else got regular Huo Guo (Hot Pot) 火鍋, I was the only one who got the Ma La Guo!

For dessert, my uncle and auntie took my sister and I to the night market near our apartment for some shaved ice!

This is their favorite dish there! Mango ice cream with mango shaved ice 刨冰 Bao bing in Mandarin, Cua Bing in Taiwanese! It was soooo delicious on a hot and humid Taiwan night.

My sister really wanted taro so she got this shaved ice with taro, boba, and boiled peanuts in a brown sugar sauce. It was good, but not quite as good as the mango shaved ice!

My sister and the shaved ice stand.

Til next time! May your days be delighted with many delectable dishes.

Thursday, September 10, 2009

Taiwan Carrefour Jia Le Fu Grocery Store!

When my sister and I got bored, we just walked around outside my Grandma's house and went grocery shopping at Carrefour (Jia Le Fu) 家樂福! I love grocery shopping, it's so fun!

When in Taiwan, pose like the Taiwanese. 

Look at how bright all the signs are! After I took this picture I got in trouble, you can't take pictures in the grocery store. But why?!

Being the rebellious kid I was, I took more pictures. And of course I took pictures of the snack isles.

These are sold in 99 ranch markets in America, but look at how big these boxes are, super sized!

Oh, Taiwan. I love how they make pudding flavored EVERYTHING!

Even Chinese Cheetos! They have some rather strange brands of Cheetos in Taiwan.

Oh my! An entire section of the refrigerated section of ONLY PUDDING (Bu Ding 布丁)! Dream come true. It's the best dilemma when you can't decide which brand/kind of pudding you want to buy!

Light Yang Le Duo. We need this in America!

Weirdest juice ever. Sounds gross.

What we bought! I got pudding flavor marshmellows, pudding, and apple milk! Another thing I really miss about Taiwan is their fruit milks. I can drink them day and night! My sister got the Meiji Strawberry Chocolates and a plum drink (she thought it was a mango on the picture, too bad).

After we finished grocery shopping, we went home to find a nice and healthy homemade dinner at Grandma's house. It may not look that good, but it was!

Til next time! May your days be delighted with many delectable dishes. (I wonder how many posts it'll take me to finish my food adventures in Taiwan).

Friday, September 4, 2009

Taiwan Part 2

Night market street food. Not exactly the cleanest food on the planet, but close to the most delicious! Since my sister and I were snacking all day, we decided to snack some more for dinner at a neighborhood street market! 

My mom and her sister claims that this stand's "o-a-mi-sua" <-Taiwanese (slender noodles with oysters) is the best around, so we quickly grabbed some open seats (there were barely any!) and ordered. You know a stand is good if there's a line!

Why does this picture look so close? Because I sat at the stand. I had the giant bowl of it cooking right in front of me. It was so hot!

My mom also ordered this glutonous rice with Pork Sung (Rou Song) 肉鬆 and "Jiang Gua" 醬瓜 dish. It was average compared to the o a mi sua. This felt like dry "xi fan" Chinese porridge.

This was the O a mi sua. SOOOO delicious! 

More pictures of night market street food.


Pig feet. 豬腳 I love pig feet! It might sound disgusting, but this is one of my favorite dishes in the world! Especially stewed with peanuts! I wanted to have some of this, but I was too full. :( My mom makes it the best!

Seasoned stir fried shrimp. Yum.

This is my favorite chinese street snack! Maybe not this kind in particular, I like the big ones, not these tiny little ones, but they're basically just egg cakes. So delicious when it's nice and warm. 

In Taiwan, apparently Bitter Melons 苦瓜 are popular to add into fresh fruit smoothies now. I knew they were good for you, but that sounds pretty disgusting to me. I love Bitter melon 苦瓜 soup though.

Takoyaki in Taiwan! Not too shabby either! This stand had a long line, so we figured that we should try some. 

The making of Takoyaki.

It was so hot (temperature wise) but actually really good! I attended the Cherry blossom festival in San Francisco last year, and this one was better than the Takoyaki stand there! AND I waited an hour for that one in SF.

My uncle decided to have us try this Cong Bing 蔥餅. It's quite different from the traditional Cong You Bing 蔥油餅, as all the onions are wrapped inside the bun.

Cong Bing 蔥餅

Luo Bo Gao (Turnip Cake) 蘿蔔糕 , another yummy street food snack.

I forgot what these are called, but it's like a mochi exterior and it's stuffed with either green bean paste, red bean paste, taro paste, or this yellow custardy paste. They were ok in my book. Not awesome. I'd rather have filled my stomach with some egg cakes.

And the world famous Chou Dou Fu (Stinky Tofu) 臭豆腐. I think it smells good, but it's probably cause I grew up with it and I love it!

Til next time! May your days be delighted with many delectable dishes.