I was sorely mistaken when I thought one post could cover photos from my mission trip and all the delicious food I had in Taiwan… because there are way too many pictures. I took pictures of almost everything I ate! (Of course this isn’t even all of it) My mouth is watering already, so I will just get into it. More detailed descriptions after the gallery. And I’ll go back to normal food posts soon, I promise!
- I love anything matcha flavored, and while green tea ice cream is hard to come by in America, it’s everywhere in Taiwan! I’m mad that I forgot to pick up some matcha powder while I was there. Matcha and red bean are two flavors that go really well together.
- This soup was at a buffet at the Taipei Main Station, and it was delicious. I’ve never seen soup with puff pastry baked on top before! They had them coming fresh out of the oven and each tray of 20-some soup bowls would get snatched up immediately.
- Din Tai Fung is an famous dumpling house, specializing in the xiao long bao (steamed dumplings) pictured here. It was my first time at the restaurant, and I think it lives up to the hype.
- We also ordered potstickers, as well as this fried rice with pork cutlet. It was perfect.
- Taiwan is the land of every kind of beverage you can imagine. The fruit selection for various smoothies, shakes, slushies, etc. on a tropical island is vast and being an Asian country, the teas are endless. Bubble tea is also super cheap, coming out to be $1 USD or less per cup, and the servings are quite large. We had bubble tea so often, I didn’t think to take any pictures of it. But you can’t really get papaya milk state-side!
- This green tea was topped with a slightly salted cream of some sort that I think would be better if it was sweetened, but Taiwanese people love the sweet and salty combination. I actually thought it tasted just okay, but everyone else loved it. I’ve never seen tea served like that, though.
- Our mission team went out to three different barbeque places together. The first was in between the two weeks of camp, the second time was after the camp was over (I missed it because I had to leave campus earlier), and the third time was a few days later when we all met up in Taipei at Xi Men Ding. This picture is from the third place – it’s all-you-can-eat so they just keep bringing plates of assorted meats and you grill it yourself. The seasoning was perfect and I ate a lot even though I’m not a big carnivore. I never know the names of the restaurants we we go to… but they had really good black sesame ice cream. Almost all restaurants in Taiwan serve ice cream.
- The town of Da Xi (Old River) is famous for its dried bean curd. We got to explore the Da Xi Old Street, a popular tourist attraction in the county of Taoyuan.
- This shaved ice place in Tainan was super famous and one order of mango shaved ice takes a 40-minute wait, on a good day. You haven’t had mangoes until you’ve had Taiwanese mangoes. My mouth is watering just thinking about it.
- Okay, so this wasn’t so much a crepe as it was a sort of pancake that was crispy on the outside and fluffy on the inside. But it was still delicious. And that ice cream was awesome. Seriously, Taiwan knows its ice cream.
- Tang yuan is ‘glutinous rice balls’ which does not sound appetizing, but it’s just a chewy ball of dough, kind of like mochi. These tang yuan were plain in the green bean soup, but they are usually filled with some sweet filling like red bean, sesame, or my favorite, peanut.
- Xue hua bing is like shaved ice, but it’s made with ice, milk, and various flavorings (lychee in this case). The mixture is frozen into a cylindrical block and the machine shaves the block into super thin sheets that melt in your mouth, like cotton candy. America is missing out.
- Nantou yi mien is a kind of ramen – they’re egg noodles, served here with ground pork and a tea egg. My grandparents are from Nantou, so they took us out to eat these noodles.
- In Taiwan, Century 21 is not a real estate company, but a fast food place. And you can buy a whole roast chicken – they literally give you plastic gloves that you use to just straight up dig into the chicken. Totally fun experience, though I would not recommend for a first date 🙂
- I posted this picture mainly for the egg tart. You can get egg tarts at a lot of places in Taiwan, including KFC. But this was at another really fancy buffet and the egg tart was fantastic. Again, I have no idea what the name of the restaurant was but it was on top of a famous hotel in Tainan.
Also, this isn’t food, but after the mission trip I got to take a boat out to see the sunset at the Fisherman’s Wharf in the Danshui district of New Taipei City (what a mouthful)! Here are some of my favorite shots:
