I showed up at Qiu Jia Xiao Juan Mi Fen about ten minutes after it opened, and the place was already packed. Suffice it to say, the place is quite popular; always a good sign.
I think there might have been other stuff on the menu, but this place is known for one particular dish, and that’s what everyone was eating: squid noodles.
There’s something in Taiwan called coffin bread, and it’s essentially clam chowder inside of a crispy, deep-fried piece of bread.
I think it’s pretty obvious that it’s tasty. I mean, you do the math.
The beef soup from Ah Cun might just be the simplest dish I’ve eaten since coming to Taiwan. It’s basically just chunks of beef in a simple broth.
It’s proof that if your ingredients and your technique are top-notch, then you really don’t need to overthink things. Simpler is better.
Yes, there are several bakeries and ice cream shops in Taichung, but if you want a classic, old-school Taiwanese dessert, you need to check out Uncle A-Dou’s Frozen Taro.
There’s a specific type of meatball that’s unique to Taichung, and if you’re here, you really need to try it.
Keelung is a small, seaside town that’s a very quick train ride from Taipei, which makes it an effortless day-trip destination. And that’s a good thing, because the night market here is definitely worth visiting.
Apparently noodles for breakfast is very conclusively a thing here, because I had noodle soup for breakfast the other day, and now here’s another plate of tasty pre-9AM noodles.
Funnily enough, one of the best things I’ve eaten in Bangkok isn’t Thai at all — it’s Chinese, from a Michelin-rated restaurant in Bangkok’s Chinatown called Nai-Ek Roll Noodles.
Obviously I wasn’t going to leave Vietnam without having pho. I’m not a crazy person.
I didn’t know this before getting here, but there are actually two types of pho: there’s the beef version, called pho bo. That’s the one that we’re more familiar with back home. There’s also a chicken version called pho ga.
I tried both, of course. Again, I’m not a crazy person.
When I sat down to eat fish noodle soup (a Vietnamese dish called bun ca) at around eleven in the morning, I started to wonder: is this a mistake? Maybe eating a potentially very pungent fishy soup for breakfast isn’t a great idea?