Taiwan Eats: Tamsui Old Street

Whenever I hear a place being referred to as "old street" in Taiwan, I can't help thinking about food. Because there will be a lot of good food found in the midst of the old street. And it's not different here, at Tamsui Old Street. Nom! Eh, I mean Jump!

If we are going by the rule "join the queue"...oh heck, I'm gonna join the queue simply because I'm curious. Hahaha.

Turns out it's gyoza-look-alike stall. Haha. Taste-wise? So-so I suppose. Time to move to next food. 

Another long queue spotted, just few metres away from the fried gyoza stall. O_o!

I saw this on TV but they sell the sponge cake in a big box. I gave it a pass cause I live alone but they look really good actually. If you have a lot of mouths to share, you can give it a try. Hehe.

Along the old street, you will see a lot of black eggs. These are called iron eggs (鐵蛋/ tiědàn). The eggs were cooked and recooked in soy sauce broth. When they are eventually air-dried, the eggs become dark and flavorful. These are famous snacks sold in Tamsui (and Taiwan in general I suppose). 

Old street really gives out a "fun" vibe especially with a lot of stuff to eat and buy. So happy there are still a lot of old streets in Taiwan. =)

Taipei Eats: Tu Hsiao Yueh Tainan Noodle, Yongkang Street

I miss Taiwan's food!!!! *cry*

But since there's no budget to go to Taiwan this year, I will just...go into nostalgia mode and blog about it. U_U.

Have you had Tainan noodle before? If not, you can try it at Tu Hsiao Yueh restaurant along Yongkang Street.

When we came in, there's a staff busy cooking noodle in front of the restaurant. I suppose he also serves as an advertisement? =P

The kind of noodles used here. 

The menu has English translation. I suppose this makes ordering easier for foreigner. Do note that there is a minimum order of NTD100 imposed here. 

The portion is kinda small though. U_U.

Other than the noodle, we also tried their fried prawn fritters. Taste average. 

After trying out Tainan noodle, I still prefer Indonesian's chicken noodle. =P

Broken picture links

I haven't been posting a lot here because I'm busy restoring the broken picture links. Haizzz.

I don't know why most of the picture links are broken and it is deeply frustrating because I don't really have enough time within a day to repair the links. So yeah, it's gonna take a few days to restore all the links in my old blog posts. *cry*

I'll post the repaired blog post in my Instagram account: feliz_w at the moment but since it's a lot, I suppose my IG posts gonna be kinda..full of #throwback. Haha.

Sorry about it guys, will try to repair them as soon as possible. Xie xie!! =)

Taipei Eats: Egyption Dali Kebab, Gongguan

If you are wondering if you read the title right, yes, your eyes are still working properly. You can eat kebab in Taipei. Really.

When I was a student in Taipei, my daily activities involved evening stroll to either Shida Night Market, Gongguan, Ximending or Taipei Main Station. During those strolls to Gongguan, I always spotted this particular stall. Which just located along the pedestrian road (the left side if you are walking from Taipower Building MRT Station).

Ordering is easy cause they only have 2 types: Small one or big one. If you want to add cheese, you need to pay extra 10 dollars. But the cheese will make the kebab taste yummier. =)

Yum. Meat. Hmm, wait, now I started to wonder, what kind of meat is that? I should have asked the ladyboss last time what kind of meat do they use. XD

Singapore Cafe: De'Pop Culture, Bugis

It is not easy to arrange for a catch up time with a close ex-colleague. So when we managed to squeeze one weekend, we made sure that we were going to try something new. Initially, we planned to go to Symmetry, a hip cafe alongside Jalan Kubor but to our dismay, the waiting time is just so..long. =(

Then, our random walk led us to another cafe, which looks kinda catchy from outside, De'Pop Culture.

The cafe is bright inside with those art pop collections hanged on the wall. Quite quirky I must say. 

Since it was scorching hot outside, we ordered a soda drink. Berry and Passionfruit they are.

Egg benedict is always my one ultimate choice whenever I go to places that serve brunch. Hehe. This one is at cheaper side (S$13ish) since nowadays most places sell this dish at S$20-ish. Sad me. 

My companion had a quite big breakfast before coming so she wanted to eat something sweet instead for lunch. That caramelized banana walnut waffles is really tantalizing. I ended up eating a quarter of it. #fatme

For more details, you can visit their Facebook page here.

Singapore Eats: Three Cups Coffee Co, One Raffles Place

Every weekday lunch time, Raffles Place becomes a warzone of finding a place to eat. R, my friend who is working in neighbouring City Hall, got a shock when she reached Raffles Place. Decided to avoid those places with long queues, we ended up having lunch at a cafe-ish kind of place, Three Cups Coffee Co.

Other than coffees, Three Cups Coffee serves all-day breakfast and sandwiches. I ordered THREE's a company, which has herb roasted chicken, egg mayo, bacon, tomato, and lettuces (S$9.50). 

R had Reuben Rosemary Beef (S$9.50), which as you can see, is full of roasted beef. I prefer my sandwich. XD

We did not order drinks because we have run out of our lunch money for the sandwiches. I guess, we will come back next time if we feel like hanging out over a cup of coffee since the place is kinda cozy. 

For more info about Three Cups Coffee, you can visit their Facebook page here.

Singapore Cafe: Chye Seng Huat Hardware Coffee Bar, Tyrwhitt Road

While a lot of my friends are coffee-lovers, I somewhat belongs to those sissy-coffee-lovers. I don't even really enjoy latte unless it's hazelnut/toffee/caramel/mocha latte which I guess, not really coffee coffee. I love frappe though. Does it count? XD

But I always give a green light whenever my friends ask me to go chilling out at a cafe. So here we come, CCSH!

To be honest with you, when my friend told me about this cafe, I thought she asked me to go into a hardware store. But no, it's a nice-looking cafe which is always crowded on weekend afternoon, apparently. 

But there are no sissy coffee(s) here so I brave myself to order a Cold Brew mix and it comes like this. My friend helped me mix according to my taste 'cause I was completely clueless about coffee-mix-creation. XD

I guess ordering a cup of latte makes your life simpler since they do everything and what you need to do is just drink. Hahaha.

Chye Seng Huat sells food too, kinda brunch type of food. I ordered ham omelette. Not bad. 

My friend ordered salmon sandwich which comes with chips. I had a bite at it and I guess it's quite ok. 

And of course, we had to order a dessert. Hello, creme brulee! <3

CCSH is located kinda out of the way, around Jalan Besar area. For more details, please refer to map below. 

Singapore Cafe: MU Parlour, Holland Village

Food post in Singapore! Hao jiu bu jian! Really long time no see. =P

Since Holland V is kinda famous as one of the cafe hotspots in Singapore (they are popping everywhere, no kidding!), today we are going to hang out at one of the cafes here, MU Parlour.

As you can see above, MU Parlour is located diagonally across Haagen Daaz and it's located at level 2 and 3. 

We came around 5.30ish on Saturday afternoon and the place is not crowded yet. Love it. *hate crowd*

Bored waiting for food. So taking picture of sugar cubes. 

MU Parlour sells a gourmet-variety of burgers. The one here comes with black buns. Choose the fillings that come with Monterey Jack and bacon. Bacon~~~

It was already dark outside when we ordered dessert. And hence, the lighting changed. Hehe. The chocolate cake is so-so but nothing goes very wrong with thick gooey chocolate layers. Nom. 

The nearest MRT to MU Parlour is Holland Village MRT. The cafe is located just opposite the hawker centre in the middle of Holland Village. 

Hong Kong Eats: Canton Deli, Harbour City

After reading a lot of blog post about Canton Deli, of course we had to visit the restaurant while we are wandering in Harbour City, a big shopping mall at Tsim Sha Tsui. When we reached the restaurant, it was only 5.30 in the evening but it was already half full. O_O!

We ordered a few dishes to share amongst two of us. First one is the black pepper beef. 

And some kind of omelette? Chinese version of veggie + omelette. Hahaha.

Canton Deli also serves some dimsum. We tried out their shrimp dumpling (har gaw). 

And the baked roasted pork pastries. 

The food at Canton Deli is not bad but I would not say they are that fantastic either. If you run out of option on what to eat at Harbour City I suppose you can always try this out. But if you are more adventurous and willing to go to a lot of other places, I think you can skip this one out. =P

For more details on Canton Deli, you can visit this link.

What to eat in Jiufen, Taiwan? - Part 2

Our eating journey continued! Even though the Old Street is not that big, you can simply find a lot of things to eat by looking at your right and left side. No kidding.

Before realising, we have already joined the queue for the...

1. Peanut and Ice Cream Wrap

When I took the picture, the aunty had not put the ice cream yet. Oh well you get the idea. Put a wrap, throw some peanuts and two scoops of ice cream and roll them together. The aunty will usually ask if you want to add the scallion. Yes, you heard it right. So if the aunty say "Nǐ yào cōng ma?"/ "你要蔥嗎?", don't say "yào" if you don't like it. Hahaha.

Ta-daa!! The end product. =P

I don't think you can miss this store because it is forever long queue. But I managed to take a shot of the store sign, just in case.

We were still halfway eating our wrap, when we spot another queue line for..

2. Green Glutinous Rice Cake

Since the rice cakes all colored in swamp-green, you need to read the characters to understand the filling for each rice cakes. To give you the general idea, I give you the easiest ones to read:

- Peanut (花生/ Huāshēng)

- Red Bean (紅豆/ Hóngdòu)

- Green Bean (綠豆/ Lǜdòu)

- Sesame (芝麻/ Zhīma)

- Veggie (蔬菜/ Shūcài)

I tried the peanut, green bean and veggie. And surprise surprise, I like the veggie one the most. 

Oh my goodness, Taiwan is really a food heaven. At least to me. Hahaha. 

What to eat in Jiufen, Taiwan? - Part 1

If you are wondering what to eat in Jiufen, well, the easiest answer is to have a taste at whatever being sold here (since you have made an effort to come here and all). =P

To help you started, here are a few food that you may want to try in Jiufen:

1. Taro rice balls

You can either have it hot or cold (served with ice) and both taste yum! The hot one is perfect for cold weather. ^^

2. Grilled sausages

One stick at NTD30 so why not? Hehe.

3. Mochi

These mochi(s) have ice cream fillings with various flavor like strawberry, peach, mango, etc. But you must eat them on the spot. 

If you want to buy the packaged ones, you can buy another type of mochi but do note that the expiration date is usually pretty short (around one month). They have branch in Taipei Main Station. They sell other things like pineapple tarts too.

Are you full? But we are not exactly done yet. Get ready for part 2! =)