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Taiwan Instagrammable Food: Social Place, Taipei

Social Place Zhongxiao Dunhua Taipei Taiwan

Pear-shaped dumpling with crab meat from Social Place Taiwan

Dim sum platter from Social Place Taipei

Pink steamed rice roll with shrimp from Social Place Taipei

Steamed rose floret bun from Social Place Taipei

Charcoal custard buns from Social Place Taipei

Mahjong coconut pudding from Social Place Taipei

Whenever I hear of the words “dim sum”, I would often think of going to Hong Kong because that’s the country which will immediately pop out to your mind when you think of Cantonese cuisine, right? Furthermore, dim sum restaurants in Hong Kong always manage to elevate the beauty of the favourite dim sum items such as Chinese bun and dumplings to be even more beautiful on platter. However, it seems that now you can enjoy similar dim sum experience in Taipei at 唐點小聚 Social Place.

Social Place offers instagrammable dim sum on plates and this is the reason of why I’m including it in my list of Taiwan instagrammable food (which I will conquer when I have the chance to revisit Taiwan). The dim sum restaurant is located within walking distance from Zhongxiao Dunhua MRT station. Its FB page show English translation of its menu (woohoo) for the benefit of those of us who can’t read traditional Chinese characters on the menu. It opens daily from 11AM to 10PM. Based on @wennick’s insta post, Social Place seems to be decorated in Tiffany & Co’s color and this would elevate your instagram game to the next level. After all those kind of blue-green-ish does not come often in the restaurant setting.

Let’s talk about the pretty dim sum items, shall we? First, they have Pear-shaped Dumpling with Crab Meat (138 NTD) which I thought was dessert item. Looks can be deceiving after all. I would definitely order this because they are so pretty. If you are not sure on what to order, it seems safe to go for the dim sum platter (238 NTD) and @yen.food.life’s platter looks so interesting, it even has heart-shaped something. The charcoal custard buns (138 NTD) are another must-order item since it comes in black color with gold dust sprinkled on top of it. Custard buns have become exceptionally luxe.

Have you ever thought that your rice roll (zhang fen) can come in color other than white? Nope, me neither. But Social Place manages to pull Steamed Rice Roll with Shrimp (138 NTD) off and serve it in pink which I suspect is beetroot’s color (and hopefully not chemically induced coloring). Next item which I would like to order is definitely the Steamed Rose Floret Bun (58 NTD) because well, rose-shaped ice cream is so last season, right? I wonder what’s the filling for the rose bun though. Hmm.

Social Place does serve other normal items (but less instagrammable) in their menu like rice, noodles, congee, chicken, etc. You can try them out but don’t forget to check out their dessert department because it’s not everyday you can eat your mahjong tiles. Yes, you read them correctly, Social Place includes the mahjong tiles (108 NTD) in their menu. Don’t worry, they are actually coconut pudding so your teeth won’t break from eating them.

Ahh, just talking about the food makes me want to go there and try them out myself. Hope they are as nice as they look on menu and instagram.

Credits: @jjeanllin, @shannonliu, @zoelin090, @yen.food.life, @rabin1030, @wennick, @akumatw, @fanialin

Taiwan Instagrammable Food: Cool colorful shaved ice from Simple Table

Green tea shaved ice from Simple Table, Taipei

Passionfruit, strawberry and green tea shaved ice from Simple Table

Chilled drink from Simple Table at Songshan Taipei

I have been reading news and it seems that the summer heat is really at its peak at many countries. Japan has reached 41 degrees while Taiwan follows suit at 39.9 degrees today. I am thankful that the everyday-summer in Singapore is still mild at 32 degrees especially if you compare to the region of Japan, Taiwan, South Korea and Hong Kong. However, the heat does not kill these countries from serving something that can help the heat. Today we’re going to look at one of the classic dish to fight the heat, shaved ice.

In Japan that would be called kakigori but in Taiwan, I think it’s simply called fruit/flavor + bing (means ice). Simple Table is located near Songshan MRT station. So if you want to go to Raohe Night Market but you reach Songshan too early, you can hang out at Simple Table while finding shelter from the hot summer sun. 39.9 degrees is inhumane for me who easily melts in Singapore. But then again, what does Simple Table sell?

Simple Table sells something simple just as its name referring to, shaved ice in many flavour and color. From insta, it seems that the most favourite items from Simple Table is its shaved ice, in particular the green tea cream shaved ice. Wah it really looks beautifully cooling, I will definitely take a lot of picture of it before I have to quickly enjoy it, since it’s ice and it’s so gonna melt if you take too long taking its pictures. Oh right, do you know how much does it cost? 50NTD my goodness. I don’t think I can get any shaved ice with that kind of price in Singapore.

Other flavours are as pretty as the green tea shaved ice. For instance, it seems that there’s passion fruit and strawberry shaved ice too. Some insta users also uploaded picture of soft-served ice cream. Yumz. Simple Table also sells chilled drink which I guess can be milk tea, coffee, or soya milk. Now I am imagining myself eating shaved ice in my room while cooling myself off with fan (electric is expensive in Singapore, sadz). You can check out Simple Table’s facebook page (although they are in traditional Chinese). It seems that they also provide cream cake wow. One slice of the cake costs around NTD 880 but it looks so pretty. Mango cake, I think. Aww I love Taiwanese mangoes so much.

Simple Table opens everyday from 11AM to 7PM and from the Google Map, it seems that you just to go right along Civic Boulevard section 6 from Songshan Station. Hope they are as nice as they look. Cheers~

Credits: @yoho_matcha, @joshinyang, @eden_0522, @nalinsaw, @redbean.h

"Been standing in the corner, studying the lights.

The dreaming of escape will keep you up at night."

The dreaming of escape, huh? I can totally feel it running in my veins. The dream has been so strong recently up to the point that I just feel like do it. You know? JUST DO IT. That kind of Nike's feeling. But then again, there is no point in rushing up certain things and some decisions are not to be taken so lightly without talking to God. So let me ponder upon this "escape-plan" again over the weekend.

Should I escape to Taiwan again? At least if I decide to escape to Taipei, I will be able to eat the super yummy teppanyaki at Chamonix in Zhongshan.

10D9N Taiwan Trip: Chamonix Teppanyaki, Taipei

Teppanyaki is quite popular in Taiwan and you can literally find teppanyaki at every corner of the city. When I visited my aunt the last time before I finished my study in Taipei, she brought me to a neighbourhood teppanyaki restaurant which is just a hole-in-the-wall kind of restaurant but it was so good. This time around actually my travel buddy and I did not put any plan to eat at teppanyaki restaurant because we did not have enough time to do research on where to eat nice teppanyaki. But my colleague happened to tell me about this supposedly-nice-teppanyaki named Chamonix. First time hearing about it and hence, have some doubts about the review. However, my colleague has sworn on it and reservation has proven to be difficult so here we are at Chamonix's entrance trying our luck to dine in without reservation.

Entrance to Chamonix Teppanyaki Taipei Taiwan

Thankfully there is seating area which is specifically reserved for those diners without reservation. We gleefully took our seats at the corner and eagerly anticipated what the chef is about to cook.

Teppanyaki Courses at Chamonix Teppanyaki in Taiwan

The first food that the chef cooked was the prawns. Did you see how juicy and big the prawns are? We literally drooled when we see the chef cooking the prawns.

Cooking prawns at Chamonix Teppanyaki Taiwan

The prawn is served as part of the warm appetiser, together with the mini chawanmushi.

Warm appetiser from Chamonix Teppanyaki Taiwan

Complimentary bread and sauces are also given to each customer so hungry customer will not give the chef deadly stares while he's busy cooking the next course. Kidding, but that does make sense, right?

Complimentary bread and sauce from Chamonix Teppanyaki Taiwan

The next course raised a bit of question in my mind but thankfully my travelling buddy told me that the finishing touch was not yet added to this course.

Inside seafood bisque from Chamonix Teppanyaki

The diners are supposed to see the inside of the seafood bisque before the chef pour the soup over it. Ahh, suddenly I feel kinda embarrassed for not knowing this table manner. Oops.

Seafood bisque from Chamonix Teppanyaki Taiwan

The next course was one of my favourite, the truffle and mushroom salad. It was definitely more interesting than the usual garden salad although there are no greens involved in this dish.

Truffle and mushroom salad from Chamonix Teppanyaki

For the main course, I chose the grilled short ribs because it has been a while since the last time I ate steak. You would have thought that each person only have this amount of steak to eat but you guess wrongly. Apparently the chef will put additional serving to our plate after we made a mess of the first serving while munching. Oh wow. I'm really a happy girl full of steak.

Short ribs from Chamonix Teppanyaki Taiwan

The carb for the day is ebi fried rice which taste so good but at this point of the meal, my tummy was already bulging. This was the last course before dessert thankfully. After we had polished the plate, we were ushered to another seating area to enjoy our dessert and coffee.

Garlic fried rice from teppanyaki set at Chamonix Taipei

For dessert, each of us opted for different kind of dessert so that we could try at least two kind of desserts served in Chamonix Teppanyaki. My choice was the apple cake served with vanilla ice cream.

Vanilla ice cream with apple cake from Chamonix Taipei

While my travel buddy's choice is chocolate ball served with vanilla sauce. The chocolate taste a bit weird not in the negative sense though. It's just...I don't know how to explain the taste of the chocolate really. It tastes different from the normal chocolate. Hmm.

This was my first time trying tiramisu iced coffee and I feel that I really need to burn my calorie off after completing my meal with this sweet and bitter explosion in my mouth. Coffee goes well with tiramisu powder I suppose. The whole teppanyaki course costs us around SGD 50 per person but it was so worth it. At least, when you compare to teppanyaki sold in SG. Hehe.

Chamonix Teppanyaki is located at:

B1F, No. 44, Sec. 2 Zhongshan North Road

Zhongshan District

Taipei, Taiwan

Menu in English is available on Chamonix's website:

http://www.chamonix.com.tw/en/menu.aspx

"Under this pressure, under this weight, we are diamonds taking shape."

Oh man, the last time I was having this strong urge to throw in the towel without concrete future plan was...hmm, let me see...oh wow, exactly 8 years ago. Everybody says that you are supposed to know what you want and find where you belong by the time you hit certain age but turns out I'm going back to the start. Am I in some kind of The Scientist's music video? Uh oh.

Not really sure how to solve this situation since the solution will not come within a day to be honest with you. I guess I'll just update this blog to finish my soon-to-be-completed Taiwan travelogue. Hehe.

Whenever I visit Yongkang Street, I dunno why but I always ended up eating at Kao Chi. Probably because there is always a super long queue in front of the original restaurant of Din Tai Fung. Kao Chi seems to be the closest alternative in the vicinity and I do suspect they get customers via this manner so they should not really complain to Din Tai Fung. I won't even be surprised if they turn out to be owned by same owner.

10D9N Taiwan Trip: Kao Chi, Yongkang Street

Guess what, Kao Chi sells xiao long bao too and its xiao long bao is not that inferior to Din Tai Fung. Maybe every restaurants in Taiwan sell good xiao long bao? Hahaha. Kao Chi also have other dishes than xiao long bao like lotus pastry, veggie dumpling, char siew pastry, etc. They all seem good but we were kinda full from our visit to steamboat restaurant in Taipei.

Xiao long bao from Kao Chi at Yongkang Street Taipei

And after eating many meats and fried stuff for the past few days, we finally miss having some greens in our diet. This is a miracle because I am not particularly a green-eater. We were initially planning to order dou miao but the server informed us that that veggie has been sold out. She recommended us for another type of veggie which we totally forgot its Chinese name but it comes out like this. Well, name does not really matter when the food taste good. If you want to order this, I suppose you can just show the picture to the server and they will find out for you. Hahaha.

Green veggie from Kao Chi at Yongkang Street Taipei

The steamboat that we just had was really filling and yet it's amazing that the two of us still had the capacity to share a bowl of dan dan noodle. Dan Dan Noodle is a noodle served with peanut sauce. I quite enjoy the different taste of this noodle and I have only tasted similar noodle at Din Tai Fung. This one does not fare that bad either.

Dan Dan Mian from Kao Chi at Yongkang Street Taipei

Oh right, what steamboat that I was referring to? My Taiwanese friend brought me and my travelling buddy to a steamboat restaurant in Zhongxiao Fuxing area. I was totally clueless on what and how to order so I left all the ordering to him after giving him one special instruction.

My special instruction is to help me order BEEF because I've been missing out Taiwanese beef steamboat. Funny thing is, all of us ended up ordering the same. Haiz, I forgot the name of the restaurant and my Taiwanese friend is totally ignoring me right now. Sadz.

Beef steamboat at Zhongxiao Fuxing in Taipei Taiwan

Kao Chi is located at:

No. 1 Yongkang Street,

Taipei

Opening hours:

Monday to Friday 9.30AM - 10.30PM

Saturday and Sunday 8.30AM - 10.30PM

"240 thousand miles from the moon, we've come a long way to belong here."

It is not easy to find a place which we can get attached to but somehow, I do find some lingering attachment to the city of Taipei. It's probably running in the blood since my dad was actually Taiwanese before he changed his citizenship to Indonesia due to work. Kinda wondering why he did not decide to stay in Taiwan instead but if that's the case, I would probably not be around now. Guess all things happened for a reason.

While waiting for my friend to finish his audit work on Saturday (working as auditor is hard no matter where you are including in Taipei), my travel buddy and I were looking for a cafe to chill out and I happily suggested Rilakkuma Cafe because themed cafe is always fun to visit with a girl friend.

10D9N Taiwan Trip: Rilakkuma Cafe, Taipei

This would serve as guarantee too just in case my future hubby dislike all things related to cute character and hence he will not want to accompany me to do this kind of stuff. Okay, to be honest I was not really such a fan of Rilakkuma either but this kind of themed cafe is unique and popular in Taipei so it would not harm to visit Rilakkuma Cafe at least once in our lifetime.

Rilakkuma Cafe at Zhongxiao Dunhua Taipei

Everything in a themed cafe features the themed character and since this time, we visited Rilakkuma's HQ in a way, his face is plastered everywhere including the menu.

There are both savoury and sweet dishes to cater all kind of different taste buds. If only we came with an empty stomach, I would have chosen to order Rilakkuma sleeping under the omelette. So cute, really!

Savoury dishes from Rilakkuma Cafe at Taipei

Desserts are mostly tarts and cupcakes. I am never a fan of cupcakes so we just zoomed in on the selection of tarts instead.

Sweet dishes from Rilakkuma Cafe in Taipei

Once we have placed our order, it's time to look around. There are many Rilakkuma cushion scattered all around the sofas so chances are you will have these cushions to take picture with.

Inside Rilakkuma Cafe in Zhongxiao Dunhua Taipei

You may also want to check out those goodies sold near the counter. Who knows the cafe sells limited edition stuff?

Merchandise store at Rilakkuma Cafe in Taipei Taiwan

If you order the egg pudding, you can bring home the container too. Cute, eh? I was seriously nearly tempted to buy this but then again, my travel buddy reminded me that my luggage was already at 98% capacity.

Milk pudding from Rilakkuma Cafe at Taipei Taiwan

Cutleries and cups/ plates/ bowls are available too but since I am not even living at my own home, all these things are deemed unnecessary for now. Haiz.

Cups and plates from Rilakkuma Cafe in Taipei

Rilakkuma Cafe is located at:

No. 3, Lane 248, Section 4 Zhongxiao East Road

Daan District

Taipei, Taiwan

Opening hours:

Monday to Friday - 11.30AM to 9PM

Saturday and Sunday - 11.30AM to 9.30PM

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Wandering Fel

Taiwan Instagrammable Food: Egghost Dessert, Taipei

Taiwan Instagrammable Food: 唐點小聚 Social Place, Taipei

Taiwan Instagrammable Food: Cool colorful shaved ice from Simple Table, Taipei

Taiwan food: Totoro shaped pancake, Shilin Night Market

10D9N Taiwan Trip: Chamonix Teppanyaki, Taipei

10D9N Taiwan Trip: Kao Chi Restaurant, Yongkang Street

10D9N Taiwan Trip: Rilakkuma Cafe, Taipei Part 1