On to Part 2 of my spring Taiwan trip!
March 26th: This day was actually pretty cold and our trip to the National Palace Museum. I had been before back in 2018, but my sister wanted to go again, and we figured it’d be a good experience for my boyfriend to see.
I had the hotel breakfast buffet again, and did take a picture.
We took a bus (and then a taxi after missing our connecting bus) to the museum, since it’s pretty far out from central Taipei, and ended up arriving around 11. We saw most of the exhibits, including the famous jade bok choy and meat stone (that I had seen before and had gotten pictures of in 2018 too, ha!), before getting pretty hungry around 2.
We decided to eat at the restaurant on the fourth floor of the restaurant, which mainly offered set meals and dim sum. Of course we all got the beef noodle soup (first one in Taiwan this trip actually!). My dad and my boyfriend got the wagyu beef noodle soup, and my mom, sister and I just got the braised one since it was supposed to be less spicy.
It was a decent beef noodle soup to start off with. The soup was actually quite good and not too spicy (aside from the oil floating in the soup, which is great for my spice tolerance), and I really liked how the carrots were soft and soaked up the flavor. Having some veggies with the bok choy too was good too, and the sides were pretty good, though at times the wood ear and lotus root were a bit too vinegar-y for my taste. The problem I had though was with the noodles, as they were defintiely cooked, but were stiff and almost a bit too al dente.
We had one more section to see before we left, and after that, headed back to the hotel because it was already 4pm. I was going to try to make a stop and get boba, but since our dinner reservation was at 6, I decided to try for after dinner instead.
Dinner was going to be hot pot at Top One Pot, a pretty big and fancy hot pot chain in Taiwan. I wanted to get hot pot at least once this time around, since Chinese-style hot pot is quite different than Japanese shabu-shabu, and my boyfriend was craving fish balls, something oddly rare at Japanese hot pot places.
Everything was very yum, and some things were definitely a new experience, including making your own fresh shrimp paste balls, meat on a rack, and a lychee slushie in the middle of the meal to cleanse your palate.
For post-dinner boba, we headed to Truedan down the street! Read about my boba here!
My dad and my boyfriend like drinking, so to end the night off they went to the hotel bar to get some drinks. Even though I went with them, I don’t drink alcohol, and so browsing the soft drinks, I wanted to try this fruity yogurt drink. Apparently they were sold out of that, so I went the non-caffeinated longan flower tea at the server’s recommendation.
Once cooled down enough, it was actually quite a yummy tea, and reminded of a mellower chrysanthemum tea. A bit floral, a bit sweet, and aromatic, I’d definitely get it again if I saw it somewhere.
March 27th: This day was by far the most exhausting, despite not even walking that much. We were going to go on a roadtrip and sightsee Northern Taiwan, and end off the day at Jiufen (that Spirited Away town that supposedly Miyazaki didn’t take inspiration from). I really had no idea what the plan was, and it turns out, no one else did except our driver.
I started the day off with more hotel breakfast, and we were off on our roadtrip at 9:30m starting with a 1.5 hour trip to Fugui Cape, where the Northernmost point of Taiwan is.
Then, we visited this famous stone arch, Shimen. The beach was pretty, I guess.
We visited a foot bath, which was also nice, I guess, but not that revolutionary in the middle of nowhere. Apparently the water came from the bottom of the ocean. It was very nice of our driver to bring towels for us though.
We had a late-ish lunch at a seafood restaurant in the area. I can’t tell you the name of where it was, but it was in an area with lots of other seafood restaurants. My mom picked out live items from tanks outside (no prices listed), and then they cooked them. I was excited for the crab, but it was tiny with almost no meat. The best thing was probably the seaweed appetizer, and the grilled abalone. I forgot to take pictures.
Then we headed to Queen’s head rock, which is a rock eroded over time that from a certain angle looks like a Queen’s head. It was smaller than I thought it would be, and the gift shop was sad. The “gift shop” ouside was basically just a freestyle, vendor market.
After that, we went to Shifen, famous for setting off lanterns. We bought an 8-colored lantern, wrote our wishes in accordance to each color, and had a guy help us set it off. That was fun and super cringe at the same time, becuase he made us pose so much, but I respect their hustle to get the tourists. I wished for more money, because I was assigned the yellow side.
Finally, at 7pm, 2 hours after our expected end time, we arrived at Jiufen. Timing-wise, I suppose it works out because when you’re in Jiufen, it’s all about the street food and souvenir shopping, so it was about time to eat. We basically walked along the main walking path from the beginning to end, and just picking out what we were interested in. Not shown are a cup of fried squid that my dad bought for the family, a couple skewers of Taiwanese sausage, and a couple wheel cakes.
New this time around that I didn’t get during my Golden Week trip last year was the fried squid (there’s quite a few stands selling fried foods), taro mochi, and the stinky tofu. There was quite a smell from far away, but otherwise the actual stand and tofu wasn’t too smelly. Tofu was quite interesting, since I’ve only ever had it fried, but tasted good and it came with a thick sweet-ish sauce and pickled cabbage. I got mine not spicy . I also like squid, fried stuff, and fried squid, so obviously that was good too. The taro mochi is actually from the grass mochi stand I went to last year. I got it this year because I low-key regretted not getting it last year since the grass one was pretty good, but completely didn’t expect the taro one to be kind of savory? Unlike the grass one which has sweet flavors, the taro one has a layer of salty mochi, with some taro chunks integrated into it. Wasn’t the biggest fan, but now, hey, I know. Fishball soup was as good as it was last year, and my boyfriend wanted to try the fish paste stuffed tofu. That was a bit of a challenge to eat with a tiny spoon and giant stuffed tofu, and we found that there was actually ground meat inside too. My entire family loved the potato balls.
Technically the boba was new too, but that’s over on my other blog. Read about my boba here!
We left a bit before 8, and arrived back at our hotel at 9 after a long day. The Jiufen food wasn’t exactly a proper dinner for anyone, so my dad went out and bought take-out wonton soup and zhajiangmian from a local restaurant [no picture, oops]. The wontons were huge and very porky with a refreshing light brothy soup, and the noodles were slightly spicy in a very savory sauce with some sliced vegetables. Chinese zhajiangmian really hits different, and I wish I had more on the trip.
I feel the spots were cool and all, but it was a lot packed into a day with a lot of sitting in the car. There were apparently supposed to be more picture spots.
March 28th: This was basically an empty day aside from a dinner reservation at 6 in the evening, and my dad said aside from going to Yongkang street (with lots of yummy food!), the planning was up to me. Time to hit up all the best spots in the area and eat! (This is what happens if you let me plan.)
We started the day off as usual with hotel breakfast, and my dad went out to buy some baozi for my sister at the pretty famous baozi place down the street. I went with him, my sister didn’t end up eating any, so I ate one. It was yummy, had a lot of cabbage, but small, so if you want to eat it for a meal, you should either have a small stomach, get a second one, or eat something else with it. What’s interesting is that there’s another baozi cart right around the corner, but it’s by the sister-in-law of this place. Wild.
We headed out for Yongkang around 10:30 because we wanted to grab Yonkang Beef Noodle Soup for lunch, which some may argue is the best (I do think it’s pretty good), and they open at 11, so we wnted to hopefully avoid a line. Luckily, there were only a few people in line ahead of us (there was a ton already inside!), but we were seated upstairs, where there weren’t too many people. We all got a small bowl of beef noodle soup, and I tried asking for less spicy.
Right after a hot bowl of beef noodle soup comes a cold bowl of Mango Shaved Ice. We headed across the street to Smoothie House for the famous Mango Shaved Ice, and surprisingly, there wasn’t much of a line! For 5 people, we ordered 2. We had to get the mango ice, but we ordered one that had strawberry for my sister, and one that had boba for my mom.
It was as fluffy and refreshing as I remember it, and perfect on a hot day. There’s always room for dessert! Because there was boba, I included it in on my boba blog. Read about it here!
Yongkang street not only had good food, but there’s a ton of shopping to do there too. Throughout the day, we popped into a few cute art stores, an umbrella store, and a clothing store.
Unfortunately, the really good soy milk shop with soy milk ice cream, Soypresso, has sadly since gone out of business. There were actually two branches on Yongkang street, but Google said only one was “temporarily closed” (though in reality it looked pretty much desserted to me). We tried going to the other location, but that one looked like it was in the middle of being torn down. There was a sign pasted on the outside, that said it had closed as of a couple days ago. I was sad I missed it one last time, but nothing I could do about it.
I had two more things to do on Yongkang street before I was done there. First, was get Tian Jin Green Onion Pancakes. I don’t really do the added stuff, so I got a plain. My dad ended up putting soy sauce on it though.
What can I say? It’s as good as ever, flaky, and hot and fresh off the grill. The soy sauce adds a bit of savoriness, though I do think I’d prefer it without.
Last thing to check off for the day was a drink from the area. There’s a ton of boba shops on the street, but the one we wanted to try out was Soma Tea and Mocktail, which actually opened a location in my hometown. I was excited to finally try an original location in Taiwan, only to be met by an unexpected surprise…Read about that here (yes, it’s the same post as the shaved ice).
We headed back to our hotel to chill for the rest of the afternoon before heading out for dinner. My boyfriend needed a haircut, so we took the empty time to find a not-too-expensive haircut place in the area that was actually just down the street. It was a salon with 2 stylists, and the person we got was very meticulous and detailed about the cut, and for a pretty good deal too.
Our dinner reservation was at 6, so we headed out around 5:30 to catch a bus to Sung Kitchen. If Taoran Ting is an older restaurant famous for Peking Duck, then Sung Kitchen is a newer restaurant famous for Peking Duck, if that makes any sense. Duck was really good (my dad thinks they cut it better here), with fancy green onion (I don’t eat it anyway), and what looks like handmade pancakes. Handmade definitely hits different, but also harder to roll up.
We were pretty full from dinner so getting actual boba for the day was a bit of a mental conundrum (at least, for my mom and I, ha!), but right next door to the restaurant was a Cremia shop. Now, Cremia is a relatively famous soft serve brand in Japan (or at least it was when I first visited, nowadays it’s a bit less so?), but alsos supposed to come from Hokkaido. There’s the original flavor, and I recently discovered a chocolate variation when I first arrived in Hokkaido, but I’ve never seen a matcha before. Even the Cremia website only lists the original and chocolate (along with what shops offer it), but I’ve seen Cremia shops in Taiwan, which are pretty commonly seen around Taipei (including Taipei 101), have both matcha and strawberry. I was going to pass it up, but my dad insisted we try, so I got a matcha one, and my mom an original. She was obsessed with cremia the first time we visited Japan.
It was really good! As creamy as I remember Cremia being, with just the right amount of matcha flavor in the ice cream and the cone. The bad thing though is if you don’t eat it quickly enough the whole thing starts to melt and also disintegrate the cookie cone. Still very yummy though. If I go back, I’d like to try the strawberry.
I was initially thinking about hitting up my first night market of the trip to Raohe since it’s realtively close by, but I was fuller than expected, so I decided to put it off to the next day. Instead, we headed back to the hotel, and my dad and boyfriend went to check out the cat themed bar near our AirBnB. The outside is a giant cat face, you enter through a cat door, and there’s a resident cat inside that comes and goes as it pleases. The drinks all come with a cat ornament on the glass too! They drank quite a few drinks, but since I don’t drink alcohol (and weirdly enough the bar doesn’t even have soft drinks), at first, the bar offered me a non-alcoholic champagne. It was cute, but didn’t really seem my thing, so he very kindly made me a custom mocktail. It was probably made with a strawberry syrup, sparkling water, and lemon juice, because it tasted like a sparkling strawberry lemonade. It was pretty good, but with a slight too much emphasis on the syrup. We ended up staying for around 4 hours!
That’s part 2! Part 1 is here, and Part 3 is here.
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