Food Edition pt. 1

I must say that when I was told the food was good, I knew that it'd be good but I didn't know how good. Maybe its the heat stroke killing my brain cells, or the bacteria tearing up my insides but that street food has to be the most amazing Chinese food I've eaten. And to top it off, the food is dirt cheap, we're talking $2 for a extra large bowl of niu ro mien (Beef noodles), or $10 for all-you-can-eat hot pot. So this post will be one of many of the foods I eat haha.

To give you a sense of how everything is set up, most of the food stands are located in clusters throughout the night markets (I'll blog bout the night markets a little later, today is about food haha) where its like a outdoor mall. The food stands are a Yelp-er's paradise (sorry Matt), except if you Yelp about it you'll never find the place again cuz the stand always change locations (except some of the shops). Every place would earn raving reviews and failing grades from the health inspectors.

I must admit though, the first time I had stand food I had to do some pre-planning. And by pre-planning I mean determining where the nearest restrooms and exits were. But so far from all the stand food I've eaten, its been staying in and been kind to my stomach (*knock on wood* haha) although the water here still makes me a tad bit queasy.

So a sampling of the food so far.

Shaved ices: Yea yea Guppies is all the rage in SoCal for their monstrous shaved ices, but that's all they have; giant mounds of ice. Albeit the size is slightly smaller than Guppies, Taiwanese shaved ices beat Guppies hands down every time. Not only do they add on fruit and condensed milk but even the ice is flavored! You can choose different flavors of ice to combine with your fruit topping (common ones being milk, peanut, or green tea). And not only is the ice flavored they actually shave the ice for you on a industrial woodwork machine! haha. And the icing on the cake, its only 2 bucks. Take that Guppies.

Hotpot: Everybody loves hotpot! But I've never seen anything like the hotpot here. Even for hotpot you have choices of the type of hotpot you want! There's even one with a hotpot in the middle surrounded by a metal grill around the side to not only hotpot but to grill meat too. Now that's efficiency. There's also a stone hotpot that apparently gets crazy hot, but the best part of these places is that they're all-you-can-eat! I know if I went there with my friends from LA, we'd clean the place out haha.

Ding Tai Fung: So when Din Tai Fung opened in Arcadia all the Taiwanese people went nuts and stampeded over there. All for one reason; their famous shao long bao (steamed buns). Now, the ones in Arcadia are pretty good and does some justice to the authentic ones, but the REAL shao long bao's at the Din Tai Fung in Taipei is like a taste of heaven. Each little bun is steamed to perfection with the perfect amount of broth inside. Also, the cheap prices allows you to eat till you burst. The great thing about the Taipei Ding Tai Fung is also that it isn't as crowded as the Arcadia one, AND it has more selection of buns and food.

Lu ro fan: Have you ever had meat so tender and fatty that it just melted in your mouth? Now that is what a whole bowl of lu ro fan does, and the only way to experience this dish is to eat it off from street stands. Lu ro fan is finely sliced pork fat and pork meat marinated in broth and put on rice. If any of you have had cerveza meat from Mexican places, imagine that 10x as tender and over rice. Nothing warms my stomach better and comes out faster than a big bowl of lu ro fan.

So in this post there aren't too many pictures of food, but check out the portfolio for more and there will be more posts and pics coming up of food. Sadly, it is probably mean of me to post up the pics of food and tease it over you guys while I stuff my face....but owells haha.