Home cookin': Soy milk hot pot

Here's something different. Soy milk hot pot. My girlfriend's friend sent it to her as a care package from Japan. I'm not sure of the origins, Japanese or Chinese or other. But I do know it has a oddly striking appearance. I'm used to sour cabbage hot pot, mala hot pot or other broths. But the broth on this is white. At first glance at a restaurant, prior to today, I didn't know what it was. My girlfriend enlightened me on it. So tonight after some time of wonder, I got to try it out. It turned out rather light in flavor and not really much of a soy milk taste. Which is good. Hot pot can sometimes be pretty heavy and oily, so this is a refreshing option. Add more vegetables and seafood, and less meat and it's a rather healthier and lighter feeling meal. If i'm in a hot pot restaurant next time and it's an option, I wouldn't mind trying it again. Anyone know where this soy milk version originated from?

Mala Village

Lets start this off by saying it's been was a crappy evening. It was goose-bump raising chilly evening with my partners in culinary exploration. To add on top of the dreariness, Taiwan's bi-polar weather decided to pour on us. We decided on a late dinner because we had a late lunch. So as everyone else was happy and warm inside their restaurants eating their meals, we were wandering the streets killing time, walking off the last of our luncheon meal. Our first choice was to just have something light, to compensate for the lack of hunger. However walking over to Yuki's favorite shabu shabu place in Dongqu came with disappointment as the store was closed for the holidays. So we turned tail and headed back to the main street. Everyone was thinking of a place to eat at, but we couldn't decide on a single place or knew of a local place we wanted to go to. Undecided in mind, we continued to walk around and check store by store. Things were looking dim, rainy, closed and late. Until we encountered a unique little 8 story building. Yuki said it reminded her of a japanese building. Narrow and tall, which each restaurant taking up a flat (one story). There was no lobby or hallways, the elevator is the front door. Sorry, that the best I can describe it. We ended up on the top floor of Bistro 98 (I'm not sure if thats the building name, but it is in the address). It as called Mala village (麻辣一材). After all that disappointment and walking, we went from not that hungry to I can eat four horses. So even at the price rate of $500+10% tip, we signed up for some All-You-Can-Eat hot pot. This AYCE place orders by menu, but buffet. You get 3 orders, so don't worry about over ordering on the first round. Food wise...awesome! They have several meat types and cuts. Several seafood choices, vegetable choices and mushroom choices. The sauce bar is eclectic! They have about 40 bowls of ingredients, so you can customize your dipping sauce to your hearts content. Moving on to the desserts. They have Meiji and some russian brand ice cream. But the topper is, freshly made waffles. Top your waffle with some ice cream for that ultimate hot and cold marriage. Thats what we did! As for the environment, It's a small place, but it's fairly clean. Although they have nice big windows to view outside from the 8th floor, due to insufficient ventilation, the humidity fogs over much of the window. Overall an excellent and cute little place. I feel that it is less popular and more hidden, so it may be a great option when other restaurants in the Dongqu area are packed. However I ate my self full 'till my jean button burst. My Chinese New Years resolution is: No more AYCE...under my own free decision. So this may be the last AYCE hot pot for a while, I'd glad Mala Village made it a good experience for me. Now to take a quick shower, hop into bed and cradle my stomach in a fetal position.

*Photo from Google Image

Mala Village(麻辣一材)
台北市忠孝東路4媏8號8F
weekdays: 11:30-3PM, 5:30-1AM
weekends: 11:30-1AM
www.malavillage.com

Irodori 鮨彩 @ Megacity

There's a new mall that has opened in Banqiao. It's part of the FE21 chain and is called MegaCity 大遠百. It's right accross from the Banqiao MRT station and New Taipei City City Hall and fairly close to the original FE21 mall. The new mall is a very modern took with outward slanted windows. The courtyard in front has been remodeled to include a lower level atrium and a giant Christmas tree in the middle. The Interior design of the food court area is awesome. It's modeled after Venice. So there are Venetian boats in a water filled canal, a 3 story Venetian building facade and lamps, pillars and walkways all tying into the theme. In fact I shouldn't say it's the food court, but the restaurant avenue. The basement floor is the food court. Don't worry, they created another themed world of visual delight there too. The Food Republic, the name of the food court, is painstakingly modeled from ceiling to floor to resemble the 40's era of China/Taiwan. They have rustic store fronts, with wood paneling, clay shingles and wooden beams. The old wooden chairs, lanterns, and various decorative items (including some old rusty bikes and straw baskets) help bring the atmosphere back 70 years. It's part museum and the coolest food court I know of in Taipei. But moving on, my parents, my cousin and I decided to try out one of the restaurants on the Venetian floor (9th i think). However it's Chinese New Years and most of the restaurants were booked, limiting our choices. Fortunately we were able to get a table at Irodori Sushi, one of our top choices. The interior resembles a simple and humble Japanese restaurant, not thing to elaborate much about. After sitting, we quickly decided on a set meal for 4. It turned out to be way too much food. After the salad, vegetables sticks and loads of sushi, there was still the hot pot. The beef that the hot pot came with probably weighed in over 2 kilograms. If you click through to the original image size, you may be able to make out the thickness of the pile 'o meat. Consequently, less than half way in, we all quit and called for a doggie bag. The quality of the sushi was excellent and the presentation was great. The bill ran into just under $1000 NT per person, so it's not going to be a cheap meal unless you stay away from the sushi. But note for the future, the set meal for four can definitely be split more thinly with 5 or even 6 people. The price will definitely be worth it for five people. Nice place overall and recommended. Great Venetian atmosphere, great service and perfect for a lazy saturday after some shopping (for people with fat wallets). Perhaps I appreciate it more that it's not on my checkbook. So big thanks, Mom and Dad!

*MegaCity Venetian floor and Food Republic picture credit goes to http://www.wretch.cc/blog/bajenny. Thank you!

Irodori Sushi 鮨彩 in the Banqiao Mega City Department store
新北市板橋區新站路28號9樓(板橋大遠百)
http://www.zoe-grp.com/irodorisushi

Silver thread bread

This is actually dinner from last night. But I thought it was appropriate to separate them out. My parents and relatives, which are visiting over the holidays, decided to bring me along for dinner to a local restaurant. It's somewhere in Tianmu. Since we took a bus and I didn't pay much attention, I'm unable to reproduce the exact location. Sad since the food turned out to be quite excellent. Of the two most notable, was the duck blood hot pot and the silver thread buns. Both I think are of Beijing origin and may also be of relation to Hakka cuisine. I'm a fan of duck blood. Looks and sounds disgusting, but it really doesn't have any strong taste. It there is any taste, it's only a very mild irony taste. The texture has the consistency of hard jello. It's not meant to be eaten alone, but dependently with a soup or a supplementary part of a larger dish. Much like the hot pot you see in the picture. This hot pot though is pretty thick to be called a soup. And that thick soupy gravy really goes well with that duck blood and white rice. Next is the silver thread buns 銀絲卷 (yinsijuan). Delicious! A crispy buttery skin on the outside with extremely soft and fluffy white bread inside. Steamed silver thread buns are named because of the unique noodle-like threads inside the buns. I hear the process is also equally unique, in that you steam it first then deep-fry it later. Silver thread buns can be served with peanut powder or stir-fried pork with preserved vegetables, but I love it just the way it is. I pick it apart thread by thread, then eat the crispy skin (the best part) for last. Yum!

Chien Yen Hot Pot...redux!

Here we are again! Gut-busting All You Can Eat hot pot at Ximending. One of my good friends here in Taipei was recently turned onto my blog. So after reading the article about Chien Yen hot pot, she really really wanted to me to revisit the place with her. According to her, mainly for the dessert/cake display not the hot pot! Well, in my original post, I only posted pictures of the cake display and not of any hot pot action. At first she was unable to decide if she wanted this much food. But at the last minute, I got a call from her stating that she was IN! Well, for gut-busting desserts perhaps. So we met up, walked in and put our names down on the waiting list. Even for a Sunday evening, it's still quite packed and thus we waited about 15 minutes. I'm sure it would have been worse had we walked in without reservations on a Friday or Saturday evening. We sat, we ate, we burped, we ate some more and then went dessert binging! yadda yadda. You get the idea from my last post about this gem of a place. Oh although they don't have froyo, they do have soft serve ice cream. In the end, she liked it so much she vowed to return with her family members when they visited. You should should visit too!

Chien Yen Hot Pot
台北市中華路1段41號2樓
02-2331-7288

Home cookin': Hot Pot

Yuki and I have been wanted to do this for a long time. It's as simple as getting some vegetables, meat, fish balls, and soup base. But it's just not cost effective, so we just opt to eat out for our hot pot fix. But after eating some great hot pot with my friend from out of town last Sunday, we decided to pull the trigger. It motivated us to plan it for tonight. I'd grab all the ingredients before hand and Yuki would show up at my place where I would have everything all prepared. Preparing for it was easier than preparing for cooking a western meal. Shopping around the Carrefour, it was so much easier finding the ingredients and with so many choices. They have hot pot assorted vegetables and roots packages for singles, doubles or triples. Next, they have specific meat cuts for hot pot. And don't get me started on beef balls, soup dumplings and fish paste balls (and various shapes, no english name for this that I can think of). They have freezer cases full of these in just about every brand, shape, filling and size. It was all too convenient. However it still took me a while to shop because I couldn't decide. Usually I spend too much time there because I can't find what I need. Anyways, as for the soup base, Yuki wanted to introduce me to a Japanese tomato base hot pot. Taiwan conveniently also imports this Japanese brand. So in the end, the DIY hot pot at home was a success. Although the tomato hot pot was delicious, I still prefer my mongolian mala (麻辣) flavor. Next time time on hot pot at home, it's going to be spicy! Just in time, because the evenings are getting really chilly here (22 Celsius).

Favorite Hot Pot place contender

A very strong contender, if not the best AYCE hot pot place I know of in Taipei. My first visit here was when my cousin introduced it to me several months back. So this time since Yuki's mother was visiting for a short few days, we wanted to pick restaurants from three cultures that represented the relationship we had. Japan, Taiwan and America. Day 1 was Taiwan, so we picked hot pot. The hot pot place is called Chien Yen Hot Pot (千葉火鍋) near Ximen MRT station exit 5. I love this place because it's large and well designed. The interior design is minimalistically elegant and the food is pretty much all equidistant from the tables. But those are the minor points. The big points are the food, drinks and dessert. To start out with, they have several selections of broth including my favorite Spicy Mala (麻辣). Next they have a wide variety of seafood, vegetables, meats and other meats (animal organs). Drink-wise they also have a huge selection. From yogurt drinks to soda to taiwanese drinks (some may say cocktail drinks). Just for desserts, they have scoop ice cream, cones, ice cream bars, fruits, yogurt, cookies, cakes and a chocolate fountain. I didn't see any frozen yogurt though. Although the food there isn't the absolute best, it doesn't have to. The beef and lamb doesn't have too much fat or gnarly hard to chew bits. The quality is above standard and good enough for the price. Speaking of price, it runs about $450 NT per adult. I'd definitely recommend this place if you want to experience some good hot pot for a decent price. Yuki's mother liked it and said she'd wish to bring her husband here next time they're in Taipei. Awesome! I'll be bringing my family and friends here in the future. It's also very convienant that it's next to Ximending, one of my favorite places to be at night.

Chien Yen Hot Pot
台北市中華路1段41號2樓
02-2331-7288

Hankyou department store

Well, I woke up this fine weekend morning and the first thing that popped in my head was STEAK. I need me some slab o' meat! So I immediately head to Shipai night market for the Taiwanese steak house they have there. Unfortunately, taiwanese steak not american steak. But I think i'm starting to prefer taiwanese steaks anyways. It's less gut busting and comes with so many extras at a cheaper price. So with my craving for steak satisfied, Yuki and I headed to the Hankyou department store (stolen picture on right). You can get to it directly from the City Hall MRT stop. It branches off the MRT underground. Yuki said it's a rather new mall that opened recently and the interior design is very good. It's special to her, because on one of the top floors (i forgot, 7th?), it has a large japanese bookstore. Majority if not all the books are in japanese. Afterwards, we met up with Yuki's friend and ate at a special japanese shabu shabu place near Zhongxiao Fuxing MRT station. Tabitabi which is the company she works for, had a review on this place and it came recommended. But we'd like to mention, it's not really shabu shabu, but a compromise between a taiwanese hot pot and shabu shabu. It's not all you can eat, but it really is delicious and clean in there. But I have to complain about the bad ventilation. There's doesn't seem to be any. So the steam from the pots really fill the air like a steam room. After dinner, we all hitched a cab over to RaoHe night market (饒河夜市). I noticed some new food there, but didn't get a chance to try it out since I already ate dinner. So i'll just make a note about it here for next time. I saw some coffin bread, crispy thai chicken and some bbq lamb on a stick. Afterwards, we went to wufenbu (五分埔) since it was down the street. I saw a lot of sections that i have not visited before because it is really huge and kind of like a maze. It'll definitely take several revisits for me to map this place out. Since most of the shops cater to women clothing, I really have to make a mental note of the good male clothing shops. But it doesn't help if I can't find it again.

Hot Pot...on a train

After class, I was craving hot pot. Yuki knew of a famous "hot pot train" in DingXi (頂溪). It's just east of the DingXi MRT station, literally across the street. It's located on the second floor of the Sushi Express building. Apparently one single company owns all the restaurants there. They're more famous for their AYCE (all you can eat) places, but they have a la cart places too. The restaurant is clean and offers unlimited drinks, red bean tapioca soup(紅豆湯圓) and ice cream along with your meal. It's $300 for AYCE hot pot on a train. It's like sushi boat but with hot pot ingredients. Also disappointingly, it's not really a train. More like a flat moving walkway like you see at the airports. One minor thing I'd like to mention that I like, is the individual hot pots are built into the table, not placed on top of it. So there's a better view of what's simmering in your broth for the height challenged. They don't serve a lot of meat. Mostly vegetables and cheap filler ingredients. So grab more meat as it rolls on by. They have pork, beef and lamb, thinly cut and of mediocre quality. But still, I really liked my meal. And it's affordable. I think I need to start eating healthier, but I'll be my "go to" cheap hot pot place after school. I have a question. How do Taiwanese stay so thin when there's such an abundance of AYCE places for so cheap!? It's ridonkulous!

Hotpot 123 (closed)

Tonight I went with my friend, Yukiyo, to try out a new hot pot place. It's in the Shida night market and called 123. Simple enough, heh. My aunt told me about it after she read a good review about it in the chinese news paper. It is indeed good. The flavors were bursting and the price was right. $150NT for the hot pot + the meat and vegetables are separate when served, so it's fresh and not pre-boiled like most of the $99NT hot pot places. It also comes with a free refillable drink. The place is clean and nice. You can also add more ingredients for an extra cost. So it's kind of like a customized personal hot pot. I had the mongolian Ma-La flavor. What can I say, I like my spices! Here's the address, No. 6號, Lane 105, ShīDà Road, Da-an District.

Hot Pot Christmas dinner party

Today I celebrated Christmas eve with my classmates. We were all invited to Yuki's house after class for hot pot. Her landlord prepared a lot of food for us. Pork, roasted duck, baby carrots, oysters...oh my! We had a great time celebrating together and playing with the landlord's tiny dog. For desert, Yuki made these cute Christmas themed cupcakes. They kind of look like animals trying to escape quicksand. I get to meet such great new friends every semester. I can't wait what new faces i get to meet next semester the way things are going! Haha, great times!

Curry hot pot (咖哩香香火鍋)

Nothing out of the ordinary today. Chinese class at the MTC as usual. I also paid the remainder of my tuition so I can continue with my current semester's intensive class. Wouldn't want to be kicked out for a mere 7,000 NTD ($210USD). After class, I headed over to the Shipai night market and found a new personal hot pot place (小火鍋). They have curry flavor hot pot (咖哩香香火鍋). I love hot pot and I love curry. So Curry flavored hot pot, you can't go wrong! soo good!

Farewell Nico!

Today after class, everyone headed to Cash City hot pot. It was a great place and very near to the Taipower MRT exit! Clean and large, easily accomodating a party of 8+. $230 for a meat (cow, 牛肉) dish and all the vegetable fixings too. There are cheaper options and different meats too. Food was excellent and plentyful. There are four kinds of free juices including Yakult icey :), my favorite. Six kinds of soda and Free choco/vanilla/strawberry ice cream. Excellent hot pot place that I will be returning to with other friends. We didn't take any pictures tonight, but I will share some from last night's farewell dinner (part 1 i guess). Nico (Su Ming) will be missed and we all said our heart felt goodbyes for the last time as we slowely parted ways walking towards the MRT station. Some of us are planning to stay for a while. Su Hoai will be here for 1 year, Arturo (Li Ke) for 5 years, Florian (Ra-an) possible permanently and I possible 9 more months or even also permanently. We'll see. But it really is a dream for Nico to return and study Chinese again in Taiwan, or permamently move here with his girlfriend. So I hope i'll still be here too, to welcome him back to Taiwan with a friendly and familiar face. Being friends with you has significantly contributed to my positive experience here in Taiwan. See you soon, bro!

Movie Scarethon

Today, in the spirit of Halloween, me and a few of my classmates had a horror movie marathon. Everyone brought their own food, snacks and drinks and movies. I contributed the first movie, Daybreakers. Which by the way, was pretty good! Not exactly horror, but maybe alittle scary and definitly action packed and bloody! Next Momoko contributed Ringu. It's an older japanese movie about a cursed video tape. Once you watch it, you'll get a phone call informing you, you'll have 1 week to live. Then at the end of the week, a creepy dead girl will crawl out of the TV and kill you. 3 of us got a phone call after the "video" was played in the movie. Really! Of course it wasn't the dead girl calling, but perfect timing. Haha! After watching Ringu, we took an intermission for dinner. The 5 of us, went out for a family style hot pot. We walked around the neighborhood and found a hole in the wall family restaurant. The place was disorganized, loud and full of laughing and smiling faces with little children running around the table. A real "family" taiwanese hole in the wall joint. So of course the meal was not only fun and delicious, but super cheap. One big hot pot, four side dishes of meat for $160 NTD person. With our stomaches full, we headed to my favorite local tea shop and got drinks. Of course, I got my Yakult icey. Back at the house, "Kiwi" Andrew contributed the next movie, The Social Network. OK, it's not a scarey movie, but it does have Justin Timberlake in it. ok ok, we really just wanted to end it on a high note and not be freaked out walking back home late at night through empty train stations or dark Taiwanese alleys. It was really fun and I got alot of requests to host another one!

Hsinchu day trip

Today I returned to Hsinchu, Taiwan to visit my neice again. I didn't have plans today nor did I have any time constraints this time. So I headed down after doing some homework early staurday morning as well as some on the train. I met up with Lucy and Hatuyen in front of Ching Hua University. From the Hsinchu HSR station, I used the #2 free shuttle bus and should have gotten off on the second stop. But the bus listed it as the third stop. So I got off 1 stop later and had to take a $100 NTD cab ride 3 blocks. haha! I'll know for next time. We had some lunch at a japanese restaurant with a beautifully designed interior. Afterwards, we hiked around a large university on our way to 18 peaks. But Hatuyen had a dinner meeting and it was getting close to dinner. So we killed off the rest of our time walking around the Hsinchu Science park. It's a nice place to hang out, read a book, snap photos or go jogging. Afterwards we joined up with my cousin and aunt to eat some Chengdu hot pot. Yes, the one with a wall split down the middle to seperate the two flavors. We had mongolian hot pot (東北酸菜火鍋) with chinese sauerkraut (suān cài, 酸菜) and Szechuan or má là (麻辣). Soo good! [Warning, bad iPhone photo, I didn't have my camera with me] I just can't find a personnal hot pot place around Taipei that has the má là flavor. Afterwards, with a full stomach, we all headed back to my cousin's home and let our dinner sink in aka relaxed in the living room. After a crappy cold, rainy and windy (typhoon) past few days, I was so content with some hiking in the sun and a satifying dinner. ahhhhh! See you readers next time.