Northern Chinese Cuisine - Chowing with the Chief of Police

We had to put on our sanitary gear before entering the kitchen. I think it's a good look.

Eggplant steeped in garlic - lots and lots of garlic... sooooo good!

These are gelly sticks made from green bean covered with a sesame wasabi sauce - Amazing!


Rice noodles with sliced cabbage, sprouts, carrots and cucumber in a richer variation of the sesame wasabi sauce. Yum yum yum!


This was an interesting congee type soup made from golden millet and barley. They recommended adding sugar to it but it already had a subtly sweet flavor.


I like the dumplings here because they taste home-made. The dough isn't super thin or refined like Japanese gyoza so it has more of a chewy texture. And of course lots of garlic in the stuffing! These were the minced vegetable dumplings.

More dumplings. Mr. Hsin explained that for each dumpling you pop into your your mouth, you should immediately follow with a clove of garlic. I guess the cold weather in Northern China calls for lots of garlic. Its pretty yummy.


Beef soup with hand-made noodles. This is a very popular Northern Chinese soup and they slice the long noodles with a big knife. The broth has a very beefy Eastern European flavor and the noodles remind me of spaetzle.


Juicy beef cakes - yum! These have to be eaten hot off the grill to fully appreciate the crunchiness on the top of the cake and the chewiness on the bottom, but you start by poking a hole in it to let a bit of the juices run out before biting into it. Soooooo good!

Inside view. It's a dense cake so it's pretty filling but still hard to eat just one.


Mr. Hsin talks dumplings video\


Making a beef roll video\

This was a fun restaurant... especially hanging out with Police Commissioner Mr. Hsin and his entourage. He's a very boisterous lively man who is very proud of his country and loves food so he was the perfect host.

Shi Ling Night Market - Find the Poos!

My bubble tea! This was the perfect sweet treat after the Royal Palace of blandness. The picture doesn't quite show it, but there are gelatin slices floating throughout the whole drink with a yummy watermelon mash at the bottom.


This gelatinous blob is a popular item at markets. They ladle out some of the blob into a cup and you slurp it up. I haven't tried it but I assume it tastes citrus-y.



Night Market video\
I didn't find any mochi but the watermelon tea made up for it.


Crazy toys video\
POOS! Try to spot the poos!

National Palace Haute Chinese - BLERG!

This is called 'Meat-Shaped Stone'. It was awful. Described as a glistening piece of Dongpo pork selected from the best pig knuckle known for its layers of fat and tastiness, served over a bed of Shanghainese vegetable noodles. It tasted like gooey gelatinous porky soap.

Here it is decunstructed. We kind of just pushed it around the plate all evening.


This is a replica of the Ch'ing Dynasty Jadeite Cabbage with Insects. This edible version was made with this sad looking bokchoy sum (Chinese cabbage heart) and a lonely shriveled shrimp representing the 'insects'. Nobody could finish theirs.


Oh God... okay this was 'Buddha's Tureen in Ting Cauldron with String Decoration' also known as 'Buddha jumps over the wall'. Apparently this soup is highly complex and takes two days to create. Made with quail eggs, bamboo shoots, scallops, sea cucumbers, abalone, pork tendon, Jinhua ham, mushrooms and taro, stewed in a chicken broth then topped with supreme shark fin. The name implies that Buddha himself would sneak over a wall to get a taste of it even though he was a vegetarian. It was so bland that we were ready to jump off a wall to get away from it.


Another monotone soup. I don't know how they managed to make everything so beige-tasting.


When this serious-looking dude arrived with Peking duck things started to look up!


... and up! This looks good right?


Well this is what happened to it. They wrapped the duck slices in some sort of bland rice pancake with a sad piece of red pepper and non descript sauce.


This was okay. Bean curd, sea bass in generic soy-based sauce.


This was the dessert platter. Um, not much to say about it... just many varieties of unsweetened formations made from bean or gelatin.

I guess we had to have one bad meal on this trip, and of course it was at the fanciest place. The Silks Palace restaurant is attached to the National Palace Museum so the venue was really nice and tres upscale. Some of the dishes shown above are edible replicas of Chinese artifacts - so weird. It was all prim and proper with servers coming in and bowing out of the room.. but it was all too much and the food was so awful.. William and I got the giggles and couldn't stop so we had to tell them we were elated from the royal food.

Din Tai Fung - Famous Dumplings

These were the yummiest dumplings so they were gobbled up within seconds of hitting our table. They're filled with chopped greens and lots of fresh garlic and served over a tasty green onion chili sauce.

These were the shrimp and pork dumplings and they were delectable. They're served on a type of cheesecloth thing so the dumplings don't stick when you pick em up.


The greens were incredibly fresh and garlicky so we ordered a second plate!


Steaming dumplings video\

This restaurant was ranked by the New York Times as one of the top 10 gourmet restaurants in the world. It's a four storey joint, there's always a line-up to get in, and the dumplings are seriously good. They're soft yet slightly chewy and the fillings are busting with flavor. My favorites are the round shaped ones -- they're filled with warm soup and a little mound of minced filling.


Dumpling makers video\

Everyone should have a mini dumpling factory in their kitchen.

Lungshan Temple - Praying for a Baby!

The wind started swaying that shrine balloon over my head so the Gods must've been listening.


Shrine line video\

There was another shrine next to this one where you could pray for wealth and prosperity, but everyone was lining up for the baby one. I did both.


Inside the Temple Tour video\

This temple is mainly Buddhist but many deities of Taoism are also included. I like temples and this one's fun to walk around in, there are lilies all around which makes the whole place smell amazing especially mixed in with all the incense which isn't heavy or musky, and the oldies like coming over to look at you up-close and happily nod their heads. People are generally praying for peaceful living.

Kaohsiung Seaside Town

Grilled squid brushed with spicy sesame oil is everywhere - smells so good!



Everything fish video\

The Taiwanese are so intuitive when it comes to cooking and it is such an eco-friendly country. All of the light bulbs used in this fish mart are those 'David Suzuki' energy efficient ones, the fruits and veg are mostly organic, the farmers rarely use pesticides, they have the strictest air emission standards in the world, and everyone's generally aware of quality and freshness. Which explains why every single thing we eat here is amazingly tasty and leaves us with a happy feeling.



'Grandma's ice dessert' video\

Luminous Hot Spring Resort - Day 4?

Hot spring room video\

Okay, I seriously need a natural hot spring water tub in my home. In every room.