Taiwan Night Market Food Faves
Everyone loves a good night market. It’s like a stationary food truck festival, a bustling market of delicious food. When visiting Taiwan, we try to go to several different night markets so we can try out all the different foods. We usually come home around 15 pounds heavier (but much happier) after all the binge eating we’ve done! Here are some of our favorite Taiwanese night market foods.
- Onion Pancakes (Cong You Bing)- my personal favorite. These savory layered pancakes are filled with green onions and either deep or pan fried to perfection. You can eat them plain or sometimes add an egg or meat to them for a heartier snack.
- Steamed Buns (Bao Zi)- these steamed buns usually come with a meat filling and are absolutely delicious.
- Fried Chicken (Yan Su Ji)- usually served in bite sized pieces like popcorn chicken.
- Dumplings (Jiao Zi)- you can get pan fried jiao zi hot off the grill.
- Stinky Tofu (Chou Dou Fu) – The smell might keep you away, but once you get past it, it’s actually not bad! These fermented tofu squares are fried and served with picked cabbage or boiled and served with chili peppers.
- Takoyaki balls- circular batter filled balls with octopus that are cooked in a special molded pan and then usually topped with seaweed, takoyaki sauce and dried bonito
- Braised Pork & Rice (Lu Rou Fan)- a simple dish of rice served with pork belly or shoulder usually accompanied with pickled vegetables.
- Oyster Omelet (o a Jian)- this egg omelet comes filled with oysters, vegetables and topped with a savory sauce.
- Shaved Ice (Bao Bing) – shaved ice dessert where you can choose your own toppings of fruit, condensed milk, grass jelly, nuts, tapioca balls and much more. Our favorite combination is shaved ice with mangos, yum.
- Black Pepper Buns (Hu Jiao Bing) - crispy buns steamed in a clay oven that are filled with pork, pepper, and vegetables.
- Tea Eggs- eggs hard boiled in soy sauce, tea and other spices. You can also find these at all the local convenience stores as well.
- Taiyaki- a sweet pancake that comes in fun shapes achieved through molds that can also be filled with red bean, chocolate, peanut, taro and other delightful fillings.
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