No booking needed: Tainan (2)

Lunch was a simple affair, Taiwan's renowned beef noodle soup (niu rou mian, mine served 'dry' with a side bowl of the beef broth) and some rou yuan (meat dumplings). The noodles were great and the generous serving of meat ultra tender from the long stewing process.

A morning in Tainan

After rousing the sleepyheads amidst a ton of protestations, our new friend CK came by to take us for a bit of a look around Tainan before lunch.

An Ping Tree House. No, it's not a house on a tree, but a house where the vines of a huge banyan tree have overtaken and penetrated the entire house. Once considered haunted it's been preserved in a semi derelict condition and is a popular tourist attraction. It's certainly one of the more unusual places in Taiwan. 

Right next door is a museum depicting life in Taiwan during the time of the Dutch colonisation. It was originally the headquarters of the Tait & Co Merchant House.

Fishingboats moored in An Ping. We're told the catch from returning boats are offered for sale in one of the adjacent car parks from about 3pm each day.

New friends

We made some new friends today courtesy of some old ones. A more warm and hospitable Christian couple and their super charming 4 kids you couldn't find elsewhere in Taiwan. And Taiwanese are generally a friendly lot. Despite us calling on them with pretty much no notice (and our protestations), they insisted on taking us out for a quick sightseeing drive, dinner, dessert and then to their home. 

Yen Ping Road in the An Ping district. The first street ever built in Taiwan, yes Taiwan, built by Dutch colonists in the 17th century.

Pre dinner snack of dou hua (dou fu pudding) at An Ping's top dou hua shop. It's pretty massive place just selling one item, and we're told it's packed on weekends. TGIF.

Their dou hua comes with various toppings and flavours in syrup. This was a lemon flavoured bowl with tapioca balls (zhen zhu).  The unusual dark color of the dou hua comes from adding the ashes from burnt bamboo. Sounds strange but doesn't affect the taste.

Dinner was at a ma la huo guo (spicy hot pot) restaurant. Unlike Szechuan or Cantonese hot pots, these come with a spicy and sour broth. Just the thing for a cold winter night! No pics due the extreme crowds!

Dessert. This is a xing ren (almond) jelly place, which serves up really wonderful iced or hot bowls of almond jelly with a variety of toppings and other extras. And again, really nice. (The shop on the left)

Cold almond jelly with sweet yam, peanuts and red beans, enough for 2. 2 thumbs up.

Almond jelly with warm black sesame (zhi ma) soup.

These little food gems are tucked away among the hundreds of places to eat in Tainan, and we would never have found them on our own. Thanks guys!

No booking needed: Tainan (1)

We arrived in Tainan at precisely the indicated time. Like Taipei the local HSR station feels like an airport. It is also as far away from the city centre as a real airport and we unfortunately made a noob mistake by catching a cab to our hotel in town. Why? Apparently we could have caught the local train for a fraction of the cost of a taxi. One lives and learns.

After checking into our hotel we went to look at a local tourist spot, the Chihkan Tower. On the way there we stopped off at a little restaurant (originally opened as a way for single mothers for themselves) to sample some Tainan fare.

Coffin bread or guan cai ban. A deep fried hollowed out thick slice of bread filled with creamy seafood, named for its resemblance to a coffin (including a lid).

Shi mu yu (fried mik fish fillet with a pepper salt dip).

Dan zai mian. A local simple noodle dish made with minced pork, named after the way the noodles were carried by street vendors, via wooden containers suspended on a pole or dan zai.

Ding bian cuo. A soup based noodle dish. The noodles are made by spreading a runny flour paste across the rim of hot wok containing a seafood soup made with, among other things, oysters. One the paste is cooked, it is simply scraped off into the soup.

Wan gui. A steamed rice flour cake topped with prawns, and fried prawn rolls with a wasabi dipping sauce.