MisoHungry: Street Foods of #Taiwan: Things on a Stick

If you've done any reading about #Taiwan's food, you'd know that street food is a main attraction in the cuisine and in the culture. In many of the cities you visit, you won't be far from street food. Food carts and food cars are aplenty in morning markets, around most all attractions, and especially the night markets. Here's some photos of street foods from various locations in Taiwan. Here's an article from CNN on the run down of some other food might want to add to your list foods to try. Not all of then are necessarily street food.

This is an example of a food truck. You'll notice through out the posts that Taiwanese are very efficient with their space. There's not a square inch of this truck that is wasted.

Not only are the Taiwanese proud of their street food, they are also proud of their architectural feats. We have Taipei 101, and we have gigantic ice cream cones. These cones were very popular at Dansui (also called Tamsui on the red train sign out of Taipei train station). The sunset here is stunning like the cones. This one was 30 NTD, or just over a $1 USD. To answer your question: Yes, I did eat it. It was difficult to eat it at first because my arms weren't long enough t lower it so my mouth could reach the top. This is a pretty thorough blog post of Dansui, by a Texan just happened to be a coincidence.

This is an example what is called literally "big sausage wraps small sausage." The small sausage inside is a traditional pork sausage tucked inside a rice sausage (similar to boudin) sliced lengthwise. It is topped with pickled vegetables and garlic. The American name for it is sausage with sticky rice. This photo was taken at my cousin's food stand, and there are many food stands in Taiwan selling these very same dishes.

Here it is deconstructed. You have the sliced rice sausage, pork sausages, pickled veggies, and garlic.

Also at my cousin's stand, we have pig's blood cake with rice. YUM! *If you don't like the thought of it, don't eat it. That just leaves more for me.

These are some very tasty pan fried dumplings. They've been called a variety of things from potstickers to gyoza. I call them tasty.

When it comes to street food, things on a stick are popular as they are easy to eat. Here's examples of things on a stick - rice sausages and fish cakes.

This stand was really interesting. They had things on skewers - all sorts of things. We have mushroom stems, beans, chicken offal, chicken, pork, and green onions wrapped in thinly sliced meats.

And here's more mushrooms and green bell peppers. Each stick was about 30 cents USD. Once you made your selection, someone behind the counter would grill it up to your specs and brush it with the sauce of your choice.

This isn't necessarily a food stand, but it is popular enough that it deserves a photo. You see many of these facing the sidewalk with seating inside. I didn't get to try any, but it appears to be "pick your own soup ingredients."

Conchs in the shell at the Queen's Head attraction at Yeh Liu Geo Park in Northern Taiwan.

This isn't street food. This was a parade in the streets of Tamsui / Dansui.

Here's another shot of the street parade in Dansui / Tamsui.

Deep fried squid is very popular in Taiwan.

I mean really popular. You will find many stands selling these crunchy lovelies in Dansui / Tamsui.

I found sausages in three flavors for just $1 USD for the stick. The top one is mixed in with salmon roe, the second one with squid ink, and the third one with with pieces of black squid.

Tempura goodies in Dansui / Tamsui

I don't know what these things are called in English. This was batter cooked on a griddle, filled with something, and sandwiched by another layer of batter. The generic name for these could be red bean cake.