TAIPEI, Sept 29 – Our noses lead the way. Long before we see the actual objects of our desire, we are drawn by its perfume – part delicate pungency, milder than robust onions, and part sizzling savour, the sort you’d only get when hot oil meets pliant dough.
What we discover, once we arrive at the right stall (no easy task given what appears to be hundreds of stalls lining the length of this street), is a daze of steam.
Once the clouds dissipate, we are greeted by bamboo steamers filled with shuǐ jiān bāo.
These leek stuffed dumplings or buns have a golden crust on the bottom from pan frying yet remain unbearably moist from steaming. Biting into one is an exercise in masochism, so hot it has to burn but who can bear to wait for them to cool?
When you are doing a food crawl of a Taiwanese night market, you have to seize the day (or the evening, as it were).
Taiwan has some of the best night markets and street food in the world; they are certainly our favourite.
Known as yèshì in Mandarin, a Taiwanese night market is typically held outdoors. Streets are closed to non-pedestrian traffic and stalls are set up in rows, often with clearly visible numbers.
There are hundreds of them in the country from the famous Shilin Night Market and Raohe Street Night Market to smaller neighbourhood ones.
From the distinctive chòu dòufu (stinky tofu) to iconic zhēnzhū nǎichá (pearl milk tea), there is something for every palate.
Before we tucked into our steaming shuǐ jiān bāo, we had already started our evening with some sausages and mochi. The former is called yīkǒu chī xiāngcháng (“a mouthful of sausage”) and grilled to order; the latter are known as nuòmǐ cí in Taiwan, glutinous rice balls filled with ground peanuts or black sesame paste.
We share and swap as we wander from stall to stall, alternating between bites of savoury and sweet.
Unlike a course-by-course Western meal, with a street food crawl, you can always have dessert first. Also, though Taiwan is greatly influenced by Japan, it’s perfectly fine to walk around while we nibble on some shāomai (pork and mushroom dumplings) as the Japanese practice of ikkai ichi dousa (or “one thing at a time”) isn’t at play here.
You don’t have to eat standing or strolling, of course. Plenty of the stalls have a few stools for sitting down (though you might have to be patient to snatch up an available seat if the shop is popular).
Certain dishes such as lǔ ròu fàn, a classic Taiwanese comfort food of stewed fatty pork served with an egg braised in the gravy, taste better seated and hunched over your bowl. Let not one whiff of it mouthwatering aroma escape.
You’d think we would have had enough of doughy snacks after all those buns and dumplings. But we can never get enough of carbohydrates, not at a Taiwanese yèshì, not when we are here for so brief a visit.
Next up we decide to bypass the stalls offering zhū jiǎo xiārén gēng (pig trotter and shrimp soup) or the ubiquitous ô-á-chian (Taiwanese oyster omelettes slathered with a sweet sauce).
Instead we make a beeline for the cōng yóubǐng stall. The vendor seems to be taking a breather; there are no lines.
Generally it’s a good tip to look out for a long queue: Taiwanese, just like their Japanese counterparts, are more than happy to wait for hours for the best eats on the street. However, we don’t always have to follow the flow. Sometimes we just want what we want.
We are rewarded for trusting our gut instinct (quite literally listening to our now heavy bellies) with crispy and fragrant scallion pancakes. Unlike the version in China where the cōng yóubǐng is pan fried and a tad too doughy, Taiwan’s version of these unleavened flatbreads is deep fried and crispy.
Our fingers are soon sticky with the scallion-scented oil – all the better to lick them clean, down to every last drop.
Every street food crawl is unique. Sometimes we opt for chaomiàn (Taiwan-style fried noodles) first, then some dǐng biān cuò (potside sticker soup) to chase it.
Other times we embrace our status as tourists and go for gimmicky snacks such as the yíngyǎng sānmíngzhì or Nutritious Sandwich. Our arteries clog up just remembering every bite of the deep-fried bun filled with stewed duck eggs, ham, sliced cucumber and tomato, and copiously drenched in salad dressing.
We have a habit of always finishing our yèshì adventure with a tour of the seafood options. Usually there’s an entire section of the night market dedicated to the bounty of the ocean: clams and oysters, mussels and scallops, crabs and shrimp, squid and octopus, and plenty of fresh fish, all resting on a throne of ice.
These can be barbecued or broiled, served in a starchy soup or baked en Papillote, the French way. Tonight these options seem too fussy for some reason.
Then we noticed an elderly shūshu (uncle) blanching dozens of fish balls in a large wok. These yú wán are all handmade from freshly deboned shī mù (milkfish), he tells us, which accounts for their bouncy or “QQ” texture despite using only a little cornstarch to bind them.
They taste gorgeous. Some of their flavour must come from watching the shūshu in action, cooking so many yú wán, and some of it from the story he’s telling us of their provenance. Not everything in a yèshì hails from a factory, though that’s increasingly the case. You can taste the difference.
There’s nothing quite like street food in Taiwan. We always hunt it down first when we land; it’s a tradition.
Much of the allure is never knowing what we’ll chance on. The night is full of surprises. Sometimes just when we think we’re done for the evening, our waistlines stretched and straining, we see or smell or hear something and we think, why not one more?
Before its hot juices even coat our tongues, the crunch of the dà jī pái – large, flattened pieces of deep fried chicken – is ambrosial, the sound of our sin of gluttony. We thought we had finished for the night. Gladly, deliciously, we thought wrong.
