The Lowdown
Restaurant Name: Tonghua Night Market 通化街夜市
Cuisine: Taiwanese Street Food
Average Price per Person: Almost everything is under $5 USD
Location: Taipei, Taiwan (please refer to the map below for details)
Recommendations: Stinky Tofu 臭豆腐, Oyster Vermicelli 蚵仔麵線, and Fried Egg Green Onion Pancake 炒蛋蔥餅Ratings (out of 5)
Taste: 4
Creativity/Authenticity: 5
Atmosphere: 2.5
Service: 3
Bang for Buck: 4
Crayscale !!!
Continuing from Part One and Part Two of Taipei Cray !!! Night Market Madness, this post is pretty much the remainder of the street food I ate in Tapei during my visit back in December. I can’t remember exactly where I had most of the food photographed below but a few items were from the Tonghua Night Market (please see the map below for details on location). Tonghua Night Market 通化街夜市 is located in the Xinyi commercial district of Taipei relatively close to Taipei 101. It’s not as large as the Shida and Shilin night markets but I thought Tonghua was more food focused and had less retail stores = MORE FOCUS MANG. Tonghua is a good night market for beginners – it’s a long and narrow and easy to find your way around. Like other night markets, it’s packed so I would recommend going late to avoid the crowd. Although Tonghua Night Market is the smallest of the 3 night markets I visited, I thought it had the best Stinky Tofu and I found my favorite street food item ever – the Fried Egg Green Onion Pancake 炒蛋蔥餅! So friggin good!
Before we jump into Stinky Tofu, first a little backgrounder. Stinky Tofu is deep fried, fermented tofu. The fermentation gives it that pungent odor that often permeates the streets of highly trafficked areas across China and Southeast Asia. There are different variations of it which we’ll cover, but for the most part in the context of “street food,” it’s fried. But as always, Wikipedia goes hard and has a more thorough breakdown.
Stinky Tofu Spot #1: We were lucky enough to have our friend Larry Chen at our disposal over the course of our trip. An amazing Taipei tour guide and he just so happens to be a Stinky Tofu Connoisseur. On our last day there, he took us on a mini Stinky Tofu journey (we’ll be planning a Stinky Tofu series with Larry the next time we’re in Taipei, hopefully this year)! This was the first spot he took us to. It was just some random spot that we walked to, close to the Dong Qu district 東區 of Taipei. Larry wanted us to try a few random spots before taking us to his favorite joints so we had a frame of Stinky Tofu reference. Eugene and I both have had Stinky Tofu before but just that nasty ish sold on the streets of Hong Kong. However, we were told that the Stinky Tofu in Taipei was different and as a local favorite, we were willing to give it a second chance.
I noticed right away that the Stinky Tofu in Taipei was different than any previous Stinky Tofu I’d had in the past. Firstly, the tofu’s appearance was different and appeared to be a lighter. Secondly, a pickled cabbage was served with the tofu. The pickled cabbage is similar to Korean kimchi but definitely not as spicy. It’s sweet, acidic slightly sour and I could have easily eaten a mound of that on its own.
The tofu had a nice crispy porous texture throughout the entire cube which helped absorb the juices from the pickled cabbage. I was already fairly satisfied with how this Stinky Tofu tasted and was looking forward to what Larry had in store for us since this particular example was rated quite low on his personal Stinky Tofu scale.
Stinky Tofu Spot #2: According to Larry, Stinky Tofu comes in all shapes and forms. As you can see from the photos, this style of Stinky Tofu differs from Stinky Tofu Spot #1. This particular style of has a huge crater in the center of the tofu block which catches all the Stinky Tofu condiment goodness.
The Stinky Tofu was served with soy sauce and pickled cabbage on the side. Additional minced garlic and hot sauce condiments can be added for extra flava.
We tried one with minimal condiments (on the left) and the other fully loaded (on the right)! I liked the fully loaded one better. Yummmaayy!
So good! I’m really glad I decided to give Stinky Tofu a second chance! The spongelike tofu soaked up the sauce while the nest within the tofu helped keep the condiments in place making for an extra deliciously flavor packed piece of tofu.
Larry’s current number one spot for Stinky Tofu! Check it out ya’ll! There was actually a third Stinky Tofu spot but my camera died so we couldn’t take pictures of it. The third spot is in Tonghua Night Market. The Stinky Tofu here was cut into smaller triangular bite size pieces. Similar to the first style of Stinky Tofu we had. The tofu was crispy throughout and was easy to eat. It was a tough call between spot 2 and 3 but spot 3 was my favorite spot for Stinky Tofu. Thanks for schoolin’ us on Stinky Tofu Larry!
Oyster Vermicelli (蚵仔麵線) is a popular Taiwanese noodle soup made from oysters and Taiwanese vermicelli called misua. It has a thicker viscous consistency and contains thin soft strands of vermicelli. At first, I thought the soup was sort of bland so I added more of the garlic and hot sauce for additional flavor. Another variation is also available which contains pork intestines.
T.K.K. Fried Chicken’s 呱呱包. I’m not sure what this is called in English but it is a deep fried glutinous rice sausage. It’s crispy on the outside with a moist sticky rice filling. T.K.K. Fried Chicken is a popular deep fried errrthing fast food franchise in Taipei catered to an oriental palate – a Taiwanese version of KFC.
Lemon Aiyu Jelly (檸檬愛玉) is a popular lemon/lime dessert jelly similar to an iced tea with lemon jelly.
I added sago or tapioca peals to mine. It’s refreshing and not too sweet. YUM!
Of all the street food I had in Taipei, this was absolute favorite! I only saw this at the Tonghua Night Market! It’s called 炒蛋蔥餅 in Chinese which literally translates to Fried Egg Green Onion Pancake. He starts by frying a disk of green onion pancake dough.
He then drops the egg directly into the deef fryer.
Once the egg hits the oil, the egg instantly starts blistering.
Shortly afterwards, the pancake is placed atop the egg.
The Fried Egg Green Onion Pancake is flipped over once more…
And it’s done son! It’s seriously sooooo good. The egg yolk is still runny and oozes all over fried green onion cake. Every bite has the perfect combination of the crispy flaky green onion cake and the creamy rich egg yolk.
Koah-Bau 刈包 . A white steamed bun served with braised shredded pork, suan cai (pickled vegetable), green onions and crushed peanuts. This was also found at Tonghua Night Market. This seemed like the inspiration for Eddie Huang’s Baohaus in New York City.
The white bun of the Koah-Bau is extremely soft and pillowy which tastes amazing with the braised shredded pork and pickled vegetables.
Yumm fried chicken! I can’t remember where this was from but it was friggin good.
Made to order!
Git in my belly!
Taiwan, 106
臺北市大安區臨江街、通化街至基隆路
p: 886.2.2720.8889
[…] spent a huge chunk of our time venturing through night markets this trip including Tonghua, Raohe Street, and the biggest baddest night market of all Shilin Night market. Shilin is known for […]