Top 10 of the best Taiwanese foods and drinks

Top 10 of the best Taiwanese foods and drinks

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1. Braised pork rice

"Where there's a wisp of smoke from the kitchen chimney, there will be lurou fan [braised pork with rice]," goes the Taiwanese saying. The popularity of this humble dish cannot be overstated.

"Lurou fan" is almost synonymous with Taiwanese food.

"Lurou fan is the more ordinary and down-to-earth dish for any Taiwanese," says Rae Lin, founder of dearbnb, a Taiwanese travel website. "From your mother's version of lurou fan to the one served in a restaurant, it's the one dish we truly can't live without."

A good bowl of lurou fan features finely chopped, not quite minced, pork belly, slow-cooked in aromatic soy sauce with five spices. There should be an ample amount of fattiness, in which lies the magic. The meat is spooned over hot rice. A little sweet, a little salty, braised pork rice is comfort food perfected.

2. Beef noodles

You know a dish is an obsession when it gets its own festival. Beef noodle soup inspires competitiveness and innovation in Taiwanese chefs. Everyone wants to claim the "beef noodle king" title.

Whether you're visiting the trendy Pin Chuan Lan's rib-eye steak noodle restaurant or have made a foray into the first makeshift noodle shack you spot, it's almost impossible to have a bad beef noodle experience in Taiwan.

Lin Dong Fang's beef shanks with al dente noodles in herbal soup are a perennial favorite. The streetside eatery's secret weapon is the dollop of homemade chili-butter, added last. But many locals prefer a stall without a sign on Tao Yuan Street (once you spot the queuing crowd you'll know you've arrived).

It's so famous that the store is now synonymous with the street, dubbed "Tao Yuen Street beef noodle" -- most supporters don't actually know its real name is Lao Wang Beef Noodle -- and has inspired a few other wannabes on the same road.

3. Oyster omelet

Here's a snack that really showcases the fat of the land in Taiwan. You've got something from the sea and something from the soil. The eggs are the perfect foil for the little oysters, which are easily found around the island, while sweet potato starch is added to give the whole thing a gooey chewiness -- a signature Taiwan food texture.

No wonder the soup was voted best snack to represent Taiwan in a poll of 1,000 Taiwanese by Global Views Monthly a few years back.

4. Bubble tea

Bubble tea represents the "QQ" food texture that Taiwanese love. The phrase refers to something that is especially chewy, like the tapioca balls that form the "bubbles" in bubble tea. It's said this unusual drink was invented out of boredom.

Chun Shui Tang and Hanlin Tea Room both claim to have invented bubble tea by combining sweetened tapioca pudding (a popular Taiwanese dessert) with tea.

Regardless of which shop did it first, today the city is filled with bubble tea joints. Variations on the theme include taro-flavored tea, jasmine tea and coffee, served cold or hot.

5. Milkfish

How popular is milkfish in Taiwan? So popular that it has its own themed museum in Anping and there's a milkfish cultural festival in Kaohsiung.

The bony fish might pose a challenge for amateurs, but it's loved for its tender meat and economical price tag. Milkfish is prepared in numerous ways -- in a congee porridge, pan-fried, as fish ball soup or braised. For home-style preparation, retro Izakaya-style restaurant James Kitchen serves pan-fried milkfish with lime. A bowl of scallion lard rice is a great complement.

6. Slack Season danzai noodles

You've gotta love a place called Slack Season, and it should be one of the first stops on any culinary trip to Taiwan. The iconic eatery originated in Tainan about a century ago.

A fisherman sold noodles during the slack fishing season and the place became so successful he quit his original trade altogether. The signature bowl of Slack Season noodles is served in shrimp soup with bean sprouts, coriander, minced pork and fresh shrimp. The bowl of comforting flavors is so addictive that a man from Tainan supposedly ate 18 bowls in a row at the restaurant.

7. Pan-fried buns

Like the fluffiness of cake and the crunchiness of potato chips? This pan-fried bun gives you the best of both worlds.

The buns are made with spongy white Chinese bread that's pan-fried on the bottom. Break one open and you reveal a moist, porky filling. A Shanghainese staple, the Taiwanese version differs in two ways: it's slightly bigger and it hits the pan upside-down.

8. Gua bao

In spite of a wave of bao madness overseas in recent years -- a lot are overpriced and underwhelming -- the best gua bao still comes from the island. It's a hamburger, Taiwan-style.

A steamed bun sandwiches a hearty filling of braised pork belly, pickled Chinese cabbage and powdered peanuts. The filling is chopped into small pieces and mixed together so there's a bit of everything in every bite. Take a big mouthful and you get salty, sour and sweet flavors and greasy pork swimming in your mouth.

9. Iron egg

It's called "iron egg" because it's so tough. These chewy little eggs, dyed black from long braising in soy sauce, are a highly addictive Taiwanese food.

Often made from quails' eggs, the protein balls are cooked for hours in soy sauce then air-dried. The process is repeated over several days until the snacks become tough and acquire the desired chewiness.

10. Pineapple cake

This iconic Taiwanese pastry -- mini-pies filled with candied pineapple -- is one of Taiwan's best food souvenirs. For one of the top pineapple cake experiences there's SunnyHills, which uses only local pineapples. The result is a darker filling, rougher texture and sourer taste than most.

The pies at other shops are filled with a mix of pineapple and chewable bits of winter melon. They have a fruity sweetness and a golden casing of crumbly, buttery pastry. Stores that replace pineapple completely with winter melon to cut costs are committing a big no-no.

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