O n any given evening, no matter how humid or muggy the weather is, browsers in Shida night market are sure to see a line in front of Hohomei’s (好好味) take-out window. Customers gaze intently at a window filled with fresh buluo bao (菠蘿包) and a bright yellow menu with Hohomei’s mascot, a smiling bun with a melting pat of butter sticking out of its noggin.
From the outside, the buluo bao, which is basically a butter sandwich that originated in Hong Kong, looks too ordinary to be worthy of such cult-like devotion. But don’t let yourself be deceived by its unremarkable appearance. The delicately crunchy top layer resembles a crystalline sugar cookie; it melts as soon as you bite into it. The bottom half is warm, fluffy bread enrobed by a thin, flaky crust. These different textures provide a counterpoint to the decadently thick pat of chilled sweet butter in the middle.
When you bite into your warm buluo bao, your teeth meet at the butter, which feels cool against your tongue but immediately begins to melt, soaking the bread and bathing your taste buds in creamy delight. The name of Hohomei’s signature buluo bao is binghuo (冰火), which literally means “ice fire.” The name presumably refers to the warmth of the bun against the cool butter slice, but the “fire” could just as well refer to the burning longing you will have in your heart for buluo baos after your first one — as well as the heartburn you might also have if you overindulge in the fatty treats.
Speaking of heartburn, Hohomei also serves up very rich Hong Kong dishes in its two-story restaurant. The restaurant’s signature noodles come laden with a farm’s worth of meat products. Take, for example, the silver medal cart noodles (銀牌車仔麵, NT$120), so-called because they used to be sold by street vendors. This smorgasbord is topped with pork meatballs, fish balls, sweet red sausage, pork intestines slices, grilled pork, gelatinized duck blood, a chicken wing and a fried egg (some veggies are also tossed in for a bit of crunch). The gelatinized duck blood (鴨血 ) might not sound very appetizing, but it is the best part of the dish. The tender pieces have a taste reminiscent of black pudding (minus the filler) and a soft but appealingly firm texture. I chose mild mala (麻辣) broth, but curry and clear broths are also available. A variation on the dish is the premium mixed meat cart noodles (超級雜碎車仔麵 , NT$100), smothered in fish balls, asparagus, pork rinds, squid, gelatinized duck blood, sliced pork intestines, a chicken wing and a fried egg.
For an alternative to the noodles dishes, try the pork-covered white rice (食神港式豬扒飯, NT$100). The pork is cooked just right and very rich in flavor. The dish is a lot more basic than the cart noodles, but just as filling and a little less overwhelming.
In late October of 1873 the government of Japan decided against sending a military expedition to Korea to force that nation to open trade relations. Across the government supporters of the expedition resigned immediately. The spectacle of revolt by disaffected samurai began to loom over Japanese politics. In January of 1874 disaffected samurai attacked a senior minister in Tokyo. A month later, a group of pro-Korea expedition and anti-foreign elements from Saga prefecture in Kyushu revolted, driven in part by high food prices stemming from poor harvests. Their leader, according to Edward Drea’s classic Japan’s Imperial Army, was a samurai
The following three paragraphs are just some of what the local Chinese-language press is reporting on breathlessly and following every twist and turn with the eagerness of a soap opera fan. For many English-language readers, it probably comes across as incomprehensibly opaque, so bear with me briefly dear reader: To the surprise of many, former pop singer and Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) ex-lawmaker Yu Tien (余天) of the Taiwan Normal Country Promotion Association (TNCPA) at the last minute dropped out of the running for committee chair of the DPP’s New Taipei City chapter, paving the way for DPP legislator Su
It’s hard to know where to begin with Mark Tovell’s Taiwan: Roads Above the Clouds. Having published a travelogue myself, as well as having contributed to several guidebooks, at first glance Tovell’s book appears to inhabit a middle ground — the kind of hard-to-sell nowheresville publishers detest. Leaf through the pages and you’ll find them suffuse with the purple prose best associated with travel literature: “When the sun is low on a warm, clear morning, and with the heat already rising, we stand at the riverside bike path leading south from Sanxia’s old cobble streets.” Hardly the stuff of your
Located down a sideroad in old Wanhua District (萬華區), Waley Art (水谷藝術) has an established reputation for curating some of the more provocative indie art exhibitions in Taipei. And this month is no exception. Beyond the innocuous facade of a shophouse, the full three stories of the gallery space (including the basement) have been taken over by photographs, installation videos and abstract images courtesy of two creatives who hail from the opposite ends of the earth, Taiwan’s Hsu Yi-ting (許懿婷) and Germany’s Benjamin Janzen. “In 2019, I had an art residency in Europe,” Hsu says. “I met Benjamin in the lobby