Day 021: Gonguan Supper

Some tea eggs, veggies, garlic, and rice and lets call it a day

Believe it or not the following meal happened on after all the goodness of of Tamsui. I am the energizer bunny of eating, but without the ears or drum. I really have 3 or 4 more meals and items that belong on this blog. I am in America now, but everything that happened in Taiwan is much more interesting than my own food experiences here. Don't worry, we will get to Christmas cookies soon enough.

So the night market in Gonguan is very near a university, and has a youthful vibe. I sat down to this meal with my ultimate hosts and they ordered all of their favorite dishes. It was one of my favorite meals. Lets take a look at why.


Ground beef. Yeah, I know. Its the easy solution in any culture to hardy, comforting deliciousness. Here we have something called marinated ground beef, or as I like to call it Chinese Hamburger Helper. Chinese Hamburger helper pretty much says it all. I inhaled this. It was superb food.

Here we have Taiwanese kim chi, or pickled cabbage. Like many Taiwanese dishes the flavor is distinctly sweet. The cabbage is lightly pickled, and firm which is nice. It tasted great with a little of that ground beef on top and some hot sauce.


Egg drop soup! Its my childhood favorite. This was the first time I encountered a dish from any typical American Chinese restaurant. I was delighted to know that egg drop soup exists in Asia, and is much egg-ier, with a clean broth. Can someone make me this dish every time I get sick?

Pork loin breaded, seasoned and lightly fried with shredded ginger. As beautiful to look at as it is delicious to eat. Sort of an Asian breaded cutlet, because pork is the chicken of Taiwan.

Cooked bamboo? I do not know the name of this dish, nor can I identify all of the ingredients. It was soft and a bit sour in a great way. A really nice compliment to some of the fattier dishes.

Another dish which I shall call by its description. Hunks of pork slow cooked, possibly braised or marinated first, with the skin on. So what you get here is gooey gelatinous skin that is nearly melted on top of fork tender pot-roast like pork. This dish summarizes everything that is great about meat, and stand up to everything that ground meat fails to . Well, maybe if there were some bones in there it could be a little more meaty. But the name of this dish in my mind is "The Great Pork Meat Bowl."

After slurping this all down I feel into a long sleep coma nap. It was my last meal with my hosts, Michael and Katherine, and it was a home run.