the Hualien night market

the cities don't truly come alive here until nightfall. the days are so steamy, it makes sense. the sun sets. the lights go up. and the people flood the streets, wandering the open shops and strolling through the night markets.

the night markets are... an experience. packed with people. roasting hot. stall after stall of new foods and strange smells.

crispy fried squid on a stick. comes in 8 different flavors. [the boys tried curry]

there are stalls with clothes and shoes and jewelry and trinkets. there are stalls with fresh fruit smoothies and shaved ice and rice noodles. there are stalls with boxes of children's toys that look like they might actually be from the late 80s. [or maybe just knock offs of something from the late 80s.]

and then there are stalls that have tall, tall towers of tasty dumplings. yep. those are round wooden baskets stacked sky high full of dumplings, steaming hot all the way up.

that's when we stop to eat. to feast. dumplings and pork buns and hot + sour soup with rice noodles. and all for dirt cheap. a basket of 10 dumplings cost 30NT. which is the equivalent of $1. ONE DOLLAR. the five of us ate until we were stuffed and the bill was less than $10 US. ridiculous. and awesome.

these are steamed pork buns. imagine that someone wrapped a meatball in bread dough and the cooked it by steaming instead of baking. [most definitely not gluten free.] but they were delicious, or so I was told.

and... dumplings. incredibly delicious pork dumplings. also not gluten free. but so tasty I ate them anyway [and suffered a stomach ache for it.] what can I say? woman cannot live on rice noodle alone.

food adventures

crispy rice, steamy vegetables, spicy sauce and an egg on top. this, my friends, is a big sizzling bowl of bi bim bap. and I'm excited about it.

the other night we went out for dinner with some of the other new teachers to the local Korean restaurant, appropriately called "Korea". it was my first time trying Korean food - ever - and I loved it. we will definitely be going back to "Korea" for more bi bim bap. [and who knows, maybe even to actual Korea someday for bi bim bap...]

Husband and I have been making most of our meals at home. if you know us in real life, you know we love food, we love good food, and we love to cook. our pantry is well stocked [we came back from our last Costco run with about 15 pounds of meat] and what we don't have we have been able to borrow from neighbors [crockpot and can opener]. so far, our meals at home haven't been much out of the ordinary: beef stew, stir fry, spaghetti, Mexican, Mexican and Mexican.

eating at home is good. it saves money... and you know exactly what you're eating. going out to eat in Taiwan requires a little bit of bravery [at least for me]. 

first: I am not the most daring person when it comes to trying new foods. I have some weird textural issues and to be honest there was a span of about 10 years where even thinking of eating eggs made me want to gag. [I can do scrambled and over easy now but hard boiled still disgusts me.] I know right off the bat there are some things I won't even attempt. stinky tofu? no way. BUT I do want to experience some culture and some tasty food, and not just eat "Western" all day every day.

I am also somewhat limited in which dishes I can try due to the fact I am both allergic to shellfish and sensitive to gluten. the shellfish allergy makes me nervous, but I do have an epi-pen that I have been carrying with me. most places we have been eating at have at least pictures of the dishes on the menu or even a short English description so I can pick a beef or vegetable dish. also, it's usually pretty easy to see a shrimp head floating in your soup. 

surprisingly, avoiding gluten has been my main difficulty. I lucked out and found one specialty store that carried gluten-free spaghetti. other than that, I haven't seen anything designated at gluten-free. bread and pasta are actually everywhere here. and a lot of things I had assumed were rice-based are definitely not. [like dumplings. which is sad.] trying to determine whether a menu picture of a noodle dish is made with rice noodle or wheat noodle is pretty close to impossible. and then there are things - like the mushroom curry I ate for lunch - that I forget could have gluten in them and eat anyway. [but my head has been aching all afternoon so I think it's safe to say it did.]

rice and vegetables might not sound all that adventurous, but I'm excited about bi bim bap. because let's face it - I will never be one of those people who can walk into a restaurant, point at a menu in a foreign language, and eat whatever wild or unusual dish is set in front of me. but there are still things I can try that are new and delicious... and won't put me in the back of an ambulance.