NIGHT MARKETS: Where all of the magic happens

One of the major highlights of Taiwan was the night markets- the crowded insanity, strange fried foods, and endless shopping were perfect at providing enought excitement to offset the serene beauty of the mountains and the coast.

Here are some photos from west coast night markets:

 Meat selection for hot pot.

 Floating fish balls

 

Some dessert toppings - boba, beans, and jellies!

 @CG: PASTRIES!

 Noodle mountain and the fixin's

Cooking molds are pretty popular - for things like cream filled mini cakes,

fried dough balls, and these giant seafood dumpling orbs!

 DEEP FRIED CUTTLEFISHES ON STICKS!

 This is jelly fig dessert. It's jello, but it's made with the fuzzy seeds of 

a fruit containing pectin, instead of horse hooves. It's good with lime!

More frying molds.

Your typical diy hot pot stand.

Scallion pancakes gone pizza style.

Grilled, stuffed rice rolls.

 One of my favorites: stew in a mug with puff pastry on top.

 More molds: this time it's quail-egg half-orbs!

Night market from afar.

 Shrimp on a stick!?

 Traditional meat bun baking method.

 

 The ever-present stinky tofu.

One of my fav desserts: A peanut, cilantro, ice cream wrap! Amazing.

the search for lei cha

 After circumnavigating nearly all of Taiwan, we found ourselves in a town in the north west of the island - finally - in front of a wooden bowl full of green tea and nuts, and a large stick with which to pestle it all together. We had finally found Lei Cha: a pounded tea made by Hakka farmers (Hakka= an ethnic Han subgroup originating in northern China; Hakka people have emmigrated to countries all over the world and a large group of them once settled in Taiwan .)

 Grinding the tea.

 Adding the nuts.

 Mochi-like desert to go along

Almost ready to add hot water....

With rice crispies on top! Delish.

Weird Food Update - Everything with Four Legs Except the Table

Many may have heard of people eating weird things in China. What they haven't heard is that part of the reason for this is that people here endured many periods of starvation, one of which was one of the biggest holocausts of the twentieth century: the Great Chinese Famine in which at least 15 million people died. When bureaucratic oversight and crop production failed to meet the needs of the people, they began to eat everything they could up to and including other people.
We did not eat human meat (to the best of our knowledge), but we did get a chance to consume another legendary component of the Chinese starvation cuisine:

 I fed this dog my leftovers.

 It's the circle of life.

 Twice boiled.

 And chewy.  There's not much flavor, so they give you a bowl of fresh mint and chillies to dip it in.

 Unrelated puppy transporting image.

TIGER STYLE (SAMPOST)

 The emperor's Birch root throne from afar.  I had to walk into the next room to take this because it was being photo-guarded.

 When the Daoists want to party they break out the puppets, firecrackers, and start lighting hell paper on fire in the streets!

 It's a wonder more invaluable historical sites haven't burnt down with all the explosives, flaming lanterns, and cigarettes going around here.

 Never trust an English.   (this is an ATM)

 Taiwan beer for Taiwan Gods.

 LOOK I FOUND AN ARROWHEAD

 To enter the tiger pagoda you must enter the tiger.

 Decoration inside the pagoda.

 Here's a Daoist warrior-god with his mount of choice.

 The Buddhist god of tigers.

 A Taiwanese soda bar with jars of preserved fruit.  (probably mostly plum)

 Here's Laura extracting a delicious non-plum fruit from her nose called sala.  It looks like and tastes like strawberries but with the texture of lychee.

 The tiger cliffs of Krabi.

 Instead of white protective sheets, the monks use orange.

 In order to indicate that the blizzard for sale has not be left out in the hot sun Dairy Queen workers will invert the product.  The flavor being tested here is corn.

 A hopefully fake tiger claw next to a very likely faked rhino horn.

Catgun has a great tasting mango fruit leather.

Taiwan Series!

Here's a video of the chant that goes on for an entire half inning behind the dugout of whichever team is up to bat.  LET'S GO LAMIGO LAMIGO LAMIGOOO!