Day 3
Started our day slightly later after our party last night. We headed out in the late morning for an early lunch. Walking past this commercial building and saw Ogilvy-Taiwan! #advertising
The hype of transformer which disappointed us. The sequel can never beat the first.
We arrived at ATT4FUN, a pretty new shopping mall which was only 15 mins walk away from our apartment. Cand's friend recommended this Hong Kong restaurant-San Yuan for some Chinese/Canoto food. Located at level 5, it was quite difficult to locate and we had to ask around before we found it.
Looking at the stacked of signed bamboo steamed basket, their signature dish must be XLBs.
Appetizer was Edamame seasoned with pepper and some other spices. Healthy and appetizing.
Stir Fried Cabbage 清炒高丽菜 (NT$220) - Sweet and crunchy. We are devoid of vegetables from the past two days with all the fried street food.
Salted egg yolk pork ribs 金沙排骨 (NT$320), anything with egg yolk is awesome!! Every single pork ribs is fried till crisp with the salty egg yolk batter, we swiped it out rather quickly.
Prawn rolls you tiao 油条虾卷 (NT$320) This is our favorite dish prawn roll fried with you tiao, crispy and goes very well with the Mayo and fish flakes. You tiao and salad is always the popular dish at Tze Char places.
Signature Xiao Long Baos 招牌小笼汤包 (NT$120)- NT$120 for 6 XLBs that's only about SGD$5!! Hot piping soup wrapped in the delicate XLB, it tasted average, nothing special. I still prefer those from DTF.
Handmade Porcupine Mantous 养身刺猬小馒头 (NT$100) for 3 pieces. We added the pair of eyes to it for some photo taking purposes heh. I didn't quite like it, the skin was too thick and hard(maybe we left it out for too long), and it is quite blend.
Chocolate Xiao Long Baos 巧克力小笼包 (NT$264) This is the top ten dishes recommended, sorry for the unappetizing picture but the chocolate lava was flowing out after I took the first bite. Heard of chocolate lava cakes but what about Chocolate XLBs? Sweet dessert to end of the meal.
The total meal cost us NT$1654 which is about SGD$12 per pax. For a restaurant standard it is pretty cheap but I guess because we did not order a lot of dishes as we planned to visit the Hello Kitty Cafe.
No. 12, Song Shou Rd, 5FL
台北市松壽路12號4F
Tel:(02) 7737-5088
Operating hours: 11am - 11pm
Nearest MRT: Taipei City Hall
Took the metrol to our next stop Zhong Xiao Fu Xing to visit the Hello Kitty Cafe. They are forever crowded so please make reservations prior to your visit. We called in to reserve a table on our 1st day(and even so we had to wait for quite a while before we were brought to our table.) Gloomy shot because it was raining the whole day:(
Everything is decorated to the Hello Kitty theme, pink alert! I am just wondering why is their utensils not Hello Kitty theme. Fans of Hello Kitty will definitely get crazy here. Cand (the hard core HK fan) felt that she actually belong there! LOL.
We actually heard bad reviews about their food from our friends. We were warned not to try their mains but maybe just dessert. There was a minimum spending of NT$300/per person, that about S$12.
Toffee Banana French Milkshake:
KT Oreo Cheese pie:
Golden Kitty Chocolate tart:
Decided to surprise the July Baby for an advanced Bday celebration at the cutest cafe. She had a Kitty German pudding with the rest of the kitty desserts on the table.
Because of the minimum spending limit, we each had to other a dessert set meal which comes with a drink. Nothing fantastic, mostly disappointing and we couldn't bring ourselves to finish it. Probably only the chocolate tart was average but slightly a little too dense and dry for me. Recommend to go for summer tea or some herb tea which complement well for the sweet desserts.
The very kawaii washroom for the ladies, themed in HK as well. Even thou cam whoring in the toilet is so passé (secondary school days) but we cnnt helped ourselves in such a cute setting.
Hello Kitty Sweets Cafe
No 90, Section 1 Daan Road Daan District, Taipei
Tel: +886 2 2711 1132
Operating Hours: 11.30am – 10pm
Nearest Train Station: Zhongxiao Fuxing Station
Next stop was to the Taipei version of orchard road. Non-stop raining day kinda dampened our mood a little when we had to carry our wet umbrellas with us everywhere. Take Exit 6 to the main shopping street in XMD and you will see the digital movie boards, signboards, crowd along the streets.
Just right outside exit 6 is 1973 香香鸡 stall. We were recommended to try their Best selling fried chicken.
Even though we were all very full for lunch and desserts, we just had to.
Next stop: 阿宗面线 The best mee sua I ever had.
It is quite prominent with its lighted signature, but don't be shy to just ask for directions. The people in TW are really very friendly and helpful.
Super love this bowl of mee sua with the chewy pig skin/intestine and goes very well with vinegar(I had it with extra vinegar). So many people crowding outside the shop, slurping on these bowl of mee sua. So good that we went back for another bowl on our last day.
Ah Zong Mian Xian 阿宗麵線
No. 8~1 Emei St., Taipei (East XMD Pedestrian Area)
No. 8~1 Emei St., Taipei (East XMD Pedestrian Area)
台北市峨嵋街8號之1 (Xi Men Ding)
Tel: (02) 02-2388-8808, 2388-8182
Tel: (02) 02-2388-8808, 2388-8182
Muah Chee Muah Chee, Jo and I had a thing for chewy muah chee. Side track, there is this stall at Old Airport food centre, beside the famous Wanton mee stall selling muah chee and some other food(can't remember). Super love the auntie's muah chee because it is so chewy and bouncy(dio dio).
I didn't quite like it because of the peanut power, I thought there is this slight weird taste that I can't describe but Jo loves it.
The girls love the quail eggs with its dippng sauce, it was too salty for me but still delicious.
I also heard good reviews about their 天天利－卤肉饭 but it wasn't as good as the one we tried on day 1. We had the best 卤肉饭 (Lu Rou Fan). We tasted the best 卤肉饭 on day 5 after our road trip out of the city. Will post about it soon.
We also ordered a plate of orh lua to share. This is so different from Chomp Chomp oyster omolette, there was a lot of starch which is super gluey and unhealthy. Was expecting more egg but I think this is usually how to fry it in TW.
In the evening, we head over to Shi Da Night Market / 師大夜市. On our way to the night market, we passed by this bao shop- 永丰盛. You really have to try their baos, here especially the meat bun(is similar to our da bao in Singapore). I was greedy and wanted to try the peanut bun too even though I was full from the snacks we had in XMD earlier on.
Peanut bun- Appear a little dry but it had a thick peanut paste in the bun, yummeh!
Hot piping juicy meat after we peeled the soft bun apart, so xing fu eating this.
Here at Shi Da Night Market / 師大夜市, the clothes here are a little pricier than Shi Lin night market but they do have more stalls selling vintage and stylish clothes, slightly more unique and less mainstream.
If you are at Shi Da, remember to try 大台北平價滷味. I have been wanting to try their 滷味 everytime we visit the 7-11 there. Initially, we only wanted to order a little (一点点) just to try, but it came out as one big plate.
Looks like our Yong Tau Fu stall.
There were a lot of bones which was quite annoying to eat it. It was also quite oily with the sesame oil, it didn't quite suit our taste. Headed back to Shi Lin Night Market for more fav chicken cutlet thereafter. The night market usually closes at 2am so we had some time to #nightmarkethop.
Day 4
Finally living up to our name and having brunch at a cafe- The Coffee Alley 咖啡弄 @ATT4Fun. We heard so many good reviews about this cafe, one of the more popular cafe in Taipei, they have two branches, and we choose the one at ATT4FUN because it is of walking distance from our apartment.
We made a reservation before hand, worrying that it may be quite packed on a Sunday morning. The cafe has a capacity of approximately 50 seat, not a big cafe but smartly integrated mirrors to make the cafe appear bigger.
Morning faces but that doesn't stop us from taking photos.
White chocolate mocha: A sweeter version of coffee that suits my liking.
I ordered Vanilla Coffee which shares the same concept of Affogato. I tried the iced affogato from Oriole which was amazing. So I was tempted to order this drink not knowing it has double shot espresso. The vanilla ice-cream melted so quickly in the hot drink, maybe I should have just stick to Iced Vanilla Coffee.
Sea Salt Caramel Latte which comes with whipped cream with caramel drizzled on top. I usually don't eat whipped cream because of unnecessary calories but this was a good match with a sip of latte.
Mocha:
Toast Skagen Shrimp Salad with Potato was their signature dish and also our top favourite. With fresh shrimp salad on the crispy toast, appetitizing citrus looking dressing to go along with the salad. And for potato lover like me, so happy to see baked potatoes serves as sides.
Cheese, Croissaint, sweet corn , fresh green and mayo-nese looking dressings, all my favorite on this plate is the Loin Cheese Croissants Sandwich! Only comment is that the croissant can be toast crispier.
Tuna Curry Ciabatta Sandwich-Strong and unique curry tuna with dressings for the salad. Not exactly my kind of breakfast but my friends like it.
Mustard Bacon Cheese Sandwich:
Not just coffee, The Coffee Alley is also popular for its Waffles. We decided to go with Waffle with Fresh Strawberry, Ice Cream and Custard despite being very full from the main. Unlike Belgian waffles, their waffles are thicker and denser. More doughy and taste more like a bread/ cake. But this is how they do it in TW.
Behind the scene- most of the time the three of us will be snapping and the others will be moaning and grunting while waiting to dig in.
3FL, ATT 4 Fun (across Taipei 101),
XinYi District, No. 12 Song Shou Road
Tel: (02) 7737-0700
Agnes b. cafe with its boutique located in Uni-Hankyud epartment store, just above the Taipei City Hall station. This is also the nearest station from ATT4Fun
Afternoon shopping was at Wu Fen Pu / 五分埔 where retail shops get their wholesale stocks from and is believe to have more variety here. I managed to grab a few buys before we had to rush off for our next itinerary. Shopping here isn't very cheap as firstly they know we are tourists and the price will generally be hiked up or secondly, we usually get in low quantity so we don't get to enjoy wholesale prices. Do remember to hassle further when you are on the street shopping, even if is 10cent difference(my auntie motto when it comes to shopping).
Photo credit: Lovethekisses
We left WuFenPu after a short few hours to go for our dance class. One of our mission for this trip was to attend at least one dance class. If you do not know, I met my group of #brunchdategirls through SIM DanceArt, and we are all passionate dancers that loves to eat as well. We braved the storm, getting lost and drenched and after walking down a couple of streets before we arrived at Dance Soul.
Dance Soul is one of the more popular commercial dance school. Most of their dance instructors are dancers for famous Pop star artists and you often see them on TW variety shows.
Photo credit: Lovethekisses
DanceSoul merchandise:
We attended Street Jass-Beginner level. Isnt exactly very beginner but I think maybe some of us are getting a little rusty doing street dance. It was really fun except that I was so tired from the walking under the rain and had a hard time catching my breath in the super cold studio.
Our instructor 阿帮, who is so sexy when she dance, look at her mesmerizing expression and pose in just a split second.
We headed back to XMD and wanted to visit the KTV there in Taipei.
The night loom of XMD, with all the neon lightboards and screens. Mobile poster truck with Transformer on, sadly the movie was a huge disappointment.
So our evening plans was to Sing K and enjoy the buffet spread. it is recommended that TW KTV has really good service with buffet spread offered for guests to fill up their tummy while singing. But when we got there their buffet was about to close so we decided to skip KTV. For those who are interested, remember to google for the popular KTV house which offers yummy buffet spread and go earlier to make your moolah worth.
We settled for dinner across the KTV house Taipei Milk King / 台北牛乳大王. It was really cold and quiet but didn't expect the food to be these bad.
I ordered seafood baked rice but I didnt quite like it. Not milky enough and the seafood wasn't fresh at all. Only acceptable thing was my top layer baked cheese.
After our disappointing dinner. We walked a couple of streets to find the shaved iced San Xiong Mei / 三兄妹. Another famous shaved ice-shop was Ice Monster (I didnt't get a chane to try it but I heard is one of the best in Taipei). We ordered Matcha shaved ice with strawberry(special order) and all time favourite- mango shaved ice with mangoes, 芒果冰.
Really cooling for hot summer day. This may not the best I have eaten though. I would prefer more condensed milk on my ice, though it sounds really unhealthy.
- 108 臺北市萬華區漢中街23號
- Daily 11am - 11pm
- Tel:+886 2 2381 2650
My favourite drink from TW 7-11. Very milky and sweet but so additive to keep on drinking until I finished it.
XOXO,
Smileybrows
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