Stinky tofu…never again

Saturday we were supposed to have two lectures, but we only had one because the second lecturer was not able to make it. The first lecture was on Agro-Rural Food in Taiwan. I learned the difference between specialty food and typicality food. Specialty food products are food, beverages, and confections meant for human use that are of special character in their category. This pretty much means that the food is authentic, nutritious, innovative, and is not mass produced. Typicality food is just the opposite of specialty foods; it is mass produced and loses all creative value.

After the lecture we had lunch and then we headed to the National Palace Museum. It has a permanent collection of 693,507 pieces of ancient Chinese artifacts and artworks, making it one of the largest in the world. The collection encompasses over 8,000 years of Chinese history from the Neolithic age to the late Qing Dynasty. It was beautiful but there were a bazillion tourists there and it reminded me of the Louvre and how crowded it gets. We were not able to take pictures while inside the museum but the exhibits of ivory and jade were amazing. We were able to see the famous jade cabbage and carved olive pit. It is crazy how an artist can work with such a delicate material and make something so intricate.

Later that evening we were able to experience xiao-chi or “small eats” of Taiwan at Shilin Night Market. Shilin Night Market is one of the largest night markets in Taipei and offers cheap food, cheap clothing, and some great people watching. I tried papaya and watermelon milk, oyster and shrimp omelet, taro burrito, green tea with tapioca, stinky tofu, and a hot roll with a slab of ice cold butter stuck in the middle. The stinky tofu pretty much tasted like what Greeley, Colorado’s slaughterhouse kill floor smells like, it was horrible! The oyster and shrimp omelet had starch added to it so there was a gelatinous consistency to the egg that just grossed me out, I could not eat it. Everything else was great though!

Taro burrito, De-li-cious!

Shrimp and oyster omelet

Bread and butter!