The Tastiest Road - Raohe Night Market in Taipei Taiwan

Bring comfortable walking shoes!

Some nice takoyaki we found

Night markets are often what people think of when they think of Taiwan - long narrow streets filled with people bustling around trying to get their hands on whatever grub the stands are peddling. But what no one tells you is how much you walk because yes, it might seem obvious because it’s a night market on a street but the feeling of being stuck in foot traffic and your ankles begging and whining for mercy really put things into perspective. Luckily I wasn’t alone and brought my friend Nathan, who was in the neighboring city of Taoyuan for a mission trip (he went back to the US early after fracturing his arm in some serious street ball).

Nathan commuted in by train while I took the MRT and we met up at the arrival gate of the train. When we walked into the night market, it was 5:30pm. There was still light and a comfortable amount of people milling around. Most of the stands hadn’t opened yet, and we were just walking through to scout out what food to get. But as we were walking around I came to a horrible realization: the street was really fucking long! I wasn’t really sure if I was ready for this much exercise when all I came for was the food. Making things worse, as the night went on the number of people only increased to the point where it became nearly impossible not to bump into someone while walking! So after we finished one lap around the entire market Nathan and I tried to escape the swarming masses and lined for the the pepper buns.

Just one bao of steamy goodness!

The pepper buns are one of the main attractions of the night market - they’ve been featured on TV many times and the owner of the stand has realized the hype surrounding it. As you queue up to grab a bag or two, you can watch as the chefs prepare the delicious snack, which is cooked by sucking the raw doughy bun with the meat filling on the inside of a rather large barrel/oven. After a while the chef lifts the lid and graces us all the the magical goodness inside. One of the best things about this method is that it offers a cheap and efficient way of getting a large amount of buns out of the barrel and into the customer's hands. It’s also pretty easy to use. So after trudging through the monstrous line, Nathan and I each got our hands on a piping hot pepper bun. In a bite, you first feel the crunchy outer crust  of the bun before biting into the dough of the bun. Then the meat filling hits and the juice will more than likely scald your gums. But after waiting a short while you can start to taste the liberal amounts of pepper which, combined with the meat juice floating around the little pocket made inside the bun, offers an amazing flavor that I cannot forget.

Just a cool pic of flame roasted beef cubes

After walking a few more laps around the entire market Nathan and I decided to try the liquid nitrogen biscuits. When I was still in the bay, I remember a few people at school eating the same thing, except instead of biscuits it was mochi. Basically, people take some sort of little food item that can withstand the extreme cold of liquid nitrogen and mix it with the liquid form in a cup. When you bite down on the treat and chew with your mouth closed all the vapor from the dry ice and the hot air of your mouth will come out through your nose! It looks pretty funny - like a dragon blowing smoke out of its nose but be careful and vigorously shake off the liquid nitrogen before eating because Nathan got one stuck on his tongue (thankfully it melted off).

Smoke! Vapor! Dry ice!

So Raohe Night Market does live up to the hype - although I only wrote about two of the things we ate, Nathan and I didn’t have room in our stomachs for the rest of the market.  I definitely recommend checking the place out with friends, which makes for a fun night out after a long day of work!

You can find me on Instagram as @stumpyeatsfood and on yelp at theplumpcat.yelp.com. You can also check out more of my photos on Flickr! If you've got a restaurant recommendation or even a recipe that you think I should try, send it to me at ryanjchen2@gmail.com! Thank you for reading!