Taipei: Boba Waffle! Enough Said - Day 3

Day 3 of my trip meant the start of the real reason why I came to Taipei, work. Since all the bigger conventions and shows always take place at the World Trade Center in ShinYi area of Taipei, I had a bevy of options in terms of what to eat around the area. Mostly restaurants, chains, and fine dining since it is a business hub.

For lunch, I got in contact with an old high school friend and we decided to grab lunch at the huge Shin Kong Mitsukoshi 新光三越 in the area, and headed to the A9 building for Saboten 勝博殿!

Saboten, a katsu specialty shop from Shinjuku in Japan, is actually where I got my first introduction to legit katsu, and by legit, I meant grinding the sesame with a mortar for the katsu sauce and realizing that it is important to fry it right so the breading is crispy but pork is juicy. It is also where I learned that there are many different types of pork katsu and the cut used can be a huge difference! I haven't been to Saboten in awhile since I was still in high school the last time I went so definitely excited.

Saboten 勝博殿

Shin Kong Mitsukoshi A9

9, 6F, Songshou Rd., Taipei

新光三越信義店A9館

台北市信義區松壽路9號6F

Saboten.

Part of the menu. Prices have gone up :P

As with all good katsu place, they have unlimited cabbage for you to eat with katsu!

Pickled items. Don't know what type of bean it is but the daikon was tasty.

Grinding your own sesame to release the aroma! Very important! Katsu + grounded sesame takes the katsu sauce to a whole difference level.

I like to grind it fine.

Their katsu sauce. Not too vinegary.

Together.

Cabbage with a little bit of the katsu sauce as dressing. Awesome.

Combo A with tempura shrimp, pork loin katsu, pork belly katsu. $430NT, around $14 US. Not bad.

Pork belly katsu. Of course the fatty belly isn't used, but the leaner parts of pork belly. Extremely juicy since there's more fat and that breading is fried to a perfect golden brown.

Pork loin katsu, which is the typical cut for tonkatsu. A little thinner than what I remembered :P

Tempura shrimp in the same panko breading. Served with house-made tartar sauce.

Miso soup. It is weird... miso soup in Taiwan is always sweeter than the ones in the States. Must be the type of miso used.

Steamed egg! Silky.

The combo also comes with free ice cream so went with the matcha ice cream. Peanut powder is lightly dusted.

Saboten is still a good place to grab some good katsu after all these years. There's also a lot more other katsu specialty shops in Taipei now but Saboten will always have a special place in my heart. Did wish the katsu portions were bigger though :P

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After lunch, I wanted a drink and saw a Ten Ren at the ATT Center, so decided to stop by for a drink. They were offering a combo special and I couldn't resist :P

Boba Chocolate Waffle. Boba. Chocolate. Waffle. How could I resist???

They warm it up for you once it is ordered so the chocolate inside stays gooey. Nice crunchy outside and a doughy inside with gooey chocolate.

Boba inside the waffle! The boba at Ten Ren is cooked in brown sugar so you taste that caramel-y flavor. The boba is still "Q" too. What a genius creation!

Fresh milk green tea. You can never go wrong with any drinks from Ten Ren. So much better than Tea Station in the States.

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For dinner, I was meeting up with a family friend and since she was taking the high speed rail from Kaushiung, I figured we should meet near Taipei Main Station so she wouldn't have to travel far and we ended up at Q Square, which is this new department store.

After looking at our selections, I saw that there was a Thai restaurant and it's been awhile since I've had Thai food in Taiwan we decided on Thai and headed upstairs to 晶湯匙 Crystal Spoon!

晶湯匙 Crystal Spoon

Q Square 4th Floor

1, Lane 1, 4F, Chengde Rd, Taipei

京站購物中心4F

台北市承德路一段1號4F

Ong Choy with shrimp paste. Ong choy, aka water spinach, aka morning glory. Whatever you want to call it, ong choy is one of my favorite vegetables, especially the ones from Taiwan. The Thai-style for preparing these in Taiwan is using shrimp paste versus soy bean sauce. Yes, I am biased so I like Taiwan's version better :P

Grilled Pork Jowl. Pork jowl is the lower part of the pork's cheek so there's a little bit of tendon and muscle fiber but it makes it a very good cut in terms of texture! Comes with a sweet & spicy dipping sauce and oddly enough, kimchi.

One of my favorite Taiwanese Thai dishes, Lemon Pepper Fish. Steamed stripped bass prepped with a mouth-watering lemon dressing. We could've picked between grouper or stripped bass, but we went with the stripped bass since it was cheaper :P

Chicken Red Curry for $1NT! If you spent over a certain amount, you get to order the daily special for only $1NT more. Why the hell not :P A little bit of kick and nice red curry flavor.

Comes with white bread to dip it in. White toasts work with everything haha.

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After I saw her off at the high speed rail, I headed back towards Zhongxiao Fushing to meet up with others at Fourplay, trying to get the to-go cup. Met and made some new friends and we tried a few more of the ones we had last night.

This was definitely the most unique one I tried that night: marijuana. Comes in a shotglass that's shaped like... a bong. They add dry ice in it to imitate the smoke, and you are suppose to lift the orange and drink the shot through the straw! Very creative I must say :P

Went to bed a little sad since it was gonna be my last night in Taipei for this trip, but excited since I'll heading off to NYC once I get back!

Lake Tahoe: Red Hut Cafe

Fresh pow! No, not really. Sadly the weekend I went to Tahoe this winter with Ben, Ahrhan, Justin, and Frank turned out to be one of the warmest week in NorCal. Boarded Saturday and guess what, freaking snows overnight so on Sunday, Tahoe was covered by a white and pristine blanket of snow. Lame.

Of course coming to Tahoe meant that I had to try something that's a little unique, and ended up going to Red Hut Cafe in South Tahoe. Red Hut Cafe is actually a really really popular breakfast/brunch place and it has done so well that there is actually 3 locations in and around Tahoe. There's even a new swanky location close to Heavenly but we decided to go to the original, located just a little bit south of South Tahoe. Again, thanks to Carolyn for pointing this spot out!

Red Hut Cafe

2723 Lake Tahoe Blvd

South Lake Tahoe, CA 96150

www.redhutcafe.com

Small spot.

The OG Red Hut.

History of Red Hut (click to enlarge).

The breakfast menu! I really wanted to try everything.

Since 1959. Crazy.

After around 15minutes, I finally decided on the French Toast with sausages. Thick slices of toasts with this awesome egg batter. So simple but man it was good. Perfect with the breakfast sausage as well.

The Waffle Sandwich, which comes with eggs, sausages or bacon, and a piece of waffle. Perfectly cooked sunny side up. Ben expected the thick Belgian waffles but I actually prefer these style of waffles more. Would've been even better it it was crisped a little more like Roscoe's.

Strawberries, not fresh since not in season, for Justin's sweet tooth. Perfect with waffles, pancakes, or French toasts.

One of their most famous, The Usual. So many people order it that they just call it the Usual. 2 eggs, hasbrowns, and biscuit & gravy. This is what you call hearty. I love the white savory gravy and can't imagine eating this every morning but man it was good.

I love the whole history and the feel of this place. Not to mention, I'm a sucker for breakfast foods. Even though it's nothing special, Red Hut does what they are known for real well and definitely coming back here next winter!

Vancouver: Life is Too Short for Bad Coffee - Day 3

For our last day in Vancouver, we decided to take it easy and do some shopping to bring back to family and friends, but of course, gotta visit at least one breakfast/brunch spot and just so happens there's a place in Vancouver that's known for their waffles and brunch.

Before that Amanda (who's still our driver and guide for the last day) brought us to Urban Fare, which is sorta like a... Dean & Deluca to me. It's essentially a market in the city but it is extremely pricey. I think I saw Breyer's ice cream going for $8!! It's like... 2 for $5 here haha. Nevertheless, we still went because you can buy some speciality items from Canada that you can't find it other markets.

Urban Fare! Modern looking place.

Of course every high end/specialty market has a crazy deli section and Urban Fare is no different. I wish they offered samples :P

So I ended up buying these Rogers' Chocolate Bar. The reason they are so special is that the the one in purple wrapper is actually Ice Wine Chocolate Truffle. Ice wine! I've actually had it once before (thanks Michael), and it's awesome. Nice semi sweet chocolate with hints of ice wine. You're not gonna get drunk off these but the taste is there.

There's also a cafe inside the market. Again, nice modern decor with wood accents.

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After Urban Fare, we decided to go to our brunch spot only to find out that we had about an 1 hour wait. I guess it's a good thing since that's a sign of popularity but man I was crazy hungry since it was around noon by the time we got there. I was also surprised to find out that this place had 4.5 stars on Yelp with 180+ reviews!

Café Medina

556 Beatty St

Vancouver, BC V6B 2L3

The front with the line.

Hmmm I wonder what I should get from here... maybe some coffee and waffles? :P

So true, so true.

So the whole time I was thinking of those big fluffy pancakes, but nope, theirs is more like the size of... a slightly bigger cookie. They make it before hand then lets it sit on the rack and toast it when the orders come.

Finally seated and the menu! Price is reasonable!

Of course HAD to get coffee so I went for the dark chocolate mocha. I actually like it a lot, especially since mocha is usually too sweet. The dark chocolate is a nice touch! Barista is hella good too at pouring.

Diana's milk chocolate lavender mocha. It's creamy and you can really taste the lavender.

White chocolate pistachio mocha. Yes they do specialize in mochas and this is really rich as well.

Vanilla latte. I like how they serve it in a clear glass so you can see the layer of steamed milk.

Mimosa, always a good choice for brunch.

Finally! The waffles! For each order of the waffles, you get one sauce so we went for three to share: milk chocolate lavender, fig orange marmalade, and the raspberry caramel.

The waffles are a little small but I guess they found that magic formula to have that perfect crispy & fluffy texture.

The caramel was definitely my favorite since the raspberry adds a little bit of tartness to the caramel. The milk chocolate lavender is interesting and the chocolate is extremely rich. I'm still not that big of a fan of lavender though. As for the fig orange marmalade, imagine a perfect orange marmalade with just a slight hint of fig.

As for the main dish, I went for the Fricasse, which is braised short rib that comes with 2 fried eggs, roasted potatoes, caramelized onions, arugula, and smoked applewood cheddar. The short rib was full of flavor, making it a perfect choice if you're looking for a savory dish for your brunch. The eggs were over easy and I loved it when the yolk broke in half and runs all over the ribs, potatoes, and onions. It also comes with this huge grilled rosemary Foccacia bread that's perfect for soaking up all the remaining sauces!

My favorite was the Tagine though. It's rare to not see a benedict of some sort on a brunch menu but this is the closest thing that comes to it because of the 2 poached eggs it comes with. Besides a hollandaise sauce, there's an addicting spicy tomato stew with Mediterranean spices, and comes with merguez sausage, sundried black olives, and cilantro. It has just enough kick to make you keep eating. The sausage is not overly fatty and the olives and cilantro completes the Mediterranean flavor of the dish.

For the Foccaia bread with Tangine, it also comes with this great hummus with mint leaves that makes it refreshing.

The Paella is their take on the traditional Spanish dish. Comes with a baked egg, curried orzo, Hungarian chorizo, zucchini, red pepper, roasted corn, grano padano, watercress, tomatoes, and avocado. Yea, that's a party in your mouth for sure!

Canard Confit. We were totally expecting a duck leg confit, but it's actually sandwiches with shredded duck confit, sour cherry compote, brie, and anjou pears between pecan craisin sourdough. Watercress and caramelized pecans are on the side. It's a little disappointing since we were expecting a juicy fatty duck. The sandwich is still really tasty and I especially enjoyed the sour compote. Definitely makes you pucker a little.

I can definitely see why Cafe Medina is so popular in Vancouver. It's something that we don't even have in LA. The menu is just different enough to draw your interest but also familiar enough that you don't feel like you are adventuring too much out of your comfort zone. Great spot!

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Now... I still haven't had a true milk tea yet in Vancouver even though Tea Spot in Crystal Mall was pretty good. Lots of people recommended Pearl Castle so right before we headed towards the airport, we made a quick stop!

Pearl Castle

3779 Sexsmith Rd Ste 1128

Richmond, BC V6X 3Z9

Pearl Castle. Best way to describe it is that it is similar to Tea Station. They serve drinks with a full menu.

Connie and Diana's drink. Totally forgot what they ordered haha.

Amanda's green tea and I went with oolong milk tea with boba, or "bubbles" as they call it in Canada (weirdos :P). Of course got it with half sugar.

Milk tea was really good actually but the boba needed work. A lot of work. It was too bland and not "Q" enough.

After Pearl Castle we went straight for the airport and after taking a bunch of pictures at the drop-off zone, Connie & I finally boarded and said our goodbyes to Canada, but not before Amanda secretly stuffing these into my backpack...

St. Germaine's pineapple bun and sweet evaporated milk bun! Totally saved me on the flight since I was STARVING. Thanks Amanda!

Next time though, definitely making a stop in Whistler for some fresh pow! I saw sooo many people with their snowboards at the airport and all over Vancouver. Time to save up!