Relaxing in Encinitas

by dennyglee Categories: Foodie Friday · Travel TuesdayTags: · · · · · 1 Comment

Just north of San Diego, there is the wonderful town of Encinitas.  It is a nice relaxing surfer (or beach bum) town with excellent dining in the heart of the town itself. Juanitas Taco Shop A great little taco shop right off of North Coast Highway 101 that is not your normal tourist cafe – which is perfect!  While normally a corn tortilla fan, they have the best wheat tortillas.  This is a picture of the to-go carnitas plate where the beans are creamy, the rice is delicious yet light, the meat is flavorful, and the avocado and salsa were…

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A touch of Shanghai cuisine (in this case, in Taichung 台中)

by dennyglee Categories: Foodie FridayTags: · · Leave a comment

When I’m in Taiwan – it’s all about the Taiwanese small eats (台灣小吃).  These little shops (you cannot even call them restaurants) line alley ways and markets have some of the most delicious food (though lacking amenities). And if you’re in Taichung (台中), you typically will continue that trend – if for no other reason it has the largest night market in Taiwan (Fengjia Night Market – 逢甲夜市). Yet through all the food chaos, sometimes (albeit only very occasionally) a sit down restaurant is in order. You still want good food, but with service, a place to actually sit down,…

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An all too brief stop over in Tainan (台南)

by dennyglee Categories: Foodie Friday · Travel TuesdayTags: · · · · 6 Comments

For anyone who regularly visits Taiwan, the city of Tainan can easily be missed with the other three major cites of Taipei, Taichung, and Kaohsiung.  Yet that would be a grave mistake if you consider yourself a foodie.  A word of warning, driving in Tainan is atrocious – there are only two major roads going into the city off of Highway 1.  Yet if you brave the driving conditions and/or decide take the train (HSR or TRA), make your way to the old historic district and you will be pleasantly satiated with all sorts of Taiwanese small eats (台灣小吃).  This…

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Taipei Main Train Station has some good eats!

by dennyglee Categories: Foodie Friday · Travel TuesdayTags: · · · Leave a comment

Like many other big cities, the Taipei Main Train Station is a major transportation hub that handles the Taiwan High Speed Rail (HSR), Taiwan Railway (TRA), and the Taipei Mass Rapid Transit (MRT) Subway system.  But in all of the chaos and craziness of moving thousands of people daily is a gold mine of great Taiwanese food – also known as Taiwan Small Eats (台灣小吃).   Here are a couple of my favorites. Potstickers and Hot & Sour Soup This little shop on the 2nd floor of the train station is technically a dim sum restaurant called 小南門點心世界（微風美食廣場）.  Its been around…

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Foodie Sunday: Fugu at 虎福亭 in Tokyo

by dennyglee Categories: Foodie Friday · Travel TuesdayTags: · · · · · · Leave a comment

Okay, normally the foodie posts are done on Friday but after some tweets back and forth, I was inspired to write up the awesome experience eating Fugu (河豚) when we got a chance to visit Tokyo a few years back (thanks for the inspiration @sqlbelle!). For starters, you have to make sure that you order fugu from a sushi chef that has a long history of experience with fugu – one wrong slice and … you’re not going to do so well, eh!?  Near the front of the restaurants that serve fugu, they have a sign showing the number of…

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Foodie Friday: Taiwanese dessert 芋圓

by dennyglee Categories: Foodie FridayTags: · · 4 Comments

I realized that from my tweets and Facebook posts (thanks Facebook Timeline) – I often go outside of the realm of being a nerd and display all sort of passion on travel, outdoor stuff, and of course food! So one of the things, I’m going to start adding to my repertoire of blog posts will be Foodie Friday.  Every Friday (well, maybe every 2nd Friday), I’ll blog post about some awesome food that I like and that you may want to try! Taiwanese “Small Eats” and Night Markets So for my first post, let’s talk about 芋圓 – also known…

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