JANUARY: Taipei Eats

For my January post, it's gotta be about my trip to Taiwan! It's been 5 years since I've been back... Which is crazy! Cuz before that, I went back every year! I definitely missed it. 

The food this time around was a bit disappointing though. Since I was there during Chinese New Year, I didn't realize most of the restaurants/businesses would be closed! T_T We still had some pretty good stuff though. Here are my top 5 bites or meals! (In no particular order.)

ManTangHung Spicy Hot Pot
Inside Bellavita Mall by Taipei 101.
B2, No.28, Songren Rd., Xinyi Dist., Taipei City
Phone: 02-2723-6300

AYCE spicy hot pot! There are different menu packages to choose from. We did the cheapest which is NT$799 I think and it was already more than enough options. My parents have done the more expensive options and said it's not much better. They even gave us complimentary seafood platter. This is a fancy hot pot place. The decor was very modern. They had several private rooms for larger parties. And they have not one but FIVE self serve ice cream stations.

So good! They also have other dishes to supplement the hot pot. Like Lu Rou Fan (braised pork on rice)... one of my all time favorite Taiwanese dishes. Hot pot in Taiwan is one of the best imo. Quote me on that!

Ming Yue Tang Bao (Soup Dumplings)
No.40, Lane 171 Tonghua Street, Taipei 106 Taiwan
Phone: +886 2 2733 8770

One of my must visit places in Taipei. I'm so happy this place is within 5 min walking distance from my Grandma's apartment so we'd been going here for most of my life. We almost always never have to wait and my family and I think it's better than Ding Tai Fung. Yea, I said it. I think DTF is overrated and overpriced and why wait in line if I have a better option!

Soup Dumplings

Sauteed Cabbage

Sauteed Water Spinach

Black Sesame Mochi (with peanut powder). OMG, so yum!

Tsujiri
Inside SOGO Food Court
106, Taiwan, Taipei City, Da’an District, Section 4, Zhongxiao East Road, No. 45 B1
Phone: +886 2 2721 6863

I'm pretty sure I've seen a shop with this name when I was in Japan. It's probably a chain but also maybe just a popular name?

I got a ceremonial matcha (matcha with water) and a matcha cheesecake. It was a combo so I saved some money! The matcha was beautifully green and so good. The unsweentened tea paired well with the cheesecake, even though the cheesecake itself wasn't too sweet. I loved the layers and the bitterness of the matcha. One of the best desserts I had on this trip.

Thai Town
Inside Shin Kong Mitsukoshi Xinyi Place A9
7, No. 9, Songshou Road, Xinyi District, Taipei City, Taiwan 110
Phone: +886 2 2723 9987

Thai Green Papaya Salad. Great flavors and textures!

Special Rice. So pretty! I'm not really sure what the red specks are in there... I didn't taste anything particular. But I love that it was served in a silver container... kinda made it feel like fancy rice.

Yellow Curry Chicken. Super tender. So tasty.

Stir Fry Water Spinach. My most favorite vegetable!

This was one of our more expensive meals. It was just me and my mom so typically we'd just go to the food court and get something for way cheaper. But we saw this and she said it was good, so we went. Funny though, it's STILL inside a department store!! Wow! One of the best meals of my trip. We ordered a lot of food but we ate it all!!! 100% would go back to this place.


The Who Cafe
110, Taiwan, Taipei City, Xinyi District, Zhuangjing Road, No. 214 2F
Phone: +886 2 2758 6512

On my last day, my parents and I went to this cute little cafe recommended by my cousin. I told her I wanted to go somewhere with 3D latte art and she found this place online. It turned out to be kind of a cat cafe. All the decor were were of cats as were the cups and saucers. They even had a resident cat walking around the cafe.

I got a matcha latte (unsweet) and it came with a cute kitty 3D latte art. The mug was saucer and spoon were also TOO CUTE!

We got dinner as well. The prices for food were a bit expensive compared to what other options we had but the portions turned out to be pretty big and they were really delicious! I love that there were multiple veggie options on each plate. You order the protein and it comes with whatever vegetable options they had that day. I LOVED all of them! Cabbage, creamed corn, spinach. And the protein was served in a super cute mini cocotte (dutch oven). Very filling meal... I didn't have room for dessert. I wish I had discovered this place earlier cuz I would've gone back for more drinks and dessert!

Extra entry ~~
2nd favorite dessert of the trip. Two Day Souffle Pancake.

Inside Shin Kong Mitsukoshi Xinyi Place A8
No. 12, Songgao Road, Xinyi District, Taipei City, Taiwan 110
Phone: +886 923 312 545

Inside another food court. Lol. The Chinese food courts are just on a whole other level. You'd never need to go to a free standing restaurant. There are SO many options and the decor is always on point. They make the American food courts look so so sad.

The fluffy Japanese pancakes are quite common in Taipei now. I saw several places that did this... although they all looked slightly different. My dad and I wanted dessert after lunch so we just went to the first one we saw. SO FREAKING SOFT! This wasn't nearly as tall as the one I had at Gram in Tokyo but I haven't seen one as tall as them anywhere. This was even softer than Gram. It was almost like eating clouds. Topped with a dark chocolate sauce, it was almost unsweetened chocolate. I really liked it. Not too sweet at all, so pillowy, and cute in its little box. I think I like the one from Japan better, but this was also a good experience. If you like sweet desserts, this would not be a good choice.

~~ CHOMP CHOMP ~~

SEPTEMBER: Food Tour through Dollywood

Y'all. I'm gonna officially call myself a travel blogger now because I've been on ONE blogger trip! :P LOL. Just kidding. But seriously though, it was a really cool experience and I could not have gone to a better place for my first trip. Dollywood, baby! That's right, Dolly Parton's Dollywood resort and theme park, and of course, it's a FOOD blogger trip! Get ready for a massive amount of food photos. (If you missed all my Instagram stories while on the trip, you can catch them in my highlights!)

A little bit about Dollywood and its achievements.
"Dollywood is a theme park jointly owned by entertainer Dolly Parton and Herschend Family Entertainment. It is located in the Knoxville-Smoky Mountains metroplex in Pigeon Forge, Tennessee. Hosting nearly 3 million guests in a typical season – mid-March to the Christmas holidays – Dollywood is the biggest ticketed tourist attraction in Tennessee." - Wikipedia

It has won many awards including most recently in 2019... 3 Golden Ticket Awards, which is the most sought-after awards in the business of amusements and attractions.
- Best Guest Experience, inaugural winner of this prestigious new category.
- Best Kids’ Area, for Wildwood Grove, Dollywood’s first win in this category. Wildwood Grove is the newest section in Dollywood. Opened in May 2019.
- Best Christmas Event, the only park to ever earn this award, Dollywood celebrates its 12th consecutive win.

This year, it has also won The Themed Entertainment Association’s Thea Classic Award, which is given only to the most outstanding theme parks and attractions. Dollywood joins past Thea Classic recipients like Disney’s Epcot and the San Diego Zoo.

Dollywood Theme Park
2700 Dollywood Parks Blvd.
Pigeon Forge, TN 37863
1-800-365-5996
www.dollywood.com

So the purpose of our visit was mainly a food tour of the theme park. In addition to that, we also did the Pirates Voyage Dinner & Show (which was SO much fun, I highly recommend) and a Dessert & Cocktail pairing at the Song & Hearth restaurant inside the DreamMore Resort (which was also fabulous and an amazing place to stay). I was one of 5 food bloggers on this trip (some of whom are also chefs, farmers, and/or vloggers). It was a great group, we had SO much fun. Check the others out sometime! Katie-Rose Watson at therosetable.com, JC Phelps at jcpeats.com, Charles Hunter III at thesaltedtable.com, and Constance Smith at cosmopolitancornbread.com. Also shoutout to the amazing and lovely publicist, Amber, who was our guide through the whole experience!

Ok. There's a lot of content, so I'm going to feature my Top 5 Favorite Bites from the park tour then list ALL THE THINGS we tried that day. Just so you know... we did not go to every single food vendor at the park so this is only a peek at what they offer. I think we'd need a week to try all the foods they have! Ha! Also, the limited time Harvest Festival seasonal items are highlighted in orange!

Spotlight Bakery & Sandwich Shop
Cinnamon Roll. The Cream Cheese Apple Danish was a close second, but if I only get one choice, it's the cinnamon roll. It kinda seems unassuming, since a lot of the other baked goods have frosting and sprinkles and other colorful decorations, but it's a legit cinnamon roll. It's just the perfect texture and flavor. Not overly slathered with frosting or super sweet. Just simply good.

Market Square - Festival Booths
Pierogi. Pierogi are filled dumplings made popular in Europe centuries ago. Dollywood's potato pierogi are topped with sautéed with caramelized onions and drizzled with sour cream. This was part of our lunch tasting. It was everyone's favorite. The outside dough texture was great, with pillowy potato filling. It was a wonderful combination of flavors. I think most of us had seconds (which says something because we were trying to limit ourselves so we don't fill up too quickly). This is one of their seasonal food items which means it's only available during the time of the Harvest Festival/Great Pumpkin LumiNights which ends Nov 2nd.

Splinter's
Pumpkin Spice Funnel Cake (pumpkin pie filling funnel cake batter, pumpkin pie spice, cinnamon, fried to perfection then topped with a rich maple pecan glaze and whipped cream). Also a seasonal item, so you gotta get this QUICK! I love funnel cakes. I think it's one of the most iconic park or fair food. Theirs was epically good. Fried to perfection... not burnt or too greasy, and topped with complimentary flavors. I'd recommend getting this earlier in the day so you can EAT IT ALL.

Grist Mill
Cinnamon Bread. Dollywood's most popular food item and literally is known worldwide. You can choose to add frosting or apple butter to dip in. Let me tell you... the smell of this place as you walk in will make you swoon. Freshly baked bread, cinnamon, sugar, warmth, ahhhhh. It's like a hug. You can see them prepping the dough for baking which was cool. They said the bread takes around 30-32 minutes to bake, and they can bake 200 loaves at a time, and they can barely keep up with demand. Dang! I highly recommend this be eaten as soon as you get it. It's fantastic. We all did a taste test between plain, with frosting, or with apple butter. I think it was unanimous that plain is best. It's so good, it really doesn't need anything else. But if I had to choose one... the apple butter.

Front Porch Café
Meatloaf (with mushroom gravy). This normally comes as a plated meal called the Meatloaf Stacker (see photo below), but for us they did family style. Definitely one of my favorite bites of the day. The whole meal was fantastic. The Front Porch Café was a cute restaurant. Walking in, you wouldn't think it was inside a theme park. I filled my plate with a little bit of everything and scraped it clean! But the meatloaf was my fav. I'm very impressed with the caliber of food at a park.

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Now we start from the beginning so you can get a sense of our day. We started around 10:30AM and ate until 2PM. Then we had a break to explore the park and do some rides. (Def try the Wild Eagle and Dragonflier!) And reconvened at 6PM for dinner at Front Porch Cafe.

Spotlight Bakery & Sandwich Shop

Tombstone Brownie

Monster Rice Crispies

Caramel Apple Danish

Cream Cheese Apple Danish
Cranberry Orange Muffins

25+ Pound Apple Pie (each slice is 3-4 lbs; takes 3.5 hours to bake). This was definitely a showstopper. We got to hold the whole pie... which I'm guessing to be more around 45-50 lbs with the cast iron skillet. My arms shook when I held it up. Guess I need to do more bicep curls. Lol. So many people stopped and looked at our spread in the shop. Some even helped us eat! It was really a lot of food at 10 in the morning. You can order this pie by the way... they ship. It's $189.99 for a whole pie. Just call the park and ask for Spotlight Bakery. 

My face. Lol. I was trying not to drop it. 

Custom Sugar Cookies

Showstreet Ice Cream Shop
Giant Pumpkin Ice Cream Cookie Sandwich. I mean... we're in a theme park so go big or go home, right? All of their cookies are this large btw. Across the park, I did not see a single normal sized cookie. The pumpkin ice cream was awesome.

Specialty Cone & Ice Cream (special dipped waffle cones). I'm gonna say the ice cream was chocolate fudge... cuz honestly, I have no idea what the flavor is called, just that it was delicious. We're featuring the cone though, which is dipped in seasonal colors. 

Pumpkin Spice Milk Shake. Pumpkin Spice ALL THE THING for reals. 

Potato Candy. Apparently this is a old style candy that parents used to make for kids when there's not really other kinds of sweets around. The potato is powdered potato that they roll the candy mixture in to use things that are available around the house. The filling is peanut butter.

Market Square - Festival Booths
Fried Green Tomato BLT (fried green tomatoes, bacon, special sauce, lettuce; served with skillet potatoes). I love a good BLT... and this had fried green tomatoes. Yum!

Low Country Boil (andouille sausage, fresh shrimp, corn on the cob, whole red potatoes and special seasonings). I really loved this along with the Pierogi I mentioned earlier. It's not too spicy or salty. The flavors are still bold though. My favorite was the sausage and the corn. I think I took 3 people's corns for myself. :P

Photo by @therosetable

Kettle Corn. Lots of flavors including caramel, strawberry chocolate, candy corn, and grape. We got to see them make the kettle corn. Make sure you stand back! Because once they start going, it pops everywhere. It was really cool to watch.

Splinter's
Fruity Pebbles Funnel Cake. Wow. Can we say another showstopper? I think this is also one of their most popular items? I can see why, it's so freaking festive and fun!

Fried Apple Pies. I was too full to try at this point. But it was freshly fried. I'm sure it was amazing. 

Harvest Cider (Fanta orange, pineapples, whipped cream, sprinkles). Not my favorite, but I also don't really drink soda. I can see it being super fun for the kids!

Pumpkin Spice Pork Rinds. Now I can say I've had a sweet pork rind. It was a little strange since the pumpkin spice overpowered the pork taste. I kinda dug it, kinda didn't. Haha. Would you try it? We also got to see them fry this in person. I loved all the live demos.

Lumberjack's Pizza
Cookie Pizza (giant chocolate chip cookie topped with frosting and fun fall decorations). This was our last stop so I have to admit I was done... defeated by food, so I couldn't try everything. This is a fun thing for kids. And again... giant cookies.

Chicken Applewood Pasta (rich cream sauce, chicken, applewood bacon, spinach and tomatoes). I did try this and it wasn't great tbh. I'm quite picky about pasta and texture... it has to be al dente and this was overcooked.

Meatlovers Pizza. One of the guys said the crust was good. I'm all about the crust!

Front Porch Café
Meatloaf Stacker (Dollywood's signature meatloaf stacked high on buttercrust bread served with buttery mashed potatoes and mushroom gravy and green beans) $15~

Cabbage Roll Dinner (stuffed with a hearty filling of beef, rice and seasonings and topped with a rich tomato sauce; served with green beans and buttery corn)

Reuben Wontons (corned beef, sauerkraut, swiss cheese, wrapped in a wonton wrapper then fried; drizzled with thousand island dressing; served with a side of homemade pickles)

Butter Fried Corn. I love me some corn.
Southern Style Green Beans. Yay for veggies! It was great to get some greens after all the sugar we've had all day. 

Pumpkin Fluff (whipped up combination of pumpkin pie filling, vanilla pudding, whipped topping and pumpkin spice). Imagine a fluffy pumpkin whip/mousse consistency. Several people said it was their fav. 

The Dessert Flight (key lime pie, crème brulee, chocolate mousse, banana pudding). Individually $4~ If you have a group of people, the flight is fun to try different flavors. My personal favorite out of the lineup was the crème brulee then the chocolate mousse.

Dollywood’s Harvest Festival - Now thru Nov 2nd
Dollywood’s Harvest Festival presented by Humana features the return of an even larger Great Pumpkin LumiNights, which includes new experiences in Wildwood Grove! Additionally, more than 600 Southern gospel concerts take place throughout the festival.

Dollywood was also crowned winner of another notable award by USA TODAY on Sep 27th, 2019. Dollywood’s Great Pumpkin LumiNights won the 2019 USA TODAY 10 Best Readers’ Choice Travel Award for Best Theme Park Halloween Event! It's a very cool pumpkin display. I recommend seeing everything during the day, then stay when the sun goes down and all the pumpkins light up. It's a different experience!

We had a BLAST! What a great day. I feel like we got to experience a lot of the park. I highly recommend visiting Dollywood with family, people who like theme parks, and people who like food. They've got it all and it's SO clean and the people are so nice. That was the most impressive thing I noticed during out time there. The park is crazy clean... I mean, have you ever imagined a clean theme park? I guess I mainly only have Six Flags to compare with but still... Impressed! The food was fantastic and they have a lot of variety. I'd say if you are a foodie, maybe go during their Festival of Nations which features a lot of International cuisines. I think that happens in the spring. I would like to go back myself! Definitely want to see more shows and go to more of their restaurants inside the park.

Haha. I'm so awkward in candid photos. Thanks for the fun shot, Amber!

Thank you, Dollywood, for inviting me and giving me such a wonderful experience. I'm so grateful for the opportunity, memories, and new friends! 

@thesaltedtable, @therosetable, @chompdallas, @cosmopolitancornbread, @jcpeats

~~ CHOMP CHOMP ~~