I-Baked, Shida, Taipei

I had walked past I-Baked many times, and every time, I was sorely tempted to try it. However, my tummy was usually very well fed by the time I remembered I-Baked. This time, I happily made room for this dessert I'd been wanting to try for the longest time, and boy, was I glad I did!

I-Baked's specialty is cookie sandwiches - basically, your choice of ice-cream sandwiched between 2 pretty good-sized cookies. What more can a dessert-crazed person ask for?

I had assumed we could only choose 1 cookie flavour. To my pleasant surprise, I learnt I could choose 2 different flavours!

I had to have the double chocolate chip cookie and the vanilla M&M cookie. To balance the sweetness of these cookies, I chose the latte ice cream. This turned out to be such a wonderful combo! Swoon!

The M&Ms gave the whole ice-cream sandwich a nice crunch!

For those who are intending to try this, do note that the cookies (at least those I tried) are the soft and chewy kind, not the hard and crisp kind. I am normally a fan of the latter, but in this instance, I thought the soft chewy cookies didn't detract fm this delicious confection :)

Definitely will go back to try out different combos!

Dazzling Thai, Taipei

As I was pretty impressed by Dazzling Cafe (their Honey Toast in particular), when I heard they were opening an eatery serving Thai cuisine - Dazzling Thai, I had high hopes.

We ordered a Thai Papaya Salad, which I usually order to gauge how good their food is ...

... and a bruschetta with minced chicken in thai spices and sauces ...

This dish - grilled pork with sticky rice - which turned out to be my favorite ...

Minced pork with lettuce wraps and broad/flat rice noodles ...

Kao Chi Restaurant, Taipei

I like this branch of Kao Chi restaurant located on Fuxing Nan Rd near the Zhongxiao Fuxing MRT station. For some reason or other, it seems to have a higher quality of food and service than the one at Yong Kang Street.

Ever since Shanghai Court in Hyatt had taken deep fried eels off their menu, I'd forgotten how much I liked them till I saw this dish on Kao Chi's menu, so how could I possibly resist?!

(I don't normally like eating eel cos of the gazillion tiny bones, but when deep fried in this tangy sweet sour sauce ... ohhhhh ... irresistible!)

We'd actually wanted Dou Miao, but it wasn't in season, so we fell back on our fav tasty beancurd skin with veggies ... delish!

What is this, you're wondering? Don't be scared! It's actually codfish buried under crispy fried beans or "Dou Su" ... yummy!

Here's the codfish beneath all that "Dou Su" :)

For our carbs, we had some noodles in a tasty broth with spring onions and bak choy ...

More Peach Desserts

I was reading one of my favorite blogs: www.joythebaker.com, and saw a cake she recently baked - a Strawberry Upside-down Cake with Cardamon. Something just clicked, and I thought about the peaches that were still sitting in my fridge ... the sour ones that I'd used to bake some Peach Streusel Muffins a while back? ... How about baking a Peach Upside-down Cake? Off I went to get some sour cream and a couple of hours later, ta-da!

Peach Upside-down Cake!

Oh wow ... this was such a beauty to look at! Honestly, one of the prettiest cakes I've ever baked!

With much anticipation, I cut into the cake, hoping it would taste as good as it looked, as the batter seemed rather thick and doughy and the cake hadn't risen much. My fears were allayed when I saw this beautiful cross-section! It turned out beautiful INside and out :)

Lovely!

This recipe is another keeper that's going into my recipe folder :)

I read that some of Joy's readers baked this with blueberries as well ... hmmm .... maybe next time ...

Coffee Alley, East District, Taipei

My, Oh My! Oh My!

This has got to be one of THE most satisfying afternoon teas I've had in a while! I highly highly recommend Coffee Alley! Just take a look at the waffles we ordered .... Swoon! ....

Before I give you a closer look at the waffles (as well as a description), let's look at the drinks we had on this hot and muggy day in Taipei ...

A refreshing cup of lemon soda with lots of icy cold crushed ice ... this truly quenched our thirst! Aaaaaaaaahhhhhhh ......

I have always been a fan of the fruit teas in Taiwan cos they give new meaning to fruit teas as the teas have a healthy serving of fresh fruits in the tea and fruit juice is also added for that added punch. However, there are times, they can be cloyingly sweet. Since I wanted it more to quench my thirst rather than to satisfy my sweet tooth, I requested for it to be less sweet, and the end result was definitely very satisfying.

Coffee Alley's fruit tea is one of their recommended teas and has a nice amount of passionfruit pulp, which gives it a very nice flavour and aroma ... definitely a plus for me. Despite my dislike for the passionfruits seeds which I generally don't enjoy crunching into, somehow, I didn't have this unpleasant experience with their fruit tea ... another definite plus :)

Proof that exceptional quality and service is all in the details ... a lemon "ice cube"! Essentially, a lemon frozen in ice! Acts to flavour the tea that you pour into the drinking glass, as well as to keep it chilled ... wonderful!

Finally, a close-up of the waffles!

We ordered the salted caramel waffles. I loved that the waffles were still crisp on top, and the accompanying salted caramel, whipped cream and vanilla ice cream were artistically placed on the side. That way, my waffles could stay wonderfully crisp and I could take as much of the "sides" as I wanted! Fabulous way of serving the waffles, at least for me! And the thing that set Coffee Alley's waffles apart from the others I've had (aside fm the above), was the generous serving of luxury nuts! Hazelnuts! Almonds! YUM!

YUM! YUM! YUM!

Another fabulous thing about this particular Coffee Alley outlet is their wonderful location - fantastic for people watching! Even waiting half an hour (it's worth the wait!) for a table didn't seem so torturous, as we were happily occupied/entertained by loads of people watching outside the cafe! Here's a view fm my table at Coffee Alley ...

Kaya Cream Puffs and Eclairs

Kaya, for those who aren't fm Southeast Asia, is essentially coconut jam. It's made with coconut milk, eggs, sugar and flavoured with pandan leaves.

One of the most famous Singapore institutions that sells kaya toast (ie. kaya on toast) is Yakun Kaya, and that's where I got my little bottle. As Yakun's kaya doesn't have preservatives etc, my bottle was expiring soon. I was trying to figure out how best to use it up when I suddenly thought - kaya cream puffs and eclairs!

Here are all my cream puffs and eclairs fresh out of the oven ...

YUM! YUM! Kaya goes REALLY well with choux pastry! :) A definite repeat is in order ... when I next go back to Spore and get a bottle of kaya :)

Peach Streusel Muffins

It's the start of the peach season and someone gave us some La La Shan peaches, which are named after the mountain area where the best peaches in Taiwan are grown. Of course, how good the peaches are also depend on which farm on La La Shan they come from. These peaches, perhaps because the season was just starting, were rather sour. So, instead of throwing them out, I started searching for a muffin recipe. Hmmm ... I've never had a peach muffin before ... I think ...

Then, inspired by an email fm a friend who was thinking of baking some blueberry crumble muffins, I found a Peach Streusel (crumble) Muffin recipe. Here are the results:

Peony Restaurant, Taipei

Several weeks back, I had a craving for tempura. For some reason, despite the strong Japanese influence in Taipei, there aren't any low to mid-priced eateries in Taipei like Tenya in Tokyo ... at least, to my knowledge. So, we eventually settled on trying Peony restaurant for some tempura ... and other Japanese food ...

Here's our interesting salad with jambu or wax/rose apple, chinese pears, tomatoes and lettuce etc with a Japanese vinaigrette ... this was deliciously refreshing ...

Our sushi platter ... this was really quite yummy! I particularly loved the seared fish sushi ...

Soft-shelled crab sushi rolls ...

And finally, the dish I'd been waiting for - tempura! It was light and crisp and really hit the spot ...

Their version of california rolls ... with a wolfberry on top - a definite oriental twist ...

Miso soup ...

Complimentary latte which came with our set meal ...

My complimentary chrysanthemum tea ...

Our red bean and jelly dessert ...

PS. While we were there, a Taiwanese celebrity walked in - Jackie Wu! He was really nice and friendly to everyone :)

Keelung Night Market

On a whim, we decided to go to the Keelung Night Market for dinner. I had heard that there were many yummy things in this night market, but Keelung seemed so far away esp since we didn't own a car. We chose to take the train and to our enormous surprise, the train ticket cost only NT32 per person per way! And the night market was conveniently located near the train station, so we could walk there. Here's what we saw along the way ...

Colourful "fish" kites drawn and made by some Taiwanese children ... pretty ...

The famous bright lights of Keelung Night Market ...

Our "first course": Taiwanese Tempura ...

Our "second course": Ding Bian Zuo ... basically a flat rice noodle-like dish with fish balls and squid balls ...

Our "Third Course": Crab soup with "oily rice" ... I loved the rice so much, I bought some back home ...

Our "Fourth Course": Bite-sized Taiwanese sausages ... yum!

Interesting that they serve it with pieces of raw garlic ...

Our last course: Tofu pudding ... this was silky smooth. So good I bought a tub home, but sadly, it didn't keep well. Best eaten there.

Yam encased in chewy glutinous flour with lotus seed ...

Tofu pudding with nuts ....