Where is this food thing going?
Talking about Taiwan without talking about food is like talking about America without talking about the National Parks - both are something that inspires awe and wonder, requires reverence and gratitude but often taken for granted and abused.
Like the National Parks the most impressive aspect of the food culture in Taiwan is its diversity. As the photos shown here - you can have a 10-course exquisitely presented meal at one of the most elegant restaurant in the world. (Believe me, in my jet-setting days I've eaten in many 5-star hotels and restaurants) The restaurant is tucked in the hills with two "eating quarters" - one for big groups and one as shown in this photo) for smaller groups. Before and after the meal you can walk around the meticulously (it looks totally natural but you know lots of work went into it) landscaped grounds. I felt like I had crossed the threshold of time and became an ancient Chinese poetess; the world melted away, the only sound was the burbling creek.
Then there is the street food variety - rice sausage and rice stick soup served with a side dish if you desire - from every part of the pig you can imagine. This stall is called "Half square-foot shop" and is listed in many travel books as the "must-visit" in Danshui. I like how one traveling author described the rice sausage - "stuffed with savory sticky rice; tender and supple like a baby's arm"! (No kidding!) If you go on the weekends you will most likely be joining the lines two or three circles deep, watch and salivate over the shoulders of the lucky ones who are eating the baby's arm sliced and covered with a red sauce.
Taiwan is a vegetarian's dream - check out the spread in the top photo. It's a buffet! Any old tofu buger just won't do. There are everything you can imagine - some look just like meat; pork, duck, kidney, fish, you name it. You won't feel deprived being a non-meat eater.
I noticed the food culture in Taiwan, like cultures do, is changing with the time and the environment - some for the better, some for the worst. Chinese has always been obsessed with health and longevity but this time with a twist - the Western influence. Apart from still wildly believing in the "usual suspects" of traditional foods that are "Bu" (nourishing)(such as ginseng, goji berry, mushrooms, etc.), nuts, seeds, raw fruit and vegetables are becoming the "new boy in town". My sister made me a smoothie each morning with fruit, vegetables and nuts. She insisted on adding beets too because my family has a history of kidney and gal bladder stones! I've never seen beets in my life in Taiwan before! It was a bit weird having my sister telling me the benefits of eating flex-seeds and walnuts as if it was a secret recipe she just discovered yesterday. I think the Western influence came from many of the top-selling health books written by doctors who studied and lived in the West. Many of them were cancer survivors. My sister's children called the book she was reading "the Bible". I understand my sister's new found "religion" - she lost her husband to cancer last year and both of her children are overweight.
Twice in Taiwan when I was not accompanied by the locals and had to choose restaurants randomly I had bad experience and it was very bad. I tasted vegetables that was so laden with pesticide that I could taste it! I challenged the stores mined not by the owners but teenage minimum-waged workers, they looked at me as if I was crazy or snooty, or both. One of the restaurant was located at the Taipei main train station - thousands of people go through there each day. Why didn't anyone complain? Why is the restaurant still in business? Maybe the Taiwanese are so used to the taste they think it as "normal"? That's highly possible and a scary thought. I didn't know what else I could have done apart from telling everybody my experience, warning them off and reminded them to buy vegetables that are pesticide-free and wash store-bought produce really well.
Since Taiwan is so small the "local food movement" is a "foreign" concept. Since people like my mother and sister almost go to the market daily they think they are getting fresh food. In the old days it was true - the local farmers would bring in their harvest to sell by the side of the road, in their baskets or carts. You can still see some but most were replaced by well-lit, well-stocked stores and supermarkets who buy wholesale and I'm sure from big growers who most likely use pesticide to keep the production up and cost down. There are vegetables labelled "organic" in stores and I did visit a store which sold exclusively organic food from their own farm. But like the States 10-15 years ago the prices were at least double if not triple the regular ones.
From my own experience I learned that you can have all the latest knowledge and information about food, health and the environment, but old habits are hard to break and true awareness takes time to sink in and it comes from "living" it. I did take a master gardeners class when I moved from urban Minneapolis to rural Olympic Peninsula and it was tremendously helpful in helping me understand my new habitat, but in the end it is nature who is the ultimate teacher - it patiently shows us the way if we are only willing to listen.
