Tea & Coffee Tea is a fundamental part of Chinese life. In fact, an old Chinese saying identifies tea as one of the seven basic neces...
Tea & Coffee
Tea is a fundamental part of Chinese life. In fact, an old Chinese saying identifies tea as one of the seven basic necessities of life, along with fuel, oil, rice, salt, soy sauce and vinegar. Fujian settlers introduced tea to Taiwan over 200 years ago; a fondness for the beverage quickly took hold and tea became one of Taiwan's main exports. Taiwan's long growing season and hilly terrain are perfectly suited for growing excellent quality tea, especially high mountain oolong, which is prized among tea connoisseurs the world over.
There are two types of tea shops in Taiwan. The first are traditional teashops (more commonly called teahouses) where customers brew their own tea in a traditional clay pot, sit for hours playing cards or Chinese chess, and choose from several types of high-quality leaves. These can be found tucked away in alleys in most every urban area, but are best visited up in the mountains. Taipei's Maokong is an excellent place to experience a traditional Taiwanese teahouse. The second type are the stands found (almost literally) on every street corner. These specialize in bubble tea, a mixture of tea, milk, flavouring, sugar and giant black tapioca balls. Also called pearl tea, the sweet drink is popular with students who gather at tea stands after school to socialise and relax, much in the way that the older generation gathers at traditional teahouses.
Bubble tea comes in an infinite variety of flavours; passionfruit, papaya and taro are a few of the most common. The pastel-coloured drinks are served in clear cups with straws fat enough to suck up the chewy tapioca balls that rest at the bottom. A cup usually costs from NT15 to NT25. Some find the gummy texture of the tapioca balls gross, but if bubble tea sales in Taiwan are anything to go by, these people are a quiet minority. As the saying goes, there's no accounting for taste.
Coffee, once hard to come by, is now widely consumed all over Taiwan, at prices ranging from cheap (NT35 per cup) to expensive (NT100 and up). Not only is Taiwan big on coffee consumption, the island is experimenting with coffee growing as well; in the past few years a number of coffee plantations in southern Taiwan have begun producing coffee for domestic consumption and export. Though Taiwan isn't likely to replace Brazil anytime soon, Taiwanese coffee - smooth, nonacidic and definitely flavourful - may well find niche market in the next few years. Stay tuned.
Juices
Fresh-fruit stands selling juices and smoothies are all over Taiwan, and these drinks make wonderful thirst quenchers on a hot summer day. All you have to do is point at the fruits you want (some shops have the cut fruit already mixed in the cup) and the person standing behind the counter will whizz them up in a blender for you after adding water or milk. Especially good are iced-papaya milkshakes.
Generally, you'll find that fresh-fruit juices sold on the streets are cheaper than in the West. Expect to pay around NT50 a cup.
Harder Stuff
On the drunk scale, the Taiwanese tend to be fairly moderate drinkers (with some exceptions, banquets being a time where much drinking abounds). But Taiwan does have a number of locally produced inebriants well worth trying. The most famous of these is Kaoliang liquor. Made from fermented sorghum, Kaoliang is produced on Kinmen and Matsu, the islands closet to Mainland China. A running joke among locals is that, were mainland Chinese troops to invade the islands, they wouldn't get much further than the Kaoliang factories. Another local favourite is Whisbih, and energy drink with a fine mixture of dong quai, ginseng, taurine, various B vitamins. caffeine, and some ethyl alcohol to give it a kick.
0 comments:
Post a Comment