Londoners Magazine

Londoners goes on location: Sarah Riches samples typical Taiwanese specialities at three of Taipei’s most well known night markets.

Pigeon feet, snake venom and frog eggs: no, they’re not ingredients in a witches’ broth, they’re Taiwan’s equivalent of a sandwich. Taipei has earned a reputation with food lovers because of the hundreds of stalls selling snacks at its night markets. Shilin, Shida and Huaxi Jie are three of the city’s biggest and stay open well past midnight.

Of all of Taipei’s chaotic night markets, Shilin must take first prize. It’s just a few minutes walk from Jiantan MRT tube station, north of the city. The main road running through the market is pedestrianised – well, no driver would dare try driving through. Alleys branch off the main street in every direction; their shop canopies so close they almost touch, forming a make shift shelter. Neon signs light up the sky as if it were day. Stall holders compete to shout their bargains the loudest. Giggling teenagers, young families and brash old ladies push past me into the throng.

But one sniff of the over-powering stench of drains makes me wonder what all the hype is about. Then I realise the lingering smell of sewage is not what I first thought. It’s stinky tofu.

Chou dofu, or stinky tofu as it is widely known, is Taiwan’s Marmite. You either love it or you hate it. It’s fermented tofu; soft and bouncy, the colour of sand, almost like a thick omelette. It’s usually cut into squares and served on a skewer. It can be eaten cold, but is most commonly deep fried. If you’re really lucky, it might be served with goose blood.

Once I got past the smell, I was pleasantly surprised. The taste largely depends on the topping; chilli, pickles, garlic and soy sauce are all popular. I took a deep breath and shelled out about 30p for a few pieces, which dripped with a gloopy barbeque sauce. It was strangely tasty; moreish, even.

In the opposite direction to Shilin is Shida night market, near Guting MRT. Shida is cheap so it’s popular with students studying at the nearby National Taiwan Normal University – yes, that’s its real name. The market is smaller than Shilin, and has a different atmosphere. It’s slightly less manic, but its alleys are just as fun to explore. Taiwanese pop blares from the stalls; I can hear three or four different songs playing at the same time.

I pass stalls selling chicken feet, octopus balls and chrysanthemum tea, but decide to give them a miss. It’s summer, and the temperature has barely dropped since the morning, so I’m tempted by a pot of Taiwanese-style shaved ice. It’s usual for stalls to offer a variety of colourful toppings; you pick two or three. As well as canned fruit and fresh mango or watermelon, you might choose cubes of aloe vera jelly or peanuts. A stall holder gave me a wide grin, his teeth black from years of chewing beetle nut. He babbled at me, waving his arm over the selection. Try it.

I chose black jelly, just for the fun of it. It was chewy but tasteless. He ladled swampy-looking mung beans into my empty cardboard pot, then sweet red beans – like baked beans, only sweet. I soon learnt a general rule of thumb in Taiwan: expect something to be savoury, and it’s likely to be sweet, and vice versa.

A mound of shaved ice went in next, followed by a generous drizzle of syrup. I sniffed: it smelt like cake mixture before it goes in the oven. Just in case it wasn’t sugary enough, he poured sweetened condensed milk over the syrup. The result? It may be a dish diabetics ought to miss, but it was a refreshing alternative to my usual cone-and-a-flake.

Sampling these street stall snacks was making me thirsty, so I headed to Huaxi Jie Street night market, also known as snake alley. As well as the market, which is one long undercover arcade, visitors to the area come here for Longshan temple, which gives the closest MRT station its name. Clouds of incense surround the temple, which was built in 1738. I was tempted to linger when I saw its intricately carved pillars, but I was on a mission.

Huaxi Jie market is a five-minute walk from the temple. As well as adult shops and massage parlours which hint at the area’s seedier side, there are tea shops, traditional Chinese medicine shops and skilled artists keen to paint your name in Chinese-style calligraphy. But I wasn’t here to pick up a scroll. I was here to try snake blood.

I joined a crowd watching a man put a large snake on a table and use a wooden hammer to hit it on its head. He then tied the snake to a metal pole and sliced its stomach open with a knife. The crowd squealed collectively as he peeled back the snake’s skin to expose its heart, which was still beating. He poked out the heart, put it on the table and cut the main artery, collecting the blood in a glass. He emptied the bile from its gall bladder into a separate glass.

The Taiwanese believe snake venom detoxifies the body, gall bladder improves eye sight and snake blood gives a clear complexion. All parts of the snake is eaten – even its penis. I tried a shot of blood mixed with syrup and rice wine. It looked like tomato juice and smelt like iron, like human blood. A handful of Asian tourists gathered around me, anticipating the white girl’s reaction. I concealed a grimace and gulped it down. The potent taste of whisky burnt the back of my throat, and the syrup coated my tongue, masking whatever was the blood’s true flavour. I gave my brightest smile. Delicious.