Japanese Street Food - AUTHENTIC Japan Food Tour in Taipei! BEST IZAKAYA Okonomiyaki + HOT SPRING!

[Music] welcome to chopstick travel I'm Luke Martin and this is our second episode of our street food around the world in Taiwan series and if there is one country that has influenced Taiwan the most in modern times it has gotten to be Japan so after 50 years of colonization Japanese cuisine and culture can be found throughout Taiwan so in this episode we are focusing on the amazing abundance of authentic Japanese cuisine here in Taiwan but there is just too much for one episode so this is part 1 of our two-part Japanese food series here in Taiwan today we're going to be spending the morning in baito a district in northern Taipei famous for its hot springs we're going to be eating a traditional Japanese Chi Seki and exploring the Japanese heritage here in baito and after that we're going to be heading back to Taipei to take you for an evening of Japanese food and drinks at an izakaya so make sure you stay tuned until the end because you're not gonna want to miss it let's go this area is just full of hot spring hotels that's what Vito is famous for and we're definitely gonna soak in one of the hot springs later but before that we've stopped first at the baito Museum a beautiful preserved Japanese era building it was built in 1921 it's one of the best preserved Japanese buildings in all of Taiwan and it's the only two-story all wooden Japanese building in Taiwan we're just checking out the grounds from outside there is a Japanese rock garden beautiful lush greens and all the traditional architecture it's just so cool to see that here in Taiwan we're gonna head inside in a minute and check out the inside but one really cool thing about this place is this was used during World War two to house the kamikaze pilots before they would leave for their their last flight so really cool history here I love it let's go inside [Music] so this building was originally used as a hot spring hotel it was called the Kazan hot spring hotel and then as I mentioned it was used as the kamikaze pilots nowadays it's the museum a lot of the museum is actually exhibiting the Taiwanese Aboriginal artifacts there's definitely some Japanese artifacts as well but really what I'm here for is the incredible architecture I mean just in this little tatami room right now and it feels like I've just been transported to Japan centuries ago and it is absolutely beautiful here a really cool place for photoshoots so I'm really into the Japanese architecture and the wabi-sabi in this place just is a perfect example it's got all the different parts of a classic traditional Japanese house got this veranda area which kind of acts as a hallway between the rooms you've got the paper walls literally made of paper with the sliding doors like this and then if you go in here you get the tatami mat and then they use these as kind of like a room divider very just artistic and simple open concept I love it [Music] so after checking out the museum for about a half an hour it's not too big we're sitting down in their restaurant also traditional Japanese style and they're serving the Chi Sachi directly inside the museum here their menu is beautiful and luckily for us they also have an English menu now you can get a vegetarian version but I think we're gonna go for the non-veg version just because that's what we prefer but love the setting in here it is beautiful they've got everything down to a tea it's perfectly all Japanese and having some tea before our meal or eyes the dam of the theme so our first dish has arrived it looks absolutely beautiful as I predicted this is the sous-vide pork chop served with a sweetened kumquat couple little pickles there but I can try the pork choppers it's not necessarily tender but it's very juicy and it's been seasoned nicely with a lot of black pepper it's got a little kick from that pepper I'm gonna try a piece with this sweetened kumquat I'm going to kind of squeeze some of this stuff from the inside of it because I don't want to eat the whole thing and that is going to give a nice sweetness oh yeah I thought it was a good pairing a little bit of citrus eNOS definitely sweet and a little bit sour too it complements the pork nicely our next dish is a gemenese chicken salad this is salt roasted chicken I can feel it's nice and crispy it's got this sauce the salad dressing on the side you just pour that all over top here and we'll get some little plum sprouts back here I'll grab some of those this is such a beautiful little salad grab some of the chicken the chicken is so moist that dressing looked like it was gonna be really powerful but it's actually very light in flavor just a hint of black pepper once again and then very moist chicken you can feel that crispy skin too one thing the Japanese are really good at besides making delicious food is also artfully presenting it so every dish in your Chi Seki is going to be just gorgeously presented this is the steamed course so we've got this steamed egg but it's got seafood in there so I'm gonna kind of dig down on deep there should be to some shrimp or crab somewhere hiding in there I want to wreck it too much and there's some little edamame too I see some fish so let me try this first it reminds me of a seafood chowder from Atlantic Canada but it's completely smothered in this creamy custardy egg and it's just kind of very light flavor light seafood flavor I gotta go back in because I know there's some more seafood hiding in here I can see something here it's like maybe a shrimp medley you try to get that oh look there's a looks like a piece of chicken in there as well I thought this was just seafood there it is [Music] Sabrina locked it with a full crab leg yeah I did course number four this is the caveat key black the old there's a pea in here a little carrot some tofu and it's swimming in a bit of a stock so I'm gonna grab I think there's an oyster mushroom underneath there too so all kinds of things going to grab this pea seal and try that it definitely has a strong Eagle flavor but it's not overpowering there's a light soy maybe a little bit of sock a flavor in there as well not very flavorful though very simple once again and there's a couple other pieces of eel in here but I gotta go for this moisture mushroom I'll of these things I love the bouncy texture this is the first may endorse the crispy skin grilled salmon look at that it is so crispy on the outside listen to that crunch we've also got a little Japanese pickle on the side here if this yeah check it out that looks so juicy you can see all that oil coming out of it Wow oh my god that was like a shell like crispy skin encasing just oh you'll almost I don't even think I got any of the meat I gotta go for another bite because I think that was just fat that had disintegrated maybe I'm wrong but look it it's just so ridiculously juicy let me try one more bite here there must be such a high fat content so this is our second main course this is the sixth dish we have and this is the rice dish so we've got it topped with some ginkgo seeds as fresh edamame and this is a pickled radish that's been pickled with perilla so it's all on top of the steamed rice and then it's served on this really cool like little almost a little table we get a little bit of the edamame they get the seeds in the rice it's really simple there's not too much to it the ginkgo seeds kind of in developed the rice is a very glutinous sticky rice but there's really not a whole lot of flavor going on there it's just kind of something to fill you up because a lot of these dishes as you see are very small let me try this perilla pickled radish that sounds so cool - got flavor next up is this soup this is the garlic huge chunks of garlic you can see there and clam soup with Japanese wild parsley I think I'm just gonna take one of these clams and a hole into that garlic and hopefully that doesn't overdo it that's not parsley - I'm not even sure how the garlic is retaining its form because as soon as I pressed down my tongue on it it disintegrated fell apart into a million little pieces the clam has a nice firm texture still to it I really love that that might be my favorite dish [Music] so after seven dishes we have our dessert and it is a red buckwheat custard and also some seasonal fruit which is some guava pineapple and some papaya but I have to try this this looks really interesting kind of like true or masu has a really creamy I'm really cold so overall I definitely recommend this restaurant it is so cool to come up here you get access to the museum with the price of your chi Seki and all the dishes were good but I'd have to say that that garlic clam soup was my favorite but let me try this dessert oh yeah super sweet oh I love that that's perfect that in the meal all right finished off at the baito Museum and our amazing Chi Seki meal I'd say it's close to authentic but definitely a little bit of Taiwanese fusion going on in some of the dishes but still worth it so the perfect thing to do after a nice meal like that is to go soak in one of these hot springs however I will admit it's not the best weather it's about 33 degrees Celsius but we're still gonna do it [Music] the hot spring hotel we've chosen to book a private hot spring room at is called the Marshall Zen garden and it's got a really interesting past so this place was built during the Japanese colonial period and it was used to put Marshall Jung who was the notorious commander of the Chinese Communist Party on house arrest so he stayed here on house arrest after being kidnapped by Chiang kai-shek in the KMT brought from mainland China to Taiwan and he's kept here for 40 years so really interesting history nowadays you can book a hot spring hotel here you can have lunch or dinner here same as what we just did at the baito Museum they offer Chi sekiz but it's also just beautiful to walk around see all the gardens and the beautiful landscaping here and the traditional Japanese style buildings but I am super excited to try out the famous baito hot springs [Music] we are in our hot spring room now it's very private it has a beautiful view out over fato and there are two tubs one is the hot spring tub and then the other is the cold tub so this hot spring water is known as white sulfur hot spring and its high in radium really good for blood circulation great for your skin and I am really excited to try that say we're just filling up the bathtub now this place is really classy there's a 1500 taiwan dollar so a little bit pricey for one hour but i think we're gonna like it you can definitely smell the sulfur coming out of that water it doesn't turn you off though it's just a subtle smell and you can see the color of the water is kind of like a grayish green and you can tell that there's just tons of minerals in there they give you this little bucket here so you can kind of scoop up some water so it's super hot okay i think i need to adjust the temperature slightly [Music] so this isn't actually the first time we've ever vlogged naked in a hot spring before this is really beautiful though we're definitely gonna turn the cameras off and just enjoy oh that was awesome one hour was definitely not you know yeah loved it skin feels really great and actually the best part about it was that there was a cold bath right beside it so you could kind of keep going back and forth just regulate the temperature a little yeah shock your system a little bit each time yeah yeah there's a lot of different options for hot springs in baito and if you'd like I'd recommend this one because beautiful views we got the $1,500 room but I think for around two or three hundred you can come here and there's also foot baths so you can just soak your feet if that's all you'd like to do and not get completely in but really great where they keep checking at some of the Japanese heritage sites here in beta [Music] we've come to the poogie temple which is definitely one of the coolest Japanese heritage sites here in baito this is a temple of Japanese Buddhist sect that was built in 1905 in the traditional Japanese style a lot of wood and it was made using donations from the Japanese railway workers so it's beautiful it doesn't look quite like the temples you see here in Taiwan and it's hidden away here wow you have to climb a little bit of a mountain and after getting here to that hot spring you definitely get the sweat guard sweating dripping it's so humid today pretty cool right really cool yeah he was in Japan yeah there are even more Japanese buildings here in vaped Oh in particular the hot spring Museum which we're not going to visit today because we've just been at it all day long we got here at about 9:00 a.m. it's just so it's 3 p.m. now we're gonna head back into Taipei City and we're gonna take you for a night of Japanese food and drinks so the Sun is setting here in Taipei we are back in the city and we're going to grab a little snack at this Oden shop behind me here before we head to our drinking place we're just waiting for it to open now but this place looks really cool so let's go check it out [Music] so the menu is all on an iPad has pictures so we're gonna order our food now we want to get this tofu piece so one and fish cakes yes maybe we'll look for some daikon radish that looks good don't let me go crazy this one okay it's a mushroom what else perfect eating that's enough for now should we get more this spot is super cool we're right on the side of the road what should I have to admit is is not very common in Japan to get a real street food on the side of the road like this but the food does look authentic so we have authentic Japanese Oden which is popular in the winter even though scorching hot today we're going to be having it we've got the daikon radish we've got tofu a couple different fish cakes in here and then also mushroom then we got two different sauces just a spicy I think it's a bean paste this one I'm not sure what it is but I'll have to taste it to find out and then we've got some edamame which are just perfect little appetizers but I get to start with the Oden I'm gonna go in for tofu which is always my favorite and I'll just try it plain first the flavor is coming from the dashi the stock which is a Japanese mixture of kombu which is a seaweed and then some bonito which is dried fish and then they simmer it down it gives it this nice blue mommy gonna really feel it all around your mouth let's try the daikon because that's always my favorite with Odin and I go try whatever this mystery sauce is it almost looks like Mayo it might be a Japanese Mayo or it might be a hot master pop master choose to write up your nose almost ago with sabe but it definitely has a little bit of a tangy mustard flavor to it from that daikon just falls apart that is really authentic tasting Oh down next up is the edamame they serve it with two dishes so you can put the spent and a mom a pods in the other one a little bit of black pepper a little bit of salt I think there's a little bit of Taiwanese five-spice on there those don't tell you quite as Japanese the oh damn but still really good so I'm going to go in for my favorite this is the fish cake and I'm gonna actually dip it in this super spicy looking paste I'm gonna try Wow Wow that's also really spicy that first cake is nice tender forget about that that's gonna burn my mouth [Music] really good Odin but I especially love the atmosphere all the people walking behind me as you can see right on the side of the street it is super cool and the flavors are very authentic especially because Taiwan has its own style of Odin which isn't quite the same you can really taste the flavor that dashi coming through [Music] so that was a good little snack but now we are moving on to the main course the Sun is down and we are at an izakaya or Japanese bar this place is called Tess show Hiroshima yaki we're gonna tell you all about it inside are gonna get some really good drinks and food [Music] so we are inside now and this place is pretty much as close as you can get to a legit Japanese izakaya it's decked out in all the old-school Japanese memorabilia they have the kind of top in Yankee style set up right in front of you we're sitting far side we warded up a couple of drinks and I got this socket so the way that they do here is also a Japanese style they serve it to you in a little box and he overflows it so a little extra for furries and you can see look at this it is completely full filled to the top oh I'm spilling oh yeah and serve nice and cool that's crisp and refreshing so you might actually be wondering what do you do with the stuff in the bottom well you got you can just pour it back in like this and then it kind of acts as a coaster this stuff is really good I like how they serve a cold here because sometimes in Japan you could even get them like to microwave it so it's hot I definitely prefer the cold room this is my all-time favorite drink that I get in Japan it is the eyeball and it's ginger highball so ginger ale and Suntory whiskey and this one this time as you can see on the front should do the trick well so they get the menu here with pictures and English which is really nice and we're gonna get the hiroshima gnocchi and a couple other things but to Hiroshima yaki is hiroshima-style okonomiyaki which is an awesome dish and it's my favorite style of okonomiyaki so I shouldn't watch them prepare it then I'll tell you a little bit about it [Music] it is super cool to sit right in front of these guys working and watching them make the hiroshima-style okonomiyaki the way that he makes is really unique he starts by finding out a batter on the griddle until it fries into almost like a thin CREP and then he's topped it with a little bit of their sweet sauce the okonomiyaki sauce and then he tops that with just a ton of shredded cabbage on top of the cavity puts a couple extra little ingredients some green onions and then finishes it with some bean sprouts so at the same time he's also starting to fry the yakisoba the fried noodles and those will come in later so after that he puts a couple strips of bacon on top and then on top of the bacon he takes a little bit more of that batter to use it as an adhesive for the noodles then he flips the entire thing over on top of the yakisoba then he cracks an egg on the griddle fries the egg and then puts the whole thing on top of the fried egg once it's finished he tops it with just a ton of that okonomiyaki sauce a little bit of seasoning and then a little bit of red pickled ginger we have the final product here it's served on this hot plate it's beautiful you can see all those seasonings on top a little bit of sesame seed and it smells it looks amazing back here we've got the meatballs chicken meatballs pretty simple but you can see that beautiful yolk in the middle that's uncooked egg yolk and the way that you're gonna do this open Omaha key is you gotta use this which is the Japanese Mayo so this is always my favorite part take the cap off and they got this special bottle that it comes in and it sprays it oh yeah here we go and you could be generous really I like to be really generous there's nothing healthy about this just load it up and then they also give you these mini spatulas which you can use to just chop this thing in half or in two it's kind of like a pizza I like to kind of like pizza cut it down the middle once get through all those noodles at the bottom and then cut yourself slices okonomiyaki oh man this just looks so good transfer this over to my plate it is smoking hot because it's served on that hot plate [Music] No [Music] there's nothing pretty about that was covered with sauce the okonomiyaki sauce so tangy then you can taste or feel those noodles I should said they're kind of fried up and almost a little bit crispy at the bottom it's just sloppy and delicious ugly delicious [Music] no ma'am I love it with the bacon in there this is the secret okonomiyaki sauce here well it's not so secret this is the brand and this beautiful lady here is where all that flavor is coming from so you can actually add some extra even though they already go very generous with the okonomiyaki sauce but that's really where all the beautiful flavors coming from so tangy just perfectly complements sake or a beer [Music] our second dish as I mentioned earlier is the chicken meatballs topped with some of that brown sauce once again and the egg in the middle just how they do it in Japan completely raw they give you this little wooden spoon so you can mix it around man that is just a thing of beauty I love the egg yolk too and you don't need to worry at all because these are super high quality eggs let me grab one of these meatballs the best part about those chicken meatballs is that they actually leave these little bits of cartilage inside of the meatball they're evenly distributed so you get these little kind of crunchy bits all throughout super creamy from that egg yolk and then just a hint from that green onion and it's not actually the open doumerc sauce i think it's a different like almost like a teriyaki sauce more sweet than tangy really good people though we've been here a couple of times and every time the hiroshima okonomiyaki is so good I forgot to mention what the difference is the main difference is that your Shima style has the yakisoba noodles usually they don't put the noodles in there it's so much better with the news here's Jimmy a team is our favorite open on the yaki of all time we have travel across Japan this stuff is the best yeah we've been to your Shima and had the okonomiyaki there I'd say this place definitely holds up super good they also have a really cool game here at this izakaya where you roll the dice if you get double ones you get a free beer or highball if you get even numbers you get 50% off and if you get odd numbers you have to buy two beers and they give it to you in this huge mug so there's no way to lose really as long as you're okay with buying two beers worst case scenario I'm gonna play let's see how idea or for Half Price [Music] so got my 50% Korean beer from Okinawa so even Japanese beer here the truck [Music] oh yeah and this refreshing even better when it's 50% off love to deal I always loved that place we've been there probably four or five times now and every time it's great and when wherever we're missing izakaya style food this is a great place tests show Hiroshima yaki yes I will leave all the stuff down in the description box that you can find all the places we visited today remember this is just part one of two of our Japanese food series here in Taiwan what was the best thing we ate a Sabrina and just the atmosphere the whole place was gorgeous loved being in the mountains today it's just amazing yeah I think the hiroshima yaki or the clam soup with the ginger that was so awesome and then soaking in that hot spring water was really perfect way to end the meal yeah so if you guys like to become a patreon also check out the link down below you can get access to our blooper reels and also our personally curated food maps which include great places like this that we never filmed that before so make sure to check us out on patreon subscribe and we'll see you on the next episode of chopstick travel soon bye bye bye

Channel: Luke Martin

Views: 383,298

Keywords: Japan, japanese, Japanese food, food, street food, chopstick travel, street food around the world, kaiseki, izakaya, high ball, sake, hot spring, taipei, beitou, Luke martin, Japanese street food, street food in Japan, okonomiyaki, oden, hot spring japan, nightlife, drinking in japan, taiwan, seafood, tokyo, Japanese architecture, Japan food, izakaya in taiwan, japanese food in taipei, Luke Martin taiwan

Id: -vAsC4shxSg

Length: 31min 46sec (1906 seconds)

Published: Sun Jun 07 2020