Traditional Chinese Bakery

Bakeries are very common in Taiwan. There is at least one bakery within a 100ft radius. There are all kinds of bakeries; most sell all varieties of bread, but there are ones that specialize in French bread, ones that specialize in healthy wheat bread, etc.

My mom took me to an old school bakery the other day in Taipei.  It is located in the Yuan Lin Street area in Taipei. It's called Olympia…

The bakery not only sells bread, they also have all kinds of traditional Chinese pastries…

Here is a closer look of 綠豆椪 (Mung Bean Pastry)… flakey crust with a mixture of mung beans and a little bit of minced meat.

Here are some Chinese dim sum snacks… fried dumplings, meat filled gluten balls, sesame balls, taro pastry, and more...

Here we have steamed dim sum- shumai, dumplings, meat balls...

Here is something else that you don't see at most bakeries today- 滷味 (Brined food). Basically these food were cooked in a salty broth. It is a common snack in Taiwan. In this picture, we have tofu/bean curd, fish cakes, eggs, chicken wings...

And here we have pork's blood rice cake. It may not sound too appetizing but it was actually one of my favorite snacks growing up...

Interesting, right?! I love it. I love the diversity of food that this old school bakery still offers. Yes, even the pork blood rice cake!