Imagine hearing a whole new form of music for the first time or learning a new language from scratch. That’s the kind of mind explosion I experienced at the Taiwan Culinary Expo this past week. I was so excited to be hosted to experience it!
Food and useful products, useful products and food: at the expo, I saw how the line is blurring in the marketplace. One Taiwanese family company, Ai Tsao Farmer, is harvesting artemesia, of which tarragon is a member of the family, to create everything from healthy teas and noodles, to relaxing massage ointments.
I also came across a food/useful product that I believe will revolutionize the food industry: edible paper! You know how paper is normally made from paper pulp? Well, the Goamg Homg Shing Factory in Taiwan is making beautiful art papers that are edible! They come in a variety of flavors like rose, ginger and scallion. They’re pretty stiff, so they’d be wonderful as origami garnishes on a plate or cut with kitchen shears into fantastic custom shapes. Why, you could bring back the colonial-era of silhouette cutting and make cakes decorated with a personalized profile — much nicer than the artificial flavors in a computerized silk screen. What about the traditional 1st wedding anniversary gift, paper? Restaurants could commemorate those dinners with edible paper! How about astronauts? It’s certainly a compact food, probably a great source of dietary fiber. You could have garnish fans made of different flavors. Alain Ducasse garnishes with gold, so why not a more affordable luxury? You could make little fancy tea sandwiches, fit for royalty. I feel like the possibilities are endless. I’ll be able to literally eat my words, if they have edible ink.
On a more traditional note — though paper was invented in Asia, so that’s still traditional — are Taiwan’s wealth of exotic fruits and veggies. They have a variety that I had never seen or tasted before. I saw morning glories and other stems being steamed like (and tasting like) asparagus, dragon fruit in many colors (which they call pitaya) — including neon purple. I wonder what kind of phytochemicals/antioxidants are in neon? I saw loofa being used as a veggie: more on that in a future post! I also experienced for the first time FRESH bamboo shoots. It’s the season now. They are so different from the canned kind, much more wonderful, I’m a little depressed about it. They’re too perishable for us to have here. It’s not even like seafood that can be chilled for a couple of days or flash-frozen. The scallions of Taiwan are prized — well, bitterly coveted is probably a more accurate description — by the mainland Chinese. They’re extra sweet, measured to be 3 times sweeter than normal scallions. They’re so sweet, scallions are added to all kinds of ladies’ lunch items, because you won’t blow someone out of the room at the office after eating them.
Taiwan does grow lots of apples, but I’ve gotta admit that I like the snap and crisp flavors of heirloom American apples better. There IS one exception: their Custard Apple! It doesn’t look like an apple, rather bumpy outside, but it tastes like apple pie filling and is the same texture, too! This would be the most perfect diet food, ever. Taiwan also loves using white peaches and mangoes in recipes.
Another traditional Taiwanese food is very healthy and easy to make: tea eggs. You can use either chicken or quail eggs and hard boil them with mushroom, tea and salt. They’re really tasty.
Speaking of tradition, Jin-Du restaurant had a huge display on the Story of the State Banquet, with dishes served on plates shaped like Taiwan!
The Taiwanese love seafood and I saw a representative from the State of Alaska there.
I also learned that the Hakka (originally the Han Chinese, one of Taiwan’s ethnic groups) enjoy entertaining last minute guests by stir-frying whatever leftovers they have.
I saw some Taiwanese wines and spirits, but I think they’re mostly for tourists or export: drinking alcohol doesn’t seem part of their culture. People drink tea or juice.
Besides exhibiting foodstuffs, the fest — if you go there next year — is a purchase point for discount coupons, much the way Groupon works. Now, it all depends on how you travel and how often. Some of these coupons work right away for a meal and/or hotel stay, but some are embargoed for a period of time. Some, you have to buy multiples of. All I know, the lines were practically out the door for heavy discounts to some of the luxury hotels and restaurants.
Luxe & Down-Home Cuisine/Culture/Travel/Style 