A Day in Taichung ~ The infamous Feng Chia Night Market

Well, after walking in the town area, it was about 5pm and thus the perfect time to head to the night market. I guess night markets in Taiwan is ever so popular and according to many, Feng Chia is one of the biggest. The reason is that it is right at the door step of the university and with that automatically means lots of people. The perfect combination for a successful night market - Food + Students!

So from the National Science Museum, we took a bus which brought us literally to the doorstep of Feng Chia Night Market. As the bus approached, we can start to see that the streets were getting more crowded as we neared. The bus stopped at Fuxing Road and the roads were filled with cars.

 The sign board which says the name of the night market! Finally we are here. Its good to arrive abit early as then its not as pack. And I mean it can get really really pack!

As you can see, its relatively less people at about 5.30pm and thats a good thing

 This stall right at the entrance was wowing everyone with his very creative cotton candy which he spins into very colorful items or cartoon characters. Pretty amazing skills that he has. And its not really expensive so it makes a nice gift :)

 I believe its about TWD70~100 depending on the design

 Start to enter the night market. FYI, there are many many streets here to explore

 Fried cuttlefish or sotong, seems to be a very popular item at any night market. The ones here were pretty large, but I find those at Dansui Old Street even larger, or maybe its the technique which they fry it

 This is how crazy the people is here about food. There was a queue with about 50 people waiting for this Korean Chicken restaurant to open its doors at 6pm. You need to grab a number and then patiently wait in line. Im wondering its probably it will take you even longer if you come later or maybe they get sold out

 For fans of soft toy machines, can try your luck here. Loads of these machines to try

 And we continued walking further taking our time. Can see the crowd starting to build up

 This is another fried chicken stall. One interesting thing to note is that almost every single stall here supposedly has been featured on TV or some program sometime ago. There is bound to be a TV with their interview or feature playing. My guess is that the Taiwan food programs ran out of stalls to feature, thus everyone gets a chance. So meaning, those food program which introduce food, cannot always trust them

 This stall is selling mainly stewed items

 Hmm, not sure what these are. On closer look, it looks like the duck head

 And on another pile is the duck neck

 Slowly you can see the wave of people flooding the street. There is signboards everywhere seeking your 2 seconds of attention

 We were thirsty and saw this fresh orange juice stall. Look at the amount of oranges they have. Hehe, now on hindsight, wonder if they even wash the orange before making it into juice?

This was the fruit juice stall

 We also got abit hungry and bought a piece of fried chicken with Korean hot sauce. Was pretty good and the queue at this stall was about 15 minutes. The chicken was still juicy and the hot sauce was really spicy. Hmm yummy

 There was a stall selling grilled duck breast. Foolish me thinking that you get a whole chunk of duck breast so I stayed and observed abit and then realize they will slice pieces off. It was about TWD150 per maybe 1/3 of the whole breast

 Closeup of grilling in action. It sure look yummy though

 This stall was selling braised clams. The fresh clams are on display and once you place an order, he will scoop a bowl and cook it in the pot

The clams were huge though

 This stall is selling meat on sticks.

 We were attracted to it as it supposedly have many varieties. And what a disappointment patronising this stall. The operator was rude, like he didn't even want to attend to my wife. End up many people cut our queue. In the end we manage to get some sticks, and the taste was bland. The meat was tough, no seasoning, and was dry. After it was cooked, there were only slivers of meat left on the stick, probably shrink 300% from before cooking. I don't normally say this, but this stall is not recommended at all

 Funny to see this stall but it proclaims to sell German Pork Knuckles. Its kind of funny that he cant sell a Taiwan Pork Knuckle but have to make a German one instead. Again, the minimum price is about TWD100~150 but again, you don't get a whole knuckle ya, they will give you like 1/3 of it

 I was thinking was if TWD150 each I sure grab a few liao

 This was another popular stall and it was selling fresh BBQ scallops

 OK, probably not fresh as in swimming but I think the scallops was preboiled

 This shop I think was selling some kind of sandwich but the queue was so long decided to skip it

 We kept on walking and there was suddenly this street which cleared up

Then realize was because this was the entrance to the university below

 And the next street was again filled with people

 Endless choice of food

 Again full of people. And this is before the sunset

 The kid had to have his dinner break so we stopped at a park.

 While the wife and kid was waiting, I decided to go queue up at one of the stalls with the longest queue, having no idea what I was queuing for

 As I approach only know that the stall was selling freshly made fried taipoca balls. The owner really put in alot of effort into making it and each fried ball is squeezed to ensure all the oil comes out and the balls are light and crispy. This one is highly recommended. You need to queue awhile as all is handmade! Look at the uncles muscle!

 Along the street there were many drink stalls

 For seafood lovers, this one will surely must try. This is fresh grilled abalone! Only TWD100 each

 Yummy yummy

 As it gets later, it is now really crowed

 Its probably about 7.30pm now and the streets are pack. Hang on to your kids if you brought them. I never like to bring my kids to the night market because its too crowded

 There are also many shops selling clothings and what not

 This was another stall that was full of people. It was selling something like lok lok

 Basically different items on a stick and its then cook and served

 We didn't feel full enough so decided to buy something back and saw this

 Its basically fried mini crabs and cuttlefish. Too bad the crabs were abit too hard and not like those soft shell crab

 And with that, we ended our 1 day tour. From Feng Chia night market, there is a bus which will go to the HSR station and it was a pleasant ride home. Well, for those planning a visit to Taichung, there are many more places to go such as Sun Moon Lake at Nantou which sadly I did not get to visit this time.