Tai-ho Traditional Biscuit

Located just a minute’s walk away from Exit 6 of MRT Ximen Station, Tai-ho Traditional Biscuit has been selling its sweet snacks for three generations. The store was opened in the late 1940s by the Chen family, who, like the founders of Li Ting Xiang, had also left China’s Fujian Province to start a new life in Taiwan. With them, the Chens brought recipes for their hometown favorites – sweetly sticky-centered laopo “wife” cakes, crisp and chewy bars of sachima, seed-flecked Mazu biscuits – all of which can still be found filling their store shelves. The recipes have been changed a little over time, incorporating smaller quantities of sugar and oil, but the cakes are still hand-made.

TAI-HO TRADITIONAL BISCUIT ( 太和傳統餅 )

(02) 2331-2772

No. 47, Chengdu Rd., Wanhua District, Taipei City ( 台北市萬華區成都路 47 號 )

10am~7pm www.thtb.com.tw (Chinese) www.facebook.com/taihotw

SUN CAKES

Sun cakes, which originated in Taichung City, are a staple among traditional Taiwanese pastry shops; they are still hand-made at Taiho, but with less sugar and oil than in the past

The store has won a place on many tourist itineraries, thanks in no small part to its pineapple cakes and nougat formed in the shape of Taiwan. Kitsch these may be, but if you want to take home a souvenir that screams “I’ve been to Taiwan,” these will certainly get the point across. For something a little more subtle, Tai-ho also sells many varieties of easily transportable baked goodies in packs meant for sharing. And regardless of what you pick, you’re bound to make friends if you return home bearing sweet treats.

ENGLISH AND CHINESE

Chaozhou Street 潮州街

Dihua Street 迪化街 laopo cake 老婆餅

Master A-Hsiang 阿祥師

Mazu biscuits 媽祖餅 ping xi cake 平西餅 sachima 薩其瑪 sansheng 三牲

Zhen Nan Pastry Shop 振南製餅舖