I had been looking forward to this one.
This week in the Chinese speaking world (Thursday) was Dragon Boat Festival which is a national holiday here in Taiwan. As it fell on a Thursday, the Taiwanese government, in their infinite wisdom gave us all Friday off, which sounds great, hurray! Four day weekend! But in practice, everyone had to work last Saturday to compensate for the extra day holiday. Workers here could really do with the extra time off, due to horrendous work hours and working culture (which is a massive rant that I can’t be bothered to get into here), and if the Taiwanese workforce who observe this extra day work thing are anything to go by, most people do very little work and spend their time drinking pearl milk tea, rearranging their desks and trying to find a reason, any reason to be in the office on a Saturday. If they trade overseas, there is pretty much nothing to do.
Normally, Dragon Boat Festival means dragon boat races, where people train for months to prepare, but this year being 2020 and nothing makes sense anymore, there were to my knowledge no races scheduled. So of course what do I do? I take advantage of the long holiday and go out for Turkish food, because, well because. I probably wouldn’t have gone anyway- Thursday was one of the hottest days on record for June hitting 39C.
Joining me today was Preschooler Bao (Mrs. Bao wasn’t present because after our move she hadn’t had time to enjoy the new house alone) as well as our friends The Rocksteady Crew. I’ve known Ms. Crew since 2012 when I had a stint of trying not to be an English teacher in Taipei, and focused instead on writing educational material and she was chief editor. Ms. Crew has quite possibly the best English of a non-native I’ve met in Taiwan, even knowing regional slang. She has some Italian/Scottish family and knows her way around Edinburgh very well. I’ve also met her father, who is also a pretty amazing linguist (speaks Arabic). Mr. Crew, I have known for a few years since they married (though I’ve forgotten what he does), very nice bloke too, particularly good with kids but a bit shy to speak English, and of course Preschool Crew who is little bit older than my fun tornado, but they get along very well. Plus, as any parents out there know, they can keep each other entertained while we focus on more useful topics.
Ms. Crew had asked to come along on one of my wild rides saying she had a preference for strong flavours, and me wanting something a bit less standard than my most recent jaunts, we agreed on Safranbolu. We also knew the young ones wouldn’t be hard to cater for, as Preschooler Bao at least, is pretty fussy.
Safranbolu had been recommended to me by one of the army of people I seem to know called Cat, who knows someone who is married to a Turkish guy who said it is great. One thing you can say about Taipei when you’ve been here a while is the place is pretty incestuous.
The restaurant is very easy to find, with the takeout kebab element of their business on the first floor i.e. the ground floor if you are British and the sit down restaurant is upstairs. The décor was as you would expect. A lot of Turkish flags, Middle Eastern themes. It was busy, but other tables’ conversations didn’t carry, which is a good thing obviously. I don’t need people who aren’t parents to know that CBeebies kicks Nick Jr’s behind. Seriously, Sarah & Duck and Hey Duggee are miles ahead of Blaze & the Monster Machines and Top Wing. These are the serious issues parents discuss when they get together.
We ordered two sets and an extra cheese pide, and bread for the young ones. If you don’t know pide, people look upon it as “Turkish pizza”, but that would be unfair. The set included a soup, appetizer, main, dessert. Soup-wise I went for the yoghurt soup with rice. One for the stranger end of the spectrum like the salty tea I had from Bhutan. It split opinion, and while we liked it, it was strange to have as a soup. It felt like it would be more at home being a dip of some kind. Next was shakshuka which was very enjoyable. The Crew had Turkish salad which was a little spicy, and they enjoy spice more than I do.
For the main I had beyte chicken doner kebab, they had lamb shish and lamb meatballs, as well as the aforementioned cheese pide. It is a little unusual to see Taiwanese people eat lamb, there are definitely lamb fans here, but many local people say that it smells weird and won’t eat it, so I was happy to see them order it. It was lovely, both the shish and the meatballs. The shish was very tender and the meatballs had a spice to them that we couldn’t work out but not overpowering. My kebab was good, and the yoghurt on the side was tip top. I’ve looked at a few online reviews and there seems to be a consensus that portions are a bit small, but I would say they are fine.
For dessert we had vanilla rice pudding, which was snaffled by both Preschooler. The small taste I had of it was good.
There is definitely a lot more to discover in here, they are very good at what they do and like everything I’ve had so far, I want to return. I don’t remember seeing it was halal certified, but I presume it is because of mentions on Facebook celebrating Ramadan and the huge pre-virus tourism push that was geared towards Indonesians and Malaysians. Another good place to bring my Muslim friends should any ever come round these parts.
Young kids, getting restless and not satisfied with the free balloons they got, we knew it was time to make moves, otherwise it would have gotten to the point where four year olds start running about for no reason, somebody falls over and…you’ve seen it many times before.
We continued our day elsewhere, letting the two kids burn off energy in the park while we discussed the finer points of society. All in all, a good time had by all.
Prices
Yoghurt soup with rice- 110NT
Shakshuka 60NT
Turkish Salad 145NT
Beyti Doner Kebab (Chicken)-420 NT
Lamb Shish 450NT
Cheese Pide 280NT
Oven Grilled Beef Meatballs 450NT
Rice Pudding 130NT
Turkish Lemonade 120NT
Turkish Bread 60NT
There is a set meal deal which included soup, appetizer, main and dessert that mentioned 300NT and wasn’t written in English so I’ll have to ask Ms. Crew what that was because I forgot to ask (we took advantage of it)
Nearest MRT:: Songjiang Nanjing station, go out of Exit 1 turn left, walk about 5 minutes.
Address: No. 60, Section 2, Nanjing East Road
52 Cuisines? 