Virgin mud crabs and other goodies

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My good friends are in town for a couple of days, and after our last experience, I promised to take them to another classic Taiwanese joint for dinner.  Ming Fu (明福台菜海鮮) is famous for some of their premium dishes, but I chose not to pre-order them since I wasn't particular interested in shark's fin, chicken testicles or bull penises.  Nevertheless, there's plenty of other goodies on the menu to make me happy.

I was presented with two complimentary starters as I sat down, which was perfect since I was starving after a whole day of eating nothing but a small pack of crackers.

Dried sakura shrimp (櫻花蝦) - perfect to go along with some alcohol.

Clams marinated in garlic - pretty nice, although the raw garlic can get a little strong.

Stir-fried bird's nest fern (野菜山蘇) - not surprisingly, this was the first dish to arrive.  Stir-fried with black beans and dried white bait.  Nice and crunchy.

Oysters with garlic sauce (蒜泥香蚵) - a little bit on the raw side, but fat and yummy.

Stir-fried mullet gizzard (炒烏魚腱) - one of the specialties here.  A little crunchy and looking like pig's kidneys.

Deep-fried prawn rolls (香酥蝦捲) - actually very yummy, with nice wrapper and prawn paste/water chestnut filling.

Grilled mullet roe (烤烏魚子) - nice and stuck to my teeth.

Virgin mud crabs (處女蟳) - this is the season for these "virgin" mud crabs, and you can see the abundance of tomalley.  Not bad at all.

Stir-fried rice vermicelli (炒米粉) - really nice.  A little on the dry side without much oil, stir-fried at high heat to give that "wok hei (鑊氣)".

Green bamboo shoots and chicken soup (綠筍干土雞) - a pretty yummy clear chicken soup.  Light and refreshing, with chunks of sweet, summer bamboo shoots.

Deep-fried pig intestines (脆皮肥腸) - this is tough to beat… Really dry and crispy on the outside yet still soft and moist on the inside.  Good with a little of that local basil (九層塔).

Deep-fried burdock with sesame (芝麻牛蒡) - not what I had expected… This was coated with batter that had black sesame seeds, then deep-fried.  The burdock itself was pretty sweet, but the batter also added a hint of sweetness.

Deep-fried taro balls with red bean (紅豆芋泥球) - good enough that even someone like me, who doesn't really like taro, thought this was yummy.

I brought two bottles of white along with our own wine glasses.  The focus tonight wasn't on wine, so for once I didn't write any detailed tasting notes…

2007 Willi Schaefer Graacher Himmelreich Riesling Spätlese - much sweeter than I expected from a spätlese.  Still very enjoyable.  Unfortunately this was served a little warm.

2007 Leeuwin Estate Art Series Chardonnay - buttery, oaky, green apple, mineral.  Drinking well now.

The night was still young, so we ended up at my apartment for more drinks.  I had talked about trying out the fruit-flavored beers from Taiwan Beer (台灣啤酒), so we picked up a couple of cans from my local 7-11.  Both the mango and pineapple flavored beers were pretty sweet and fruity.  I can imagine that they would be popular with the younger crowd, especially girls.

Bijofu Yuzu Liqueur (bottled August 2010) - two years after bottling, this no longer tasted as fresh as it did when I bought it 2 years ago.  Instead the flavors of honey - one of the ingredients - has become more prominent.  On the palate it now tastes more like candied lime or aged lemon marmalade.  I made the comparison with aged, oxidized Chardonnay.  We wondered how it would taste if we froze it and made it into a Slurpee…

A lot of food, and a reasonable amount of alcohol.  I think we were all pretty happy...