Taiwanese Cuisine Part 2 - Sit-Fun Restaurant

Our hotel in Taipei was not located near any subway station. Yet, it has a great location because it was a short taxi ride away from most of the main shopping areas and restaurant areas in the heart of Taipei.

More importantly, it was a short walk away from Yong Kang Street. Yong Kang Street is a street famous for lots of good food.

Sit-Fun Restaurant (喫飯食堂) is a restaurant on Yong Kang Street that serves Taiwanese food. Sit-Fun (喫飯) means "Eat rice" in Cantonese.. Eat rice is a very typically way of saying eat. The last 2 words in the restaurant's name 食堂, translates more accurately to "canteen". Put together, 喫飯食堂 gives you the impression that it is a simple restaurant where you can eat well.. at a reasonable price.

And indeed that is what the owner of the restaurant wanted - good food at a reasonable price. The food at Sit-Fun is very very good indeed.. It is a good restaurant for small groups because unlike your typical Chinese restaurant, most dishes come in 2 sizes and the small size is pretty small.. so even though I only went there with The Husband, the 2 of us could try out a good number of dishes.

My favourite dish had to be the Stir-fried Pork Liver. It is cooked with a dark, sweet sauce, with a sprinkly of toasted sesame seeds. The pork liver is cooked perfectly so it is just nice and tender. The server said that this dish is best eaten when hot and she is right.. The liver continues to cook with the heat from the dish so the last piece I ate was not as tender as the first.

Stir-fried Pork Liver - I can finish a whole bowl of white rice with this..

Hm.. but maybe my favourite dish is not the pork liver but the Crispy Homemade Beancurd. It is made from blending tofu with a variety of seafood. Methinks I tasted fish, pork and some vegetables. Again another perfectly good dish - crispy out the outside, soft and piping hot on the inside.

 

Crispy Homemade Beancurd

But then.. the Fried Yam Roll was very good too.. so maybe that is my favourite. The roll is extremely crispy and the yam inside is sweet and has an interesting texture - a mixture of grated yam and finely cut yam strips.

Fried Yam Roll

The Steamed Cabbage with Bonito Flakes was also surprising good. It is such a simple dish.. but I'm sure without good quality cabbages, it was not be possible to have such sweet steamed cabbages.

 

Steamed Cabbages with Bonito Flakes

The house specialty was Steamed Chicken Drumstick. The chicken drumstick was steamed with white rice wine and served cold. It was very good.. but nowhere near the standards of Golden Formosa.

Steamed Chicken Drumstick

Overall though, I would think that if there is only 1 Taiwanese restaurant I could visit in Taipei, Sit-Fun Restaurant would be the one I would visit. Almost every dish we had could have been my favourite.. and there were so many others I wanted to order but couldn't because there were only 2 of us. This is a restaurant I would definitely be visiting again and again...

If you ever have the chance to visit this restaurant, be sure to also check out the various signboards on the wall - they show that the owner has a fun sense of humour!

 

This reads "My wife is afraid of me" if you read it from left to right. 

It says "I am afraid of my wife" if you read from right to left. 

This is meant to be read from left to right - it translates literally as 

"Eating rice is bigger than the Emperor" 

- meaning having one's meal is more important than the emperor himself. 

A very apt description indeed

Sit-Fun Restaurant 喫飯食堂

Add: 5, Lane 8, Yong Kang Street, Taipei (台北市永康街8巷5號)
Telephone: +866(02)2322 2632
Website: http://www.sit-fun.com.tw/menu1.html