Qingdao Soybean Milk Shop 青島豆漿店
Qingdao Soybean Milk Shop 青島豆漿店 in Taipei serves one of the best breakfasts we had on our recent Taipei trip.
Located in Zhongzheng District in Taipei, this humble shop serves traditional Taiwanese breakfast such as roasted soy milk, shaobing 燒餅 (unleavened flatbread), and hot pockets filled with minced pork and chives (肉餅), and leek (韭菜盒).
We enjoyed all the items!
Qingdao Soybean Milk Shop 青島豆漿店
Qingdao Soybean Milk Shop 青島豆漿店 is located close to the Chiang Kai-Shek Memorial Hall and is a 2-minute walking distance from the Dongmen MRT station.
Opened daily from 5.30 am until 11.30 am (closed on Sundays), this corner lot shop is very popular with the locals as there is often a queue in front.
Do note that the store is only open for takeaways – but there are no restrictions for patrons to enjoy the pastries while they’re still hot on the sideways (which we did!).
青島豆漿店 is popular with locals and less “touristy”
Soybean and shaobing can be found at most brekkie joints.
This includes exceptionally popular and Michelin-mentioned Fu Hang Soy Milk, which we skipped due to the insane hour-long queue despite being close to our hotel. We’ve also eaten at Yong He Soy Milk in 2019 – which we remembered to be good.
However, we do think Qingdao’s offerings were superb and warrant a visit if you’re looking for good soybean milk and hot pockets without the “touristy” hype.
The buns are made fresh in front of your eyes
While there were a few people ahead of us, the best part of the queue was watching the owners work their magic.
A man can be seen baking the hot pocket in the oven enclosure, while the shaobing 燒餅 are being cooked on the griddle on top.
Interestingly, a kettle can be seen being constantly kept warm on top of the griddle and close to the fire source.
We learned that the kettle contains soy milk, which is left to boil for hours which gives it a smoky aroma – something we’ve not tasted anywhere else.
At the rear of the shop, a few women were busy folding the fillings into the freshly-made dough.
Unique smoky soybean milk
Let’s start off with soybean milk.
To be honest, Soybean Milk is such a common drink among the Chinese community globally (Ipoh serves one of the best soy milk in the world, in our opinion) – so we didn’t have great expectations for this.
But it surprised us! Due to it being left on the griddle for hours, the bottom of the kettle is slightly burned which gave the soybean milk an interesting “smoky” roasted taste.
While Ming didn’t enjoy it as much, Max loved it as the smoky aroma added an extra dimension to an otherwise regular soymilk drink.
The leek bun is our favourite
Among all the pastries we tried here, the Leek Vegetable Hot Pocket 韭菜盒 was our top pick!
Made into an elongated shape and larger than the typical round meat buns, the vegetable hot pocket is filled to the brim with chopped leek, glass noodles, tofu and egg!
This was so good! The leek is incredibly fragrant, and it was nicely complemented by the tofu cubes and glass noodles. The different ingredients have their own distinct flavour and texture, which worked well together in the bun.
We loved that these were served warm – so the filling was really nice and steamy (this applies to all pastries here). The pastry skin was also incredibly flaky.
The pocket is the perfect breakfast item as it contains protein (tofu, egg), fibre (leek), and carbs (glass noodles).
Juicy minced meat and chive buns
The Minced Pork and Chive Bun (肉餅) is also amazing here!
Made in the typical round shape, the skin is incredibly flaky but the filling was outstanding as the minced pork was incredibly juicy, with a lovely fragrance from the chives. Add some chili sauce on the side if you want some heat to go with your juicy pork.
Shaobing 燒餅
The Shaobing 燒餅 (flatbread) here was also better than most as it had good flakiness and wasn’t desert-dry.
We ordered ours with youtiao in the middle. There’s the chili sauce on the side if you like more flavour with the shaobing.
Summary
We really enjoyed all the pastries we tried here, and the roasted smoky soybean milk was a revelation.
We also wanted to try their savoury soymilk dessert here but it was not served that day.
HIGHLY RECOMMENDED!
Qingdao Soybean Milk Shop 青島豆漿店
Address: No. 139-3, Section 1, Hangzhou S Rd, Zhongzheng District, Taipei City, Taiwan 100
Hours: 5.30am-11.30am Daily (Closed on Sundays)
Phone: +886 2 2393 4958
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