Dishes
Shaobing and soy milk breakfast
燒餅
Also called: 燒餅油條 · huoshao · 豆漿 · 鹹豆漿
Flaky baked flatbread, filled with egg, a fried cruller or pickled greens, eaten with soy milk for breakfast.
What it is
Shaobing is a baked, layered flatbread, with or without sesame on top. Breakfast shops split it and fill it with scallion omelette, a length of youtiao (fried cruller) or pickled greens. Salty soy milk is seasoned with vinegar, soy sauce, sesame oil or chilli oil and has pickled mustard greens, dried shrimp and youtiao pieces in it.
Where it comes from
Shaobing comes from northern Chinese cooking and is often linked to the older hubing flatbread. In Taiwan, soy milk is a popular breakfast drink, usually eaten with youtiao, mantou or shaobing.
How it is made
Layered dough is baked until crisp outside, then split and filled to order. At Kuan Lai Shun the pickled mustard greens are stir-fried with Sichuan peppercorns for a numbing heat.
How to eat it
Both shops named here open before dawn, so think breakfast. A filled shaobing and a bowl of soy milk is the standard order, plus a steamed pork bun if you are hungry.
In Kaohsiung
Kuan Lai Shun is famous for shaobing with egg and peppery pickled greens. It sits in Zuoying's Guomao community, known for its military-village atmosphere. Hsing Long Ju near Liuhe Night Market also fills its shaobing with youtiao, scallion egg or pickled greens.
Where to eat it in Kaohsiung
寬來順早餐店Kuan Lai Shun Breakfast
This Zuoying breakfast shop made its name on soy milk. Order a clay-oven sesame flatbread with egg and pickled greens, a pork bun and a salty soy milk.
興隆居Hsing Long Ju
Queues are long at this 60-plus-year-old breakfast institution, which opens before dawn. Order the big soup dumplings, a sesame flatbread with egg, and savoury soy milk.
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