Have you ever tried Taiwanese cuisine? It seems like I have tried it before, but I was unaware of it. However, all I can say is that it’s SO DELICIOUS! If you ever notice a Taiwanese restaurant in your area, I suggest you check it out. The flavors are simple and pair together very well. Taiwanese cuisine uses fresh ingredients and proteins to enhance each other without doing anything fancy. If you ask me, it is one of the best comfort foods.
In Aiea on the island of O’ahu, there is a restaurant called Fooki Hawaii. Fooki features a variety of Asian style foods and specialty teas. They pride themselves on their signature beef noodle soup. The soup is simmered for 12 hours and is seasoned with 20 spices. They serve this beef soup with fresh noodles, various cuts of beef, vegetables, and a seasoned soft boiled egg. Fooki Hawaii serves delicious Taiwanese fusion cuisine and delicious teas at an affordable price for all to enjoy.
My friend suggested this place as our “girl’s night dinner” and I was so excited to try! We ordered their Grandpa Rolling Beef, COW WOW Noodle Soup, and the Fooki Belly Bowl. The Grandpa Rolling Beef dish was my favorite! It was braised shank rolled in a crispy scallion pancake, drizzled with a sweet and savory hoisin sauce, and topped with fresh vegetables. The crunchy texture of the pancake was perfect, shank meat was seasoned very well, and the vegetables added a nice fresh aspect to the dish to tie it all together. I’d definitely come back here to order that again.
The COW WOW Noodle Soup was definitely out of my comfort zone in terms of the cuts of beef in the soup itself. I love a simple-yet-flavorful beef noodle soup, but I usually go for the “level one” type of cuts. I was pleasantly surprised to find out that I don’t mind these textures and flavors! The tendons were soft and gelatinous, the shank was fall-off-the-bone tender, and the beef ribs were a nice balance of soft tendons and meat. The noodles had that very sought-after “QQ” (bouncy chew that you find in Chinese noodles, dumpling wrappers, etc.), which was SO GOOD! I asked for the spice on the side, and that was nice to be able to control how spicy I wanted my soup to be.
I was able to try some of my friend’s Fooki Belly Bowl and I will vouch for that dish in my next visit! The braised pork belly was melt-in-your-mouth tender, and full of flavor! The bowl also comes with house-made pickled mustard cabbage to cut the fattiness of the pork, and topped with crunchy garlic chips. I love that they add their marinated soft-boiled egg to most of their dishes too. The creaminess ties everything together, and who doesn’t need a little extra protein?! Anything that comes with a soft boiled egg and garlic chips is a “must try” in my book. I’d say that this dish is made for two people to share with a side dish or two.
Fooki Hawaii is cranking out delectable Taiwanese Fusion food that is great for even the pickiest eaters to try. I can imagine that every dish is well-balanced with simple ingredients, in tasty combinations. They are adding Taiwanese Fusion to Hawaii’s assembly of world-wide cuisines. I can’t wait to go again to try more items on their menu and sample their delicious array of teas! Until next time…
Leave a Reply