Taiwan is the land of breakfast shops. If there are two 7-11's on every block, than there is at least one breakfast shop. The breakfast items they usually sell are various sandwiches (bacon, egg, cheese, etc.), hamburgers, chicken burgers, and a unique egg wrap roll akin to a breakfast burrito. And to wash it down, some soy milk.
As unhealthy as all this food is, breakfast shops are packed most mornings. Perhaps it's because at home the typical Taiwanese breakfast is rice and vegetables. Definitely not something to excite you out of bed. These breakfast shops seem to give people a brief rest on their way to work.
Usually they are open from 6am to 10am. Most say 5am to 12pm, but I hardly ever see them open that early or late. In fact that is an interesting thing about Taiwan, opening hours more mean "we will be open at some point in between these hours." It is a shame that they close so early, as for many foreigners the food is quite heavy for breakfast but we wouldn't mind eating it for dinner. The idea of breakfast for dinner hasn't made it's way over here yet. Perhaps this is for the best when i open my chain of breakfast shops that are only open in the afternoon and evening.
The breakfast shop pictured above has a special place in my heart, in that it saved my heart. I used to have a great fondness for bacon, egg, and cheese sandwiches from breakfast shops. each place made it a little differently, with perhaps some lettuce, or cucumber, or what have you. One constant at all breakfast shops is a type of mayonnaise that is sweet and looks like vaseline. Looks and sounds terrible, but tastes good.
I used to eat these sandwiches at least twice a week. definitely not good for me, but tasty and easy to pick up while walking my dog. Also while each place has it's own style, they are pretty hard to mess up, and i appreciate that consistency. That is, until I ate at this shop. In their effort to stand out, they use high quality cheese on their sandwiches (also making the sandwich cost much more than other places). However while the cheese might be good on its own, it did not blend well with the other ingredients and the whole sandwich tasted terrible. After a few bites i couldn't eat anymore. But that's not all, it was so terrible that i can never have a bacon egg and cheese breakfast sandwich again. to this day (almost a year now) my stomach still feels that sandwich and it gets kind of uncomfortable. Even though i know other places make good sandwiches, i can't bring myself to eat them, this store has tainted my view of all breakfast shops and foods.
However this is not a complaint. Even though my stomach feels a little queasy reliving the memory as i write this, I'm happy that i will never again eat such unhealthy food for breakfast. Now if only I could have similar experiences with all the other unhealthy food I love to eat.
