What We Ate In Taiwan, Part 5 - Indigenous Food

In my only other visit to Taiwan nearly 40 years ago on a trip assembled by the pioneering but defunct Jet On Travel Agency in San Francisco, we were taken to this hokey Aboriginal village near Sun Moon Lake.  (I learned they took the "hokey" out of it a few years later by turning it into a full fledged Aboriginal themed amusement park.)  But back in 1980 it was just a few aboriginal buildings, along with a combination restaurant and theater, if you call a small stage with a stylized Aboriginal backdrop in front of a few tables and chairs a theater.  As our tour group of a couple dozen was escorted to our tables in front of the "stage", loudspeakers blared out what apparently was a call to arms.  After a few minutes four women dressed in bright aboriginal garb dashed over, presumably called by loudspeaker to pause their other village duties.  After some singing and dancing we had our lunch by the stage.  Unfortunately the meal is a complete blank to me 40 years later (as was much of that Taiwan tour), but I'd be surprised if it was anything more than a plate of food.

This is in contrast to the Supera/Signet (www.superatours.com) tour indigenous meal we had at what appeared to be a converted farmhouse.  Proving that they indeed eschew tourist traps in favor of actual adventures, Signet/Supera took us to a fabulous Indigenous lunch.  The lunch itself was preceded outside the restaurant by a demonstration of the unique hot stone cooking used by the restaurant.   Hot stones are dropped into a cooking vessel full of liquid and fish and other items are cooked.

The cooking vessel and the resulting broth is then brought into the dining room to provide a delicious soup served directly from the vessel.

Meanwhile, the tilipia which was taken live from the pond near to the outdoor cooking area is deliciously salt baked.

Here's the multigrain pumpkin fried rice along with a vegetarian dish.

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The most interesting vegetarian dish was referred to as "valentine tears" for which I could find no internet reference.  Supposedly seaweed/algae related.

Next on the menu, pork patties.

How about some pork chayote soup?

And lastly for dessert, passionfruit yogurt.

All in all a most distinctive, interesting and delicious meal which had the tour group members talking about the meal as we headed for our afternoon destination.