Zhu Xiang Yuan

 

Zhu Xiang Yuan is a very famous restaurant located in Tainan, Taiwan.  It is well known for its famous pot cooked chicken.  It currently has 7 different locations in Taiwan serving the customers all over Taiwan.  The restaurant is also known to have its tables and chairs made out of bamboos to resonant with the bamboo in its restaurant name.  Zhu Xiang Yuan typically gets quite busy during the peak dining hour.

As we went to Tainan as a one day trip, Zhu Xiang Yuan was our first stop to go to.  We got off the Tainan High Speed Railway station and took the taxi to here.  Since the distance was a bit far, it costed us $600 NT to get there.  It was a bit pricy.  When we got there, it was barely 11AM and the restaurant just opened.  We were the first customers there.  We sat down at the table by the window to go through the menu items.

We first ordered half of the famous pot cooked chicken.  We then ordered the stir fried pork, fried oysters, and the bamboo mixed water spinach.  Since it was our first time here, the restaurant also served us sweet potatoes and a bowl of chicken flavoured noodle.

The first plate served was the famous pot cooked chicken, along with the chicken soup.  The chicken soup was free with unlimited refill.  We started with the soup and loved the sea weed and the bamboo shoot in there.  We quickly asked for the refill right away.  The chicken was juicy and tender.  It even had a small bowl with chicken grease in it and asked customers to pour it on top of the rice.  It was so aromatic and the flavour was so pure.

The stir fried pork was amazing as well, but obviously not as overwhelming as the chicken.  We kind of just enjoyed it as a regular meal.  The fried oyster was good and it came with sweet and hot sauce.  The sweet and hot sauce was not hot at all.  It was more sweet and worked really well with the fried oysters.  We loved the bamboo mixed water spinach.  The slight sourness and the crunchiness of bamboo mixed really well with water spinach.  We really loved the flavour.  The sweet potatoes on the house had some sugar coating spread on top of it.  It tasted more like sweet dessert.  The chicken flavoured noodle was basically the same chicken grease poured on top of the noodle.  It was just as aromatic as the chicken and we loved it as well.

The lunch meal at Zhu Xiang Yuan was definitely not cheap but we did enjoy the food, especially the famous pot cooked chicken.  We may visit it again in the future with people who have not tried this yet.