Home-Made Taiwanese Tea Ice Cream on Yongkang Street
百元號 is a tiny little tea shop on Yongkang Street, right next to Jin Ji Yuan, a Michelin-approved restaurant that you absolutely must try. It’s easily recognizable by its funky entrance and plastic ice cream cone outside. There is also a little notice telling passers-by about their specialty: Taiwanese tea ice cream.
The shop mostly sells premium Taiwanese tea in cute packaging, a perfect purchase for the throngs of tourists that grace Yongkang Street every day. The owner has 30 years of experience as a tea master, and created their own recipe for home-made tea ice cream.
Being a small shop, there are only a few flavours of ice cream available. The first four are always tea-flavoured, with interesting choices like chocolate oriental beauty tea and honey Oolong.
There were also three additional flavours that looked delicious, but we passed in favour of the tea ice creams that had enticed us into the shop in the first place.
Although it was hard to choose, we were eventually able to narrow it down to two. First, we tried the premium oriental beauty tea ice cream ($180). This tasted strongly of oriental beauty tea while still being creamy and sweet. We enjoyed it, although if you don’t care much for the taste of tea you should probably avoid it since the tea flavour was quite powerful. Despite being creamy, we didn’t feel like this ice cream weighed us down too much, which made it a perfect after-dinner treat.
Next, we tried the wild honey Oolong tea ice cream ($120). This flavour was much milder, with sweet hints of honey in every bite. We loved it. You could definitely taste the Oolong, but it wasn’t overpowering like the Oriental flavour. And like the first ice cream, it wasn’t too heavy — a perfect way to end a Yongkang Street eating session.
In addition to ice cream, the store has a variety of teas in cute packaging for purchase. Prices tend to be on the higher side, but it could make a nice gift if you are prepared to spend a little.
What’s the vibe?
Cute, tiny little tea shop on Yongkang Street with ice cream. It’s a little touristy and prices reflect this, but nice nonetheless.
Worth it?
$180 for one scoop of ice cream is on the pricey side, but we let it slide since it was unique, the ingredients were premium, and the owner has a lot of experience as a tea master. Whether or not you think this is a good deal is completely up to you to decide!
Would you go back?
Probably not. We tried it and thought it was good, but not good enough to warrant a second visit. Next time we’ll return to Snow King, which also has tea-flavoured ice creams (along with almost every other bizarre Taiwanese flavour under the sun).
Visited: December 2018
| Bai Yuan Hao |
| Chinese Name: 百元號 |
| Hours: 11am – 9pm |
| English Address: No. 30, Yongkang Street, Da’an District, Taipei City, 106 |
| Chinese Address: 106台北市大安區永康街30號 |
