Photos: What's Your Favorite Asian Street Food?

October 4th, 2012

Papadum, fried paper-thin wafer of lentil or chickpeas, usually eaten as an accompaniment with dips, from India.
(Saki Yuen)

In China, lamb kebabs, known as yangrouchuan. (Matt Birch)

Fried fishballs and squid balls from the Philippines. (Ayie Zerrudo)

In Thailand, spicy fish curry served with rice and beer. (Scott Rosefield)

In China, tanghulu, or haw fruit and grape kebabs covered in sugar. (Matt Birch)

In Thailand, a street vendor selling the notoriously fragrant fruit known as durian. (Kavi Reddy)

Tomato-egg stir fry with white rice, a common Chinese home dish. (Julia Dorff)

Bacon-wrapped sausages on a stick from Seoul, Korea. (Briana Green)

Imprinted flatbread from Xi’an Islamic Market in China. (Julia Dorff)

Betamax, skewered salted solidified pork or chicken blood, from the Philippines. (Ayie Zerrudo)

Char kway teow, stir-fried rice noodles with dark soy sauce with shrimp, egg, and sometimes cockles, from Singapore. (Saki Yuen)

Sliced boiled lamb hand-ripped soup noodles from Xi’an, China. (Julia Dorff)

Balut, a duck embryo that is boiled and eaten in the shell, from the Philippines. (Ayie Zerrudo)

Smelly beancurd or stinky tofu: fans swear by it, others run for their lives with their noses pinched. This fermented tofu is usually deep-fried, and one can smell it at any night market before one sees it in Taiwan. (Saki Yuen)

Rou jia mo, street “meat sandwich” from Xi’an, China. (Julia Dorff)

Takoyaki, "grilled octopus," are ball-shaped snacks commonly sold at festivals, or matsuri, in Japan, and have octopus, ham or even cheese stuffed in them. (Saki Yuen)

Soy beancurd, or "douhua," a Chinese dessert made of soft beancurd served with sugar syrup, and with the texture of very soft pudding. Found all over Asia and sold in plastic tubs, it's the Asian alternative to ice cream on a hot summer day. (Saki Yuen)

In Singapore and Malaysia, nasi lemak, or "fat rice," is a fragrant rice dish cooked with coconut milk and pandan leaves. (Saki Yuen)

Wonton noodles are interpreted in many different ways in different countries such as Hong Kong, Malaysia, Philippines, Thailand and Singapore, with variations on its dumplings, or wontons. Wontons can be filled with shrimp, minced pork, mushrooms or fish paste, and can be fried or boiled. (Saki Yuen)

Tapsilog, a traditional Filipino meal primarily served during breakfast that consists of garlic-fried rice, tapa (dried beef), and fried egg. (Ryan Fernandez)

Fruit juices and drinks such as coconut, longan, lemon, chrysanthemum, and pennywort from Thailand. (Ryan Fernandez)

In China and Southeast Asia, zongzi (粽子) are pyramid-shaped glutinous rice dumplings stuffed with items like meat or red beans. According to myth, the dumpling was created to divert fish from eating the corpse of poet Qu Yuan when he jumped into a river, so that they would devour the dumpling instead. (Saki Yuen)

Mango shaved ice, or bao bing, a popular dessert from Taiwan. (Yi Zheng)

Curry puffs are deep fried fritters that resemble empanadas with curried potatoes and sometimes chili sardines. In Singapore, they are commonly sold by bicycle vendors or the back of vans. (Saki Yuen)

Enlarge Hide captions

Food is a topic of constant discussion among the Asia Society Online team. During one such conversation this summer about an Asian street food truck in New York, we had an "aha" moment and thought, why not ask our readers — what's your favorite Asian street food?

Photo submissions poured in from around Asia, and you can see the results in the gallery above. We tried to capture a range of diverse foods and drinks, but the entries don't have to end here. Please continue sending us photos of your favorite Asian street food — along with the name, origin and description — through email, Facebook, Twitter and Tumblr. We'd love to know what gets your taste buds dancing!

In the meanwhile, watch the video below, shot by Jeff Wang, Associate Director for Education and Chinese Language Initiative s at Asia Society, on a recent trip to Beijing. It shows a street vendor making jianbing, a crepe-like egg pancake with various filling ingredients, commonly found in Beijing and Shanghai. If you have similar street food videos from Asia, send those in too!

With reporting assistance from Boruo Chen, Saira Siddiqi and Anne Zhou.

About the Author

Tahiat Mahboob is Asia Society's Senior Multimedia Producer. She grew up in Bangladesh, worked at New York Fashion Week and taught at the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism.

@tahiatmahboob

Photos: What's Your Favorite Asian Street Food?

Related Links

About the Author