Guozheng Hotel started by offering catering services. The restaurant now offers both catering and in-house dining services, and spend half of the days in a year preparing for food catering. The lady chef even suffered from hand injuries due to a lack of manpower and overwork because of the good business.
Come visit Shanshang District in Tainan City! The nostalgic flavors are guaranteed to be most unforgettable.
◎Yipinqing (Aunt Yan's) Popsicle Store◎
Cold icy popsicles become immensely during summer in order to hold the simmering heat at bay! The most famous, nostalgic, and popular online brands would acquire a great following. Let's head off to Shanshang District of Tainan City, where a fantastic store offering the best popsicles await us!
Yipinqing Popsicles (Aunt Yan's Popsicle Store) is located opposite Shanshang's busy market area. This is where every Shanshang resident would go during hot summers.
Yipinqing Popsicles is a store with over 50 years of history. The store has a traditional refrigerator made in Japan that is reputed to be the only operational equipment of its kind in Taiwan. This belt-powered equipment uses ammonia as the refrigerant to freeze water and make ice. Visitors to the store would quickly notice the sound of the revolving belts, bringing back memories of ages past.
Aunt Yan is now over 70 years old but is still as hale as ever. She typically starts her 12-hour workday early in the morning to prepare the ingredients needed to make the popsicles and would labor all the way to about 9 PM at night. Aunt Yan started working at Yipinqing since she was 17 years old. The owner, Mr. Wang Chin-te, was a widower with three children, and Aunt Yan eventually married him for his sincerity and her love for the children as well. Mr. Wang passed away after a decade, leaving behind 4 children whom Aunt Yan raised by herself by keeping the popsicle store store. Since then, over 30 years had passed and Aunt Yan has never stopped making and selling popsicles. Popsicle making is no easy task, and Aunt Yan's children and grandchildren have advised her to retire and enjoy a more relaxing life. However, Aunt Yan preferred the joy of making popsicles and seeing the satisfied smiles on her customers' faces, and is thus determined to keep making these popular popsicles and other signature ice desserts until she finally decides to retire.
Astute visitors at Shanshang would notice 2 red-colored shop signs, one reading Yipinqing Popsicles, and another one reading Aunt Yan's Popsicle Store. The shop was originally named Yipinqing Popsicles and had been operating under this name for decades. Recent news coverage has improved the popularity of the store. Although the popsicle shop is located along the streets, Shanshang is an extremely rural place with traditional street boulevards and unassuming storefronts, which meant that it's extremely easy to miss. News coverage also referred to the store as Aunt Yan's shop instead if Yipinqing, and thus many visitors were unable to locate the place. Aunt Yan therefore commissioned a new sign that read Aunt Yan's Popsicle Shop as well as a new replacement for Yipinqing Popsicles, giving this store a total of 2 signboards.
The traditional storefront may be narrow and messy, but Aunt Yan is an extremely hospitable owner and enjoys chatting with her customers. Visitors must also try out Aunt Yan's ice desserts. The menu offered include popsicles, shaved ice, and four-fruit-flavored ice. But there are two important signature ice desserts that must not be missed for anything, namely the sansebing (three-colored ice) and the qingbing (clear ice). Sansebing is created using a three-stage freezing process. The lowest layer would be duck egg fillings. The middle layer would be chocolate, while the top layer would be milk (PAMINA condensed milk). The complex creation process meant that the Sansebing would come with a slightly higher price tag. Qingbing (clear ice), on the other hand, is locally known as water ice. Despite looking like any other shaved ice, Aunt Yan's qingbing offers a very different flavor. Qingbing is made using shreded and boiled pineapples that are continuously churned in the freezers until it assumes a snow-like texture. The spongy texture and sweet pineapple flavors is unforgettable. It comes as no surprise that Qingbing is regarded by local Shanshang residents as the best ice dessert in the area.
We welcome you to Shanshang District in Tainan City. The rustic sights and flavors are guaranteed to be unforgettable!