What it is
A bowl of finely shaved milk ice, soft like snow ice, covered in thick sweet red beans with a raw egg yolk set in the middle. The name 月見 (yuèjiàn, 'moon-viewing') comes from Japanese cooking, where it marks a dish with an egg broken over it, the yolk standing in for the moon. Plainer versions put the egg on clear ice with condensed milk.
Where it came from
The dish survives mainly at long-running ice parlours (冰果室, bīngguǒshì), and food writers present it as a taste of the past.
The best-documented example is Yin Feng in Yanshui, Tainan. In 1951 the current owner's grandmother bought the building. When a relative in Tainan closed a cold-storage business, she bought its Japanese-era ice machines. She called the shop 銀鋒冰枝店: ice and silver coins are both white, and the name voiced a hope for silver piled high.
Local lore makes the parlour a meeting place for arranged introductions. If the young man's parents ordered the red bean milk ice with yolk, the match was on; soda or black tea meant a polite no. Traveler Luxe (旅人誌) says a bowl then cost 30 yuan when plain ice cost one, so ordering it was a real luxury.
How it is made
Ice made with milk is shaved fine so it stays soft. Sweet red beans go on top; Yin Feng cooks Wandan beans (萬丹紅豆) for six hours without soaking them first. Condensed milk is drizzled over, then a fresh raw yolk is placed on the mound. Simpler bowls skip the beans: a hollow is scooped in clear ice, filled with condensed milk and a raw egg, which half sets in the cold.
How to eat it
Stir the yolk through the ice before eating, so it blends with the milk into a smooth, creamy coating. Ask for 月見冰 (yuèjiàn bīng), or at Yin Feng for 紅豆月見牛奶冰. Some parlours offer a version with a pudding on top for anyone wary of raw egg.
Around Taiwan
- Tainan
- Yin Feng Ice Parlor (銀鋒冰果室) in Yanshui, now run by the third generation, stands beside the Ye family's octagonal house (八角樓), built by an ancestor who grew rich trading brown sugar.
- Kaohsiung
- Dongmen Ice Parlour (東門冰菓室) in Meinong, a shop of about 60 years at the corner by the East Gate tower (東門樓), serves the plain version: clear ice, condensed milk and a raw egg.
- Central
- Jiancheng Ice Parlour (建成冰菓室) in Toufen, Miaoli, open since 1977, tops clear ice with an old brand of condensed milk and the yolk of a free-range egg.
- South
- Southern parlours also drop a raw yolk onto banana-flavoured ice (香蕉冰), a combination regarded as a southern habit.
