Taiwan Cafe

I’ve been here so many times in the past month and just realized I haven’t written a review yet. Yes, I only discovered this place about a month ago. Sadly, while I loved it at first, my love for Taiwan Café has waned a little bit due to decline in service and overall food quality.
We usually go at night, either during peak dinner hours or just after. Parking has never been a problem for us, because there’s a small-​but-​big-​enough parking lot out front. Although the plaza looks a little bit sketchy and even deserted during the day, it’s worth going in and checking out. Their food is the cheap-​but-​good kind, and you even get a 5% discount if you pay in cash.
If you get nothing out of this review, get the Wan Luan pork hock (pig’s feet). They’re not the most consistent — sometimes, they get the texture just right and there’s almost like an elasticity to it; other times, it tastes really fatty and kind of overcooked. I would say give it a try at least twice before you make your love-​or-​hate determination. When they get it right, they really get it right.
Although they hit the nail on the head with most of their dishes, some of their dishes not so much. For example, we ordered the Hakka stir fry, and they used the wrong kind of squid. An important aspect of Hakka stir fry is the texture, or rather all the textures working together in one dish. Hakka stir fry fell flat, in my opinion.
A note on service: we ordered the Mi Tai Mu, a short rice noodle. I’ve never had it stir-​fried with ketchup, but apparently that’s the way it’s done here. The waitress said that, in the future, if we don’t want ketchup in our noodles, we should ask. I didn’t know ketchup in noodles was the new standard, but okay. I guess my only complaint would be that the waitress didn’t ask if we wanted a remake of this dish without ketchup, she just basically told us we’re stuck with it. We didn’t even bother taking the practically untouched noodle dish home.
Because we’ve generally been more and more disappointed with quality of service and food, we haven’t been coming here as often. We used to come here as often as three times a week! But I think we may need to find another «usual» spot.

Not a lot of options for Taiwanese food, so I am pretty happy with this place. They go strong on the flavors so you can recognize the food as uniquely Taiwanese, but in a way it takes away from the authenticity of it a little bit. For example I always love the meatballs with the glutinous skin, but the sauce is too sweet. The sticky rice in bamboo stalk has a really sweet sauce on top as well. The chow mein has a lot of sacha sauce on it, which I like, but it also makes it quite oily. I think if you had these dishes in Taiwan, they would not be as sweet or oily. But I can see they do it for mass appeal.
What I have only found here and why I like coming to this place, is the jello-​like dessert with black sugar syrup, fen-​guo. I have always loved it, and I don’t find it anywhere else.

The food here is great! They have Taiwanese meat balls (ba-​wan) which are definitely one of my favorite foods. The ba-​wans reheat nicely too so I definitely recommend picking up a few to take home as well.
I also had the beef noodle soup which was flavorful but not too salty and included generous hunks of meat. They also gave me extra pickled mustard greens when I asked for some.
Oh, and there’s a 5% discount if you pay in cash.

Since i was washing clothes in neighbor, I went into this café and ordered a seafood noodles while I was waiting. The noodle is kind of tasteless. I didn’t eat much although I was hungry. However the environment is comfortable and quiet.

This place has delicious Taiwanese food!
I highly recommend the meatball dish. There is a chewy gelatin layer surrounding the meatball, and it is doused in a red sauce. One meatball can be shared between two people.
Service is OK here. After all the food is served, the waitresses stop coming to your table. You will have to flag them down to get the bill.

For die hard fans of pork hock (pig feet), Taiwan Café is the only place to go in the South Bay.
Located in a nondescript and rather sketchy-​looking strip mall in north Milpitas, the place is a haven for all those looking for some ridiculously cheap and good Taiwanese soul food. The interior is surprisingly spacious and looks like a reclaimed southwestern-​themed restaurant. You almost expect to see tamales platters going by.
My usual is their awesome bowl of pig feet noodles with de-​boned pig feet! Having gnawed through my share of pig feet, well into the hundreds over this lifetime, I almost feel like a minor royalty to have such pampering. You get nice little slices of delightfully gelatinous pig skin and juicy pork in a lightly salted but heavily seasoned broth. It’s just chocked full of fried garlic, onions, and fresh cilantro. Just heavenly, like home cooking.
If you want extra pig feet, they’ll even serve up a whole plate of it, all de-​boned. If you think working for your delicious morsels makes them taste better, you can have them leave the bone in. Their sides are pretty good too, deep fried chicken, pork intestines, blood cakes, pig ears, etc.
At $ 30 with tip for 2 with sides, the tab was so low, I had to check they didn’t miss anything on the bill.

We had
1. Pig ears. Bad, extremely chewy due to bring frozen for too long.
2. Loofah with fish cake. Pretty good.
3. Hakka stir fry. Super salty. I was so thirsty after eating this.
4. Shrimp rice thing. It was OK but nothing special.
I would not come back.

Taiwan Café is located in a random strip mall and looks kinda shady on the outside. But once you walk inside, it’s like you entered a completely difference place. It’s nicely decorated and very clean.
Dat pork hock, tho…
Hella good! The pork itself has a nice «crunch» but it’s also moist. The garlic dipping sauce is SO GOOD!
Other dishes are definitely tasty also! Nothing is overly seasoned. My son loves their minced pork with rice. We also like to get the stir fried rice noodles, fried chicken, and oyster pancake.
It tends to get crowded on weekends, so expect a wait. The food comes out pretty quickly and the workers are pretty efficient so turnaround isn’t bad at all.
It’s a little out of the way, and the prices are reasonable but a little higher than some Taiwanese restaurants around here, but we still like to go once in a while. The shaved ice looks REALLY good, but we have yet to try it.

Authentic Taiwanese flavor and lowest prices. Worth the drive. Bigger menu selection than red hot wok; not as salty; closer to home style food taste like seafood soup with shiitake, fish, tofu, cilantro
Crowded during peak hours; line is often out door. Half price of Cupertino and my. View Taiwan places and better
Food quality than boba places

Awesome Taiwan-​style restaurant. Their pig feet is a must-​try.
You can tell the owner put a lot effort on decoration. Stuff are very friendly. Just a little bit expensive for such small dishes.

Still one of my faves Taiwan Restaurants in the Bay Area. So many yummy dishes and defs the most authentic out of all the other ones out here. Of course not every single dosh on their menu tastes amazing, but they definitely have a handful of great ones! Like any other place restaurants have certain dishes that just takes A-​okay or mehh. I recommend trying the ones with a thumbs up next to them.
Personal Favorites:
— Basil Fish
— Dried Shrimp Fried Rice.
— sweet rice ball soup
— pork hocks are defs worth a try! I don’t eat meat anymore so I no longer get this. But these were defs yummy!

Review from a Taiwanese who grew up in Taiwan. I heard so many compliments about this restaurant and decided to give it a try when I came down to south bay.
We Ordered:
+Pork chop over rice: came with fried pork chop, a scoop of rice has a bit ground pork on the top, marinated bamboo and egg. Overall tasted ok, a bit salty after finish it. Wish it have more veggies.
+Taiwanese oyster pan fry: VERY DISAPPOINTING! greasy, oily and only tiny 4 – 5 pieces oyster in the whole dish. But it costs $ 8 something. I rather order one more entrée not this. SKIP THIS!
+Fried intestine: Just simple fried intestine. tasted soso.
The service was nah, the waitress seemed not in the mood to cater the customer.
Anyway, I am not coming back.

I am not Taiwanese… but that doesn’t stop me from trying out their food fare. So I was here last week to try the place out. The pictures were spot on with the deco and the reviews were pretty on point. I came about a quarter before 1 pm and waited to be seated. As I checked out the place, they have a decent number of people eating and a couple waiting for their food to go. The place is clean and relaxing… that is if your into a heavy terracotta painted wall and ceiling lights that changes color after half a second. A few minutes later I was seated on a corner table that is very spacey and comfortable. I did try the thick (dry) noodle dish (Mi Tai Mu) and the Ping tong meat ball since I found the names in the menu intriguing. I was told that Mi Tau Mu is comparable to the Japanese soba but with a chewy texture. My attentive server also told me how big the meat ball is.
Taste wise the Mi Tau Mu tasted like the Chinese beef lo mein. Same dark sauce with onions and bean sprouts with ground meat mixed in the hand made noodles. What made this distinct is the thick noodles that was chewy good! I love the fact that it holds the sauce well and every bite was al dente. The meat ball is another ground meat (they seem to like their ground meat) encased in a sticky rice ball that is poured with savory –mildy spicy sauce. While the sauce is indeed tasty it seemed that it is too much… but then again, I am not Taiwanese… but that doesn’t stop me from appreciating their food.
If I do come back, i’ll try their oyster pancake…

The food was okay… The waiter recommended all of the dishes. I felt like there was not enough taste in any of the dishes. In one of the pork intestine dishes, there were lots of ginger but I couldn’t even taste them. The shaved ice dessert was also meh.

Quite busy for a Sunday night dinner, but we were seated right away.
Most of the stuff we ordered tasted ok, but some things were too saucy and sweet like the sticky rice in barrel, meat ball, and pork blood cake. The pork hock and noodle with preserved egg and ground pork were good.
Service was very nonexistent after they brought our food to us. We had to wait 15 minutes or more for someone to take our order and it was difficult to flag someone down for our bill and to go boxes. However, they are quick to bring out food and clean up tables.
Only one credit card can be used in your group. 5% off your bill if you pay in cash.

Who needs to go to Taiwan when you have the real Deal here?! I must concur with other Unilocalers… this place has the most authentic sauces west of Taiwan! Trust me their chef has matched every dipping sauce to match the cuisine! Service was efficient and servers were friendly– another plus when you take into account how busy it was for a Sunday! Next time I will come with a larger group so we can try more of their selections! A «must return» from even my picky hubby!

+ Oyster omelette was the most legit I’ve had in CA
~ Egg and radish was a bit too oily
~ Wanhong Pork Hock was good but not mindblowing
Overall I think I prefer Red Hot Wok

My Mom was craving a quick Taiwanese snack before our movie date and we found Taiwan Café on the top of the Unilocal list. The place was full of excited and hungry patrons, «people mountain people sea.» There were beautiful Taiwanese mural paintings on the wall and authentic wooden benches. Despite being really hectic, the staff did their best to be welcoming and patient.
In addition to having traditional Taiwanese food, we were pleasantly surprised to see this place offer Hakka (客家) dishes. The Taiwanese Style Rice Noodle (台式炒米粉), Hakka Delight (客家小炒), Fried Tofu and Simmered Pig’s Ear brought back nostalgic memories. Although the dishes are not exactly identical to the homeland, it does have some resemblance.
I look forward to visiting Taiwan Café again whenever I am in town, and will try some of their stir fry and noodle selection.

I never had Taiwanese food before. I don’t know if this place is authentic Taiwanese food or not. Please help a friend out.
My first time eating Taiwanese food and I’m not impressed. The food was rather bland. The ingredient looks good but tasted poorly. I was not satisfied with my meal.
I don’t know if I ordered the wrong things or something. Every dishes we ordered was underwhelmed. My friend boxed everything and took it home. He didn’t even end up eating it the next day. Heh!
I hope I can experience the real Taiwanese food someday…

I ate here last night with my family, this is a great restaurant for traditional Taiwanese food. I’ve been here a few times and this place never disappoints, a few dishes I recommend is the oyster panfried egg, popcorn chicken, chicken twists, beef shank rice combo. The service was terrific and they know what ingredients are used in a dish. I tried the sticky rice mixed with pork blood for the first time and it was very tasty (the thought of pork blood really turned me off initially).
They accommodate larger parties as well as small parties, there are booths as well for privacy.
My family and I ordered a about 12 dishes and the total was about $ 140. But for the taste and the quantity it was well worth it.
Must try the apple cidra soda, I’ve never had this soda before in the Sacramento location so it was nice to experience something new.
I’ve also attached some photos of things to show the server when you order, as well as the renown sticky rice pork blood dish.