Shadowing Practice: $3 Noodles VS $340 Noodles! (WORLD RECORD Breaking Bowl of Noodles!) - Learn English Speaking with YouTube
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The moment has finally come.
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The moment has finally come.
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The most expensive bowl of noodles in the world right here.
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Are you ready?
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I think so.
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Let's do this.
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How much would you pay for the best bowl of noodles in the world?
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Today we're taking on Taiwan's national dish the beef noodle at three different price points.
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$3, $36, and the world's most expensive bowl of noodles coming in at $340.
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大家好!
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Taiwan local and food YouTuber TJ is gonna join me for the adventure.
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Let's chew on that.
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Let's chew on that.
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What do you think of that?
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I say let's, let's chew on that.
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Yeah.
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I think, I mean, if you keep saying it, it'll work.
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Yeah.
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Alright, let's just get started.
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The Taiwanese beef noodle has a soy-based broth with beef that's been stewed for hours.
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Chefs let the stock simmer for hours or days,
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soaking up rich, delicious bone marrow.
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There's no end to the personal flair a chef might add,
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whether they're focused on feeding the masses with a hearty bowl,
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or trying to elevate the dish to its highest potential.
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What do you look for in a good beef noodle?
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Number one, I look for good marbling on the beef.
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Number two, the aromatics, so the dry ingredient.
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What makes this soup special and different from all other soups in Taiwan.
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And number three, the texture of the noodles.
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Do you want the noodle to be kind of chewy,
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or what are you looking for?
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I love it chewy.
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When you bite into it,
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you kind of feel a little bit of that thickness.
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Like T-H-I-C-C thing?
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Like that kind of thing?
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Yes.
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Today, fellow foodie and YouTuber,
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TJ, will help me bounce around the city of Taipei,
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exploring the best it has to offer at every price point.
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Let's chew on that.
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This stall has been here for around 30 years.
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A lot of locals grew up eating this and they still eat this now as an adult.
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Right here they have the knife cut noodles.
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So you see the texture of the noodles is quite thick and flat.
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And each strand of noodle has different texture.
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And right over there we have the stew,
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the boiling pot of aromatics and beef.
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Location 1, a lively, street-side beef lovers paradise.
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Serving up hearty bowls for about $3.
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Right there those are the freshly cut noodles.
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And they're gonna put those in the boil soon.
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There's a huge fistful and you just dump them in right there.
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Gigantic chopsticks, stirring sticks.
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I feel like a kid peeking over a fence.
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What's over there?
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To put it in, bam.
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And they are not shy about the portion they give you.
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Look at that, it's huge.
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They're gonna put in some broth and some of this beef here, right?
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Yes.
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Oh, there it goes.
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That's the potted beef.
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Yeah.
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Yes.
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Look at those big pieces of beef in there.
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Amazing.
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Ooh, that portion is incredible.
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When we came to the $3, $4 place,
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I was like, alright, we'll get through this and then move on.
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These look majestic.
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I really love the environment of this place.
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Although these noodles look amazing as well,
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but this place is so packed that even we even got our little neighbor over here eating too.
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And back to us.
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I want to give him a little bit of privacy so he can enjoy his noodles alone.
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That's what I would want.
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What do we do here?
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We just jump into it?
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Yeah, I mean first you want to mix it up because this knife cut noodle is quite sticky.
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Yeah.
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You see it kind of clumps together.
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Right.
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Yeah, but it's beautiful because the soup just clings right on.
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I got a nice beefy piece of beef here.
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Me too, I got one too.
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Let's go for it.
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Mmm.
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Meaty, a little firm, but still a nice texture
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and then from there we can just get a bunch of these noodles together.
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Oh, the steam is just pouring off here.
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We're both starving so this looks awesome.
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Let's just go for it.
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So they have these like imperfections like some are a little more fat some are more thin
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and then it just creates a amazing like diverse chewy texture in your mouth.
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Yes, absolutely.
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It's definitely chubbier than most noodles, but I love that.
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How often do people eat something like this?
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Honestly, we eat it throughout the day.
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This place is open from morning to night.
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So it can be breakfast too?
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Absolutely, yeah, if you want to.
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Not only are the noodles thick, but they're crazy long.
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They're unwirably.
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Mmm.
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Oh, that's good broth.
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Warm, savory.
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Feel the oil on your lips?
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Beefy and full of fat.
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The price is what's most crazy to me.
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It absolutely is.
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Because that's a legitimate amount of good quality beef.
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Broth that's been made with love simmering for hours there.
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This place has been stamped.
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If you're walking down the street and you see this stamp,
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then stop and get some nudes.
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Off to location number two.
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Let's go.
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And let's go, but actually let's stay here and eat this.
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Oh, okay.
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We have come to our second location and can you tell me what's
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so special about this place other than the fact that the chef and owner of the place has a statue of himself.
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So right now we are at Chef Hong Taiwanese Beef Noodle Soup.
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Chef Hong is a renowned chef.
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His beef noodle soup has won several international awards.
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Wow, which ones?
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Can you name them?
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Cool, let's go.
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We are inside now taking a look at the menu.
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What is the average price of the normal kind of standard beef noodle here?
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They have a braised beef shank noodle soup and it's 160.
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160 is about five dollars?
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And then it goes up in here so there's 230 for higher quality meat
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and then the highest is a thousand and eighty eight which is the one we're trying.
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This one speaks to me.
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Five different types of beef.
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Is this the drumstick of the count?
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The count drumstick?
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Yeah.
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I heard they're gonna let us go back into the kitchen and see how it's made.
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Let's go do that now right now We're headed into the kitchen.
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I'm actually kind of honored.
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We're getting this like behind-the-scenes look It's a big unveiling moment.
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Go for it.
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Okay.
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Oh Would you just take a bath in there if you were allowed to oh my gosh?
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Oh?
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So all the bones and all the marrow is getting soft
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and leaking out into the broth making it nice and fatty
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So this is the aromatics with all the dried ingredients that I was talking about.
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Oh.
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That's what gives it that nice flavor, fragrant flavor.
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This is the finished beef and it's moved right here.
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Oh, yeah.
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Can I have that much in my bowl?
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Right now we're on kind of the assembly line where they're gonna make this bowl
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and we're gonna see it right before our eyes starting with a huge fistful of noodles.
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So it's going in the little noodle net.
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The noodle net, I like that noodle net.
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It's going to be in there for three minutes.
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What should we do?
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Do you have any good stories in the meantime?
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Um, so once that.
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Oh, and we're back.
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Oh, that's all for one?
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Oh, that's all for one.
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Okay, that's a mess of all our noodles to start with.
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There's tripe, and then there's gonna be shank,
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and then that large shank with the bone.
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That's a gigantic tendon.
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This is crazy.
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It's gonna blow torch.
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Oh, rib, it's the rib.
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This is American beef.
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Maybe I knew this cow.
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And then right here, the big bone in shank,
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just looking like a giant beef drumstick.
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I'm starting to understand the price now.
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Sizzling some of the fat on there.
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Oh, do you smell that?
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Oh my goodness.
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This is like some intense foreplay.
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Wow.
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And then in with the broth.
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And this is going to be the same broth that everybody else is getting.
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So even if you're getting the $5 beef,
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it's still the same broth.
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It seems like the main difference is like these great cuts of meat.
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Just draping it over there.
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You can barely see the noodles.
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It's just meat on top.
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And then he's putting on some garnish.
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A nice slow motion garnish.
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And that's it.
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I love it.
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I know.
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I'm like scared to touch it because it's so beautiful.
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There's a huge amount of meat.
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What's really interesting is with some of these parts,
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like for example, the tripe here he was talking about,
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it's not just that it's tripe,
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it's like a special section of the tripe,
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and from each cow they can cut just this small piece of the tripe.
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It's like the most fatty,
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delicious piece of the cow's stomach.
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To me it seems like a pretty good deal, actually.
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I think it's a great deal, it's huge.
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Let's start with this beautiful amber tendon.
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Fatty, it's thick, it's been boiling for eternity.
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Let's go for it.
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Mmm.
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That is chewy, sticky goodness.
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I was gonna just say it's so sticky.
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It's one of those things that I grew up feeling like it was a little weird.
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And it's just one of my favorite things now when I get noodles It's that juicy fatty sticky crazy tendon.
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Maybe we should try some of this broth Mmm, that is smooth.
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I could go run a 5k and then drink a glass of that Should we try some of this tripe?
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It's a big cut of tripe right there.
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I might even have to bite it in half.
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Let's go for it.
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Oh, lots of flavor.
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It is like a sponge for that broth.
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Those are some good organs.
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Yeah, he was quite proud out of the tripe.
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I think we'll work our way up to this big bone-in shank.
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But we got this meat here.
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That one is also the shank.
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Beautiful swirls of tendon in here.
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Mm.
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Game over.
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Oh, there's actually noodles down here too.
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Hey, noodles.
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These are slippery little suckers down here.
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I'm like trying to pick it up.
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Oh yeah, you're making me feel better with my skills.
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All right, all right, ready?
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Mmm.
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That is some good chewy noodles.
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It's more thin than the last place.
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Yes.
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Incredibly chewy.
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They're soaking up that broth beautifully.
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To eat this last bit,
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I'm just gonna grab it like an actual chicken drumstick.
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Look at that.
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Oh.
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Oh my gosh.
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Whoa.
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Oh my gosh.
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It's just all coming up.
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Cheers.
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Here we go.
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Wow.
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Mm-hmm.
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That's the best one here.
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All the best things in one bowl.
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It's just like a meat buffet and it happens to be on this bowl of noodles.
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The noodles we had this morning were already terrific.
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Here they just like piled on even more.
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What else could they possibly do to scale up a bowl of beef noodles more than this?
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Well, we're gonna find out at our next destination where they are charging
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$340 for a bowl of noodles ten times this price.
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Will it be ten times the noodles?
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Let's find out.
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Before leaving this life-changing noodle joint,
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I had to thank the chef personally and ask him one burning question question.
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If there was the perfect bowl of beef noodle,
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how much would you be willing to pay for that?
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He would pay 100 to 200 US for the perfect beef noodle soup.
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Wow, okay.
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So an award-winning chef says he'd pay one to two hundred dollars for the best bowl of noodles.
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We found the price tag,
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but now it's time to see if they're really the best.
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We have arrived at our last- see why would it- it doesn't make sense if I'm just walking up and you're there.
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Maybe you should walk up and I'm here?
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Oh, maybe you should just walk away completely.
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Okay, cool.
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We have arrived at our last destination.
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When you walk in here, there's only four tables.
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So every day they're making maybe 20,
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30, at most 40 bowls of noodles.
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Let's go in and learn a little bit more.
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Actually, this is it.
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It's a one-sheeter.
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They have eight different options.
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The base price is 500 NT.
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Number eight, which is what we're getting today,
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presidential beef noodle soup for 10,000 NT.
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The gentleman running the restaurant now,
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his father started this establishment.
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He came up on beef noodles.
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He took it over and so he's running it now.
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But they have one location, they have four tables.
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And to me, that kind of says they're really focused on just making the best.
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We're gonna get two of these, two presidential beef noodles.
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Right now we are in the kitchen of New Baba,
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And I'm with the chef.
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Eric, how did this noodle start?
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The recipe is from our customer.
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Over years, 15 years of trying different things,
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you saw finally what people liked the most.
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Yes.
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And that's what you still are serving now today.
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All right.
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Why don't you want to expand?
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Why don't you want more tables?
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We want to just focus on our beef.
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I mean, one day if we cook just 20 to 40,
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we can very focus and we can do the best.
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And you're going to show me how it's made right now.
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Let's do it.
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This bra is the top layer and this bra is in the bottom.
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Light bra is the rich bra.
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When they're gonna assemble it now,
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like what he's working on,
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it's just gonna take a few minutes to put it together.
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But if he was making this from scratch,
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it's gonna take like a week from beginning to end.
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Okay, the bra is okay.
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And then we go to the noodle.
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The noodles are already pre-portioned.
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Ooh, yeah.
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So we're blanching the noodles, getting those all nice.
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Two minutes has elapsed.
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We're taking it out of the noodle net.
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And then we're in the beef center here.
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And this is Wagyu beef,
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short ribs, and one is prime short ribs.
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Special piece, half tendon and half beef.
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These look beautiful, like perfectly cut.
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They look like little pieces of art.
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And then in with the light broth.
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Yeah, and red broth.
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And then the ridge broth.
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This ridge broth here, which smells so fatty and meaty.
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It's making me forget about the two other bowls of noodles I had today.
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And that's it?
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That's it.
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That's all right.
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Ding ding.
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Waiter.
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Oh, thank you, sir.
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Table one?
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Table one.
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Okay, I'll make sure he gets it.
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Hey guys, thank you for sitting through act one and act two,
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and we are finally here.
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The most expensive bowl of noodles in the world.
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And if I'm completely honest,
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when I first heard about this,
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I was super skeptical, and then I met the owner.
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Their focus for years and years has been how could you possibly make the absolute best?
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I think we start with some of this meat.
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We have to put this in there first.
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So we're gonna dump all that in.
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Oh, it's gonna go a little bit.
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Do do do do do.
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I'm gonna dump it all in.
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Alright, you go ahead.
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Okay.
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We have these kind of perfectly cut prime beef to our Australian Wagyu beef.
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Wow.
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Alright, here we go.
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Our third beefy bite of the day.
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You got space in your stomach still?
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Yes, I am ready for this one.
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I always got space for beef.
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It completely melts in your mouth.
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You could chew this with your tongue.
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It's smaller, but the quality is outstanding.
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We just ate one-sixth of the beef.
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How much was that?
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That was like $25.
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That's crazy.
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Oh my goodness.
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Each bite is like $25.
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Mmm.
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I can't even keep my eyes open when I eat it.
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I have to close them immediately.
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You hadn't heard of this place before, had you?
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I haven't heard of this place before.
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I mean, I grew up on Taiwanese beef noodle soup.
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Wow, this quality of this meat is so tender.
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Here, they have this other cut that's kind of half tendon,
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half beef, and you can see they've actually cut it to create this kind of round shape there.
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Someone carving with scissors piece by piece to make this rounded shape.
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Let's go for it.
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Wow, this is so good.
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Really good.
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What I really like is that we've been to three different places
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and they all have a different approach to their noodles
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And what stands out about the noodles here is they're a little thinner,
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but they're not clumping at all Wow,
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that soup on that noodle is perfect,
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it's beautiful
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It's just
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so simple it kind of surprises you at how good it
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tastes Again going along with the lines of my unique concept in this show,
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would you say a meal like this is Worth it?
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Wow, that is so unique.
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For me, a huge privilege doing this with you today.
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Thank you so much.
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Check out TJ's channel.
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She's doing tons of food reviews on her channel as well in Taiwan and elsewhere.
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I want to thank all the establishments that allowed us to come in and shoot with them today.
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People throughout this whole trip in Taiwan have been amazingly kind and generous.
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So friendly.
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And we're definitely going to be back.
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We loved it.
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Yeah, come back.
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If you enjoyed this video, maybe slap a subscription.
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And the last of all thing that I want to say is this video was made possible by OneTrip Vietnam.
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OneTrip Vietnam is a company in Vietnam putting on amazing tours right now in Saigon,
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Hoi An, and Da Nang.
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But soon to come, many more cities throughout the entire country.
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I'm talking food tours, the Mekong Delta tour, adventure tours.
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For more information on OneTrip,
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check out the links in the description down below.
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I will see you next week.
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Thank you again, TJ.
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Thank you.
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A-Peace!
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When your eyes will start looking at me And the words that you said last night
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They will echo through my mind
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About This Lesson
In this lesson, you will practice English speaking skills through an engaging exploration of Taiwanese beef noodles, as presented in a fascinating YouTube video. By focusing on different price points and personal insights about food, you will improve your English pronunciation, enhance your vocabulary, and gain confidence in using food-related expressions. This lesson is tailored to support English learners who aim to enhance their speaking abilities for social interactions and IELTS speaking practice.
Key Vocabulary & Phrases
- Beef Noodle: A popular dish in Taiwan, featuring noodles and stewed beef in a savory broth.
- Soy-based broth: A rich soup base made primarily from soy sauce, often adding depth to the flavor.
- Stewed: Cooking food slowly in liquid to develop rich flavors.
- Aromatics: Ingredients like herbs and spices that enhance the smell and taste of a dish.
- Marbling: The visible fat within the meat that adds flavor and tenderness.
- Texture: The feel of the food in your mouth; important for both noodles and broth.
- Chewy: A desirable texture in food that requires some effort to bite and chew.
- Hearty: Describes a dish that is filling and satisfying.
Practice Tips
To maximize your practice from this video, consider using shadow speech techniques as you listen. Start by repeating phrases immediately after they are spoken. This will help you emulate the speaker's speed and intonation, improving your English pronunciation. Here are some specific tips:
- Focus on Rhythm: The speaker has a lively tone that matches the excitement of trying different dishes. Pay attention to how they emphasize certain words like “chewy” or “simmer.”
- Match the Speed: Notice the pace of the speaking. If it feels too quick, pause the video and practice each sentence until you can say it at a comfortable speed.
- Emphasize Key Vocabulary: Use the vocabulary list to form your own sentences about food, integrating words like “aromatics” and “marbling.” This will not only expand your vocabulary but also prepare you for IELTS speaking practice.
- Record Yourself: After practicing with shadow speech, record yourself reading a few lines. This will help you self-assess your pronunciation and speaking fluency.
Engage closely with the video content, and remember that consistent practice is key to mastering English through enjoyable topics like food. Let’s chew on that!
What is the Shadowing Technique?
Shadowing is a science-backed language learning technique originally developed for professional interpreter training and popularized by polyglot Dr. Alexander Arguelles. The method is simple but powerful: you listen to native English audio and immediately repeat it out loud — like a shadow following the speaker with just a 1–2 second delay. Unlike passive listening or grammar drills, shadowing forces your brain and mouth muscles to simultaneously process and reproduce real speech patterns. Research shows it significantly improves pronunciation accuracy, intonation, rhythm, connected speech, listening comprehension, and speaking fluency — making it one of the most effective methods for IELTS Speaking preparation and real-world English communication.
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