Du Hsiao Yueh is the restaurant that made Tainan's danzi noodles famous, and the original branch near the Chihkan Tower area has been serving the same dish since 1895. The recipe: thin noodles in a small bowl of rich pork-and-shrimp broth, topped with minced pork, a half-boiled egg, a single fresh prawn, and bamboo shoots. Each bowl is tiny — the point is to order several along with other small dishes. The restaurant remains family-run and the noodles are still cooked over charcoal at the front of the shop.
The story behind the dish gives it extra flavour: a century ago, a fisherman named Hong Yu would sell noodles from a street stall during the off-season when rough seas kept him ashore. He called it "passing the slack season" (danzi), and the name stuck. The restaurant now has multiple branches across Taiwan, but the original Tainan location on Zhongzheng Road is the one worth seeking out.