Hualien Wonton

Hualien wonton is a signature breakfast and street food of Hualien City, made by wrapping lean pork filling in an extremely thin dough skin, shaping it into a gold-ingot form, and serving it in a clear pork-bone broth topped with crispy shallots and celery bits. Walking from Hualien Train Station into the city, the shop signs along Xinyi Street almost always feature the two characters 'bianshi'; the broth is clear to the bottom, and the wonton skin is so thin it nearly reveals the filling inside — a breakfast scene locals have savored for more than sixty years.

Yexiang Bianshi on Xinyi Street in Hualien was founded by Dai A-huo, a Hakka native of Guanxi in Hsinchu, who learned to make bianshi from a chef trained in Fuzhou and started as a shoulder-pole street vendor; the shop, now run by the third generation, has been operating for more than 70 years. In 1976, then-Premier Chiang Ching-kuo dined there, propelling the shop to wider fame. Another well-known shop, Daiji Bianshi, was founded in 1959 and announced its closure on August 31, 2023.

What is Hualien Wonton

"Bianshi" is the Hokkien word for wonton. The Hualien version is known for its extremely thin skin and lean filling — fresh pork hind leg meat hand-chopped and shaped into a gold-ingot form with a little tail. The broth is light: pork bones simmered and finished with house-made crispy shallots and celery bits, relying on natural flavor rather than MSG. A bowl holds around 10 wontons, priced at just coins — an everyday food that Hualien locals eat from morning to night.

Why did Hualien become the home of bianshi? Yexiang Bianshi on Xinyi Street was founded in 1922, a century-old institution still family-run today, once recorded in the National Cultural Memory Bank; it rose to wider fame after then-premier Chiang Ching-kuo visited in the 1960s. Daiji Bianshi has been passed down three generations, and together with Yexiang and Haipuu Egg Pancake, forms what locals call the "Three Swords of Hualien City Breakfast." With several century-old shops coexisting and each with its own loyal following, Hualien bianshi has become a culinary cluster rather than a single-shop legend. Locally the dish is also known by its Hokkien name, Pián-si̍t, a reminder that the snack traveled to Hualien with Hoklo settlers long before it became a citywide fixture.

How to eat it the authentic way

Local know-how

Data compiled from Hualien County Government Tourism Department, local township farmers' associations, and large-scale public reviews; sponsored content has been filtered out. Photos will be replaced with exclusive channel footage after Dio's on-site shoot.