Walking along Ren-San Road at Miaokou, you pass the glass case at Li Hu Pastry Shop stacked with rows of golden flaky pastries. The queue outside hasn't stopped since early morning. The curry pastry that Keelung locals were fed as children by their grandparents, the pineapple cake brought out at weddings — all of it comes from this century-old pastry shop. Tear open the wax paper bag, and the pastry shatters at the snap: a rush of curry fragrance from the filling. This is the souvenir that has filled Keelung Miaokou with its scent for more than sixty years.
What is Li Hu curry pastry?
Li Hu curry pastry is one of the signature flaky pastries made by Li Hu Pastry Shop, a century-old Keelung institution. Multiple layers of oil pastry dough are folded and baked to produce a thousand-layered crispy texture that shatters at the snap and dissolves on the palate. The filling is made from curry powder, sugar, pork floss, and a small amount of minced pork — savory, mildly spicy, and clearly fragrant with curry, without being overly sweet. Alongside pineapple cake, mung bean pastry, and salted egg yolk pastry, curry pastry is one of Li Hu's four signature items. But the curry pastry is Li Hu's most distinctive product — rarely found at other century-old pastry shops in Taiwan.
Li Hu Pastry Shop has a long history. The National Repository of Cultural Memory records it as a well-known Keelung confectionery, founded approximately at the end of the Qing dynasty period. Keelung City Government official materials describe it as having "over 110 years" of history. Starting with traditional Chinese pastries, the shop has operated at its current location in front of Miaokou through the Japanese colonial period, post-war years, and into the present day — one of the few century-old family-run pastry shops still operating in Keelung. The use of curry in the pastry echoes Keelung's history as the first place in Taiwan to receive Westernized foods through the Japanese colonial-era port. Along with Keelung curry rice and satay curry, it makes up what locals call Keelung's "three curry tastes." Despite being caught up in a food safety incident in recent years, the shop adjusted its practices and increased transparency, and it remains the locally recognized landmark souvenir destination at Keelung Miaokou.
How to eat it like a local
Local knowledge
Verified references (no sponsored content)
- The National Repository of Cultural Memory records Li Hu as a well-known Keelung confectionery, founded approximately at the end of the Qing dynasty period.
- The Keelung City Government tourism website lists it as a representative century-old establishment with "over 110 years" of history.
- Curry pastry is Li Hu's distinctive specialty item, rarely found at other century-old pastry shops in Taiwan.
Practical tips
- Weekend evenings can have queues — weekday mornings are less crowded.
- Delivery by mail is possible, but the fragile pastry layers may break in transit over long distances — buying in person gives the best result.
- Shelf life is one to two weeks. Don't stockpile more than you'll finish.
Information compiled from the Keelung City Government Department of Tourism and City Marketing and large-volume public reviews, with sponsored content filtered out. Photos to be replaced with channel-exclusive material after Dio's on-site shoot.