Time to try a Taiwanese tea egg, one of the country’s most popular snacks with millions consumed every day.
Available in Taiwanese convenience stores, street-food kiosks and night markets, Taiwan tea eggs 茶葉雞蛋 are popular with all ages and are a super quick and convenient snack, usually costing around NT$10 to NT$15 an egg (cheaper when bought in multipacks).
As soon as you walk up to a Taiwanese tea egg stand, the strong smell hits you – and in 7-Eleven Taiwan stores alone, it is said an average of 40 million tea eggs are sold per year (no yoke!)
Check out our ‘tea-riffic’ (sorry) guide to Taiwan tea eggs!
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What are Taiwanese Tea Eggs?
Taiwanese tea eggs (Cha Ye Dan) are hard-boiled eggs with cracked shells that are simmered in a tea mixture, allowing the flavorful broth to soak inside.
They usually soak in a savory broth of soy sauce, aromatic spices like star anise, cloves, fennel and cinnamon, plus local black or oolong tea leaves.
The resulting effect as it seeps through the cracks on the shells creates a marvelously marble pattern on the hard boiled albumen / egg white.
Whilst there are big tea egg manufacturers that stock Taiwanese convenience stores like 7-Eleven, Hi-Life and FamilyMart, many of the local street food and night market vendors have their own unique tea egg flavorings, using their own secret family recipe.
Taiwan Tea Egg flavored potato chips
Such an iconic Taiwan snack, we even discovered Taiwan tea egg flavored potato chips / crisps on our trip to Taiwan in spring 2026.
We love spotting unusual potato chip flavors in Taiwan and have eaten everything from Taiwan coriander Doritos to extraordinary local flavors like pineapple cake potato chips and scallion pancake flavor. We’ve even tried their super smelly century egg flavored potato chips too!
Hwa Yuan 華元食品 is a famous Taiwan snack manufacturer, perhaps best known for their oyster omelette flavored potato chips – but recently, they launched Taiwan tea egg flavored potato chips 華元波的多薯片茶葉蛋風味.
They are particularly pungent but also taste quite nice and replicate the authentic Taiwan tea egg flavor pretty well.
Famous Tea Eggs in Taiwan
Grandma’s (Ah Ma) Tea Egg
Xuanguang Wharf is also home to Sun Moon Lake’s most famous food stall, Grandma’s Mushroom tea eggs Ah Ma Tea Leaf Eggs 金盆阿嬷香菇茶葉蛋. There is also a second stall in Shuishe.
According to the captain on our Sun Moon Lake boat shuttle, they sell thousands of these herbal eggs every day which are soaked in tea and other rejuvenating ingredients.
We grabbed one of Grandma’s Tea eggs (NTD$25) on the way back down from our hike to Xuanzang Pier (along with some much needed cold drinks and ice cream).
The unique taste of Ah Ma’s Tea eggs is down to the shiitake mushrooms that they also add to the tea broth
The Taiwanese tea-egg was delicious and not too overpowering in taste – we knew they’d be good as all of the workmen resurfacing the jetty on our visit were eating one as we arrived! Always a good sign.
Find Ah Ma Tea Leaf Eggs 金盆阿嬷香菇茶葉蛋 on Google Maps >
Uncle’s Tea Eggs 阿伯茶葉蛋-中山店
This relatively new self-serve tea egg store in Shuishe is a second branch of Uncle’s Tea Eggs, who has another stall near Shuishe pier.
It was recommended by several Taiwan Travel Tips Facebook group members after we did a shout out asking for Sun Moon Lake food recommendations.
Uncle’s Tea Eggs is a small store with just a couple of chairs and tables and is based on an honesty system – you take your food from the urns and then pay the correct amount; prices are good too.
The food here is simple and delicious, serving tea eggs, sticky rice, tea soaked shiitake mushrooms, shrimp with Taiwanese tea etc. The store also has a cute cartoon tea egg mascot with stickers and branded bags also available to buy.
Find Uncle’s Tea Eggs 阿伯茶葉蛋-中山店 on Google Maps >
Sheriff Tea Egg
Something we learned from one of our Taiwan Travel Tips Facebook group members Kris Chen – Sheriff Tea Egg 所長茶葉蛋 is a famous Taiwanese tea egg brand originating from Tainan which is sold in many Taiwan convenience stores.
But how did it get its unusual name? Sheriff Tea Eggs were actually founded by a Tainanese Police member Shih-Hua Liao, who originally brewed the tea eggs in the early 2000s to give to other police colleagues and visitors.
Word of these terrific Tainan tea eggs spread and Liao soon started up a dedicated food business, also selling iron eggs and dried tofu.
According to Kris, it has a Chinese herbal braised flavor and it tastes much better than regular tea egg although its price is a little higher(TWD 18 per egg). Find out more about this 7-Eleven special tea-egg >
Ah Po Metal Egg
We have yet to try this ourselves but are very keen to on our next Taiwan trip – Ah Po Metal Egg (阿婆鐵蛋- Grandma’s Iron Egg) comes from Tamsui and often uses smaller eggs (like quail) than traditional tea eggs.
The eggs are repeatedly braised in a spiced soy sauce blend and air-dried over several days.
It is said an elderly Tamsui local called Huang Chang-nian (黃張哖) set up a tea-egg stall near the pier – however, on days when she didn’t sell many eggs, she would boil them again…and again and they soon shrunk down, with a unique texture and taste.
Word soon spread how amazing they tasted, using Grandma’s accidental cooking technique and Grandma style / Ah Po Metal Eggs can now be found in various forms including in convenience stores.
Find Ah Po Metal Eggs on Google Maps >
Tea egg thefts in Taiwan
And finally some weird Taiwan tea egg news – given their small size, they are also one of the most commonly stolen convenience store items!
It was reported that a Hsinchu 7-Eleven store alone had 476 tea eggs stolen in a two month period alone.
The store is near National Yang Ming Chiao Tung University in Hsinchu City and students were said to be the tea egg thieves – now that is some stinky shoplifting!
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