Hiding in plain sight, Badoyell brings great Taiwanese soul food to lucky South Perth

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Never mind what it says on the internet or in the standfirst above: I’m not going to talk about Badoyell’s beef noodles. I’m not going to talk about its murky, rust-coloured soup buzzing with chaotic-good meatiness and slow-release chilli.

I’m not going to talk about the chemistry between said soup and the taut wheat noodles it’s served with. Or at least I’m not going to talk just about the above.

Because while those Taiwanese-style beef noodles are reason enough to beat a
path to Badoyell, I also want to highlight the rest of the Taiwanese deliciousness this sincere 20-seater in South Perth has to offer.

Things like the potstickers: slender parcels of juicy pork coaxed into dumpling
rounds. Or fried chicken that’s juicy of flesh, medium of crunch and perfumed with the floral lift of white pepper. And check out that springy grilled ox tongue rice, a wondrous bowlful of iron, vitamin beef and great Taiwanese shortgrain rice. Eaten in sequence, a procession like the above is gratifying enough to have most diners saying, “What beef noodles?”

Not that this fluid, pick-and-mix dining is unique to Badoyell. Across Asia, snacking is a semi-professional sport and competitors, whether the arena is a hawker centre or a family potluck, play to win.

Badoyell’s owner, Keegan Tang, knows this. His family home in Taipei was inside the Raohe Night Market, so his childhood was filled with the smells and sights of one of the capital’s major markets. Little wonder then that, once settled in Perth and working in logistics, he found himself yearning for these familiar tastes and decided that opening a restaurant was the best way to scratch his itch.

Tang’s trips down Memory Lane prompt me to revisit memories and thoughts of my own, too. His seafood omelettes – unexpectedly nimble splats of golden egg and various starches – are closer in body type to the crunchy Thai seafood pancakes known as hoi tod than the fluffier Singaporean-style omelettes I’m more familiar with.

Tender turkey wings prove that, when treated right, Christmas’s unofficial spokesbird has its charms. (Deep-frying the turkey, it turns out, is just the final step of a multi-day process that begins with curing its hefty mid-wings.)

The biggest flashback, though, was that to my initial encounter with Tang’s beef
noodles at the original Badoyell, which he opened in 2019 at the legendary Thornlie food court, Spencer Village.

That first bowl struck me as mostly fine: notable more for novelty than being
especially delicious. Now skip back to the present, where seven years of fine-tuning have seen a once so-so bowl steadily ascend the divisions. So much so that any serious discussion about Perth’s great beef noodle soups in 2026 needs to include Badoyell.

Each batch takes three days’ work and 70 kilos of beef shank, specifically front leg beef shank. Cows use their front legs more than their back ones, so the meat and muscles there are more developed. And when subjected to multiple rounds of braising, resting and reheating, this meat surrenders into dense hunks of flesh that are, paradoxically, soft in parts yet wonderfully chewy in others.

Just one catch: this meat comprises less than half of each shank and needs to be
trimmed by hand. The rest of the shank goes in the soup – another multi-stage process, don’t ask – that’s bolstered with spice and Taiwanese-style doubanjiang (fermented chilli bean paste), which is sweeter and softer than the fiery OG synonymous with Sichuan cuisine.

While Badoyell’s cooking is sharp and seasoned, its restaurant craft isn’t quite as polished. The rostering for any given service seems to consist of Tang plus one other staff member.

You may have to wait a bit, just like the visibly annoyed delivery drivers who stand around or slide into seats. Part of me feels for them and gets their frustration at not being on the road.

But another part of me reckons they should just make the most of the situation and hook into some of Perth’s finest noodles.

Good Food reviews are booked anonymously and paid independently. A restaurant can’t pay for a review or inclusion in the Good Food Guide.