Chien Yen Hot Pot...redux!

Here we are again! Gut-busting All You Can Eat hot pot at Ximending. One of my good friends here in Taipei was recently turned onto my blog. So after reading the article about Chien Yen hot pot, she really really wanted to me to revisit the place with her. According to her, mainly for the dessert/cake display not the hot pot! Well, in my original post, I only posted pictures of the cake display and not of any hot pot action. At first she was unable to decide if she wanted this much food. But at the last minute, I got a call from her stating that she was IN! Well, for gut-busting desserts perhaps. So we met up, walked in and put our names down on the waiting list. Even for a Sunday evening, it's still quite packed and thus we waited about 15 minutes. I'm sure it would have been worse had we walked in without reservations on a Friday or Saturday evening. We sat, we ate, we burped, we ate some more and then went dessert binging! yadda yadda. You get the idea from my last post about this gem of a place. Oh although they don't have froyo, they do have soft serve ice cream. In the end, she liked it so much she vowed to return with her family members when they visited. You should should visit too!

Chien Yen Hot Pot
台北市中華路1段41號2樓
02-2331-7288

Shin Yeh: Japanese

The second selection of the three restaurants was Shin Yeh. Shin Yeh is a Taiwanese restaurant that usually serves Taiwanese food, but they have one location that serves Japanese style. At first I thought it was the 101 Shin Kong Mitsukoshi location, but it isn't. Yuki had the privilege of picking out this restaurant. Although it's not truly Japanese fare, she opted to not go completely Japanese with more traditional Japanese food. The Japanese branch of the Shin Yeh is near the Zhongxiao Fuxing MRT station. When you first walk in, you'll see a female receptionist greet you in a traditional kimono in a black marble lobby accented with wood and japanese decor. They have table downstairs, but hopefully you won't be seated at any of those because all the food is upstairs. Fortunately we got seated upstairs next to the windows. The food turned out to be pretty darn good. Of course, there is still a lot of Taiwanese dishes and Taiwanese influenced Japanese dishes, but it's delicious. They also have unlimited beer (Taiwan beer not Asahi, sadly), wine and champaign. My only complaint about the food is the sushi selection. Other than the boring shrimp, eel, egg, octopus sushi, they only had yellowtail, salmon and tuna. But Yuki pointed something out that I never noticed before. Taiwan really doesn't have any sushi selection outside of tuna, salmon and yellowtail. Unless you go to a ridiculously expensive Japanese restaurant that can import more fish varieties. It seems to always be these same three selections. Well, in the end, I still enjoyed myself and left with a very happy tummy. The decor, food, drinks, desserts, service was all good to great. I don't remember the price tag, but expect somewhere between $500-600 NT/person. Once again I must apologize for coming back with no photos. Enjoy the one I stole from Lynette Sun courtesy of Google Images, LOL.

Shin Yeh: Zhongxiao [Japanese] branch
台北市忠孝東路4段112號2樓
02-2752-9299

Favorite Hot Pot place contender

A very strong contender, if not the best AYCE hot pot place I know of in Taipei. My first visit here was when my cousin introduced it to me several months back. So this time since Yuki's mother was visiting for a short few days, we wanted to pick restaurants from three cultures that represented the relationship we had. Japan, Taiwan and America. Day 1 was Taiwan, so we picked hot pot. The hot pot place is called Chien Yen Hot Pot (千葉火鍋) near Ximen MRT station exit 5. I love this place because it's large and well designed. The interior design is minimalistically elegant and the food is pretty much all equidistant from the tables. But those are the minor points. The big points are the food, drinks and dessert. To start out with, they have several selections of broth including my favorite Spicy Mala (麻辣). Next they have a wide variety of seafood, vegetables, meats and other meats (animal organs). Drink-wise they also have a huge selection. From yogurt drinks to soda to taiwanese drinks (some may say cocktail drinks). Just for desserts, they have scoop ice cream, cones, ice cream bars, fruits, yogurt, cookies, cakes and a chocolate fountain. I didn't see any frozen yogurt though. Although the food there isn't the absolute best, it doesn't have to. The beef and lamb doesn't have too much fat or gnarly hard to chew bits. The quality is above standard and good enough for the price. Speaking of price, it runs about $450 NT per adult. I'd definitely recommend this place if you want to experience some good hot pot for a decent price. Yuki's mother liked it and said she'd wish to bring her husband here next time they're in Taipei. Awesome! I'll be bringing my family and friends here in the future. It's also very convienant that it's next to Ximending, one of my favorite places to be at night.

Chien Yen Hot Pot
台北市中華路1段41號2樓
02-2331-7288

乾杯! 1 Year Anniversary in Taiwan!

So today's plan is to have a relaxing day. Three things to do. Watch Transformers 3, eat lunch and find a special place to eat dinner. Why is it so special? Because it's my one year anniversary of living here in Taipei! For those of you that have followed me since the beginning know that I arrived July 24, 2010. So today, Sunday, would an exact year to the day that I have lived in Taiwan. After a lazy morning, sleeping in and missing breakfast in trade for some TV time in bed, we headed out to Gongguan. Yuki had to do get a chore out of the way first. She had to go to the Gjun office, which is a Taiwanese computer training center. She's signing up for 3DS Max classes. All the classes are in Chinese, so that'll be very challenging. I applaud her for her enthusiasm and will. Moving on to lunch, we went to a small pizza place down a small alley (not even sure it has a street name). It's a very small joint as you can see from the pictures. Seating for about 10 people. The decor, …well they tried. Fake bricks glued to the walls to make it look like an old style pizza place. But decor has nothing to do with the food. So continuing, we originally thought it used a ceramic oven, but a quick glance at the oven, we discovered it was only electric. They buried this giant electric toaster (taiwanese oven), behind a wall to make it look like it's a brick oven. Disappointing, but i'm willing to let that go because of the cheap price. Their menu consists of about 8 styles of pizza; vegetable, hawaiian, pesto chicken, mushroom, seafood, margarita…thats about all I can remember. Each pizza is about 10"s sliced six ways. All this for $100 NT. The taste conclusion, somewhere under so-so. The crust was thin, crispy and flavorless. I blame it on the lack of dough used and the electric oven. You just won't get the same flavor as a brick oven cooked with wood/coal. Even NY thin crust has more buttery, doughy flavor than this. The toppings, could use improvement. Not enough basil, not enough herbs and the tomato sauce...what tomato sauce!? The cheese wasn't bad though. I don't get that wonderful mozzarella flavor, but it was very hot and "cheesy". So overall, bad pizza. And being in Taiwan isn't an excuse because i've had decent pizza in Taiwan. But again, Taiwan's strong point is, it's CHEAP! $100NT ($20NT glass bottle coke) for a whole pizza isn't bad. If I visit again, I'll try the seafood. After filling our tummies, we headed over to the Gongguan movie theater. Student pricing, $300 for Transformers 3 3D. Although several of my friends have criticized it, I thought it was a decent movie. Tons of CG and long action scenes. Although the story may be cheesy or shallow for some people, I've been a fan of Transformers since youth, so I don't care. However I did miss Megan Fox. The relationship between Mikeala and Sam was built up over the first two movies, so it's a strong disappointment and sense of rejection over the new hot blonde replacement. In addition, her role in the film really isn't that powerful. At least Mikeala was smart, useful and independent. I've read that it was both the studio's fault as well as Megan Fox's fault for not returning for the third and final installment. In a nutshell, wiki said Megan Fox didn't realize filming a blockbuster film required hard work and long hours. What a prima donna. Anyways, if you want to watch two and a half hours of CG robots, CG action, gun-play and cool cars, then watch Transformers 3 in 3D. Otherwise save your money for the DVD. Moving on to dinner. I decided to splurge a little and eat at a All-You-Can-Eat grilled meat restaurant (吃到飽燒肉). It's in Gongguan and called 燒肉王子 (grilled meat prince if translated). The damage came out to be just under $500 NT per piggy. But the quality of the meat was pretty good as well as a wide variety of cuts. They had beef, pork, chicken, lamb, seafood and vegetables. For drinks, unlimited Taiwan beer and juices and soda. For dessert, unlimited Meiji ice cream as well as Ice cream filled grilled mochi. The waiters/waitresses were very nice and helpful, often getting another bottle of coke for me or helping me grill the meats. They also taught me how to grill mochi and stuff it with ice cream. Overall it was a very belly busting, fun and positive experience. If there was one thing I had to complain about, is the height of the grill and the exhaust hood. The grill is placed on top of the table, instead of inside a cubby hole IN the table, making it high even for someone as tall as me. In addition, the exhaust hood is too low, which means banging my head. I may or may not have a return visit, not because of the restaurant, but because $500 is about the normal price for a AYCE DIY grill. So there are other places that may be better, for the same price. Well, this has probably been one of my longer entries into this 1 year old blog. So I end it with, Cheers (gan bei,乾杯) !! To another year of food hunting and exciting new discoveries in Taiwan!

燒肉王子
台北市中正區羅斯福路四段142號
No. 142, Section 4, Roosevelt Road, Zhongzheng District
Taipei City, Taiwan 100

Aunt Su's Pizza House

Yuki and I was looking for a quick dinner after class because we had a 8pm celebration with my friend that just got a job. So I remembered a pizza place I saw several times near the Sun Yat-Sen memorial. It always looked packed and the pizza smelled divine. I can appreciate a good pizza. So we took a bus ride over to the Aunt Su's Pizza House (蘇阿姨比薩屋吃到飽). The place was packed and busy, but we didn't have an issue getting a seat promptly. They have two ways to order. All you can eat or by the pie. All you can eat is around $380 NT. And they do it, brazilian style. As in, a waitress walks around to each table and asks you you want a piece of whatever flavor she happens to have. The flavors rotate. We decided against that. That just sounds like ALOT of food. We ordered a small pizza that comes with three crust options. Thin, Medium and Thick. As a Chicago-an, I'm obligated to select the thick crust. Also, I'd like to mention, they have fried chicken too. Odd, but it looked just as good as the pizza. It took about 15 minutes, before our pizza arrived. Definitely thick crust, not Chicago stuffed/Deep Dish, but thick none the less. It was flakey and buttery! Perfect. For being in Taiwan, this is pretty damn good pizza. And the old 1950's Coka-cola advertisement interior design really hits it home. It's bustling with enjoyment and laughter like a real pizzeria. Cost us $400 for the small pie that can feed 2 people to FULL. I want to make a return visit with more friends!

No. 300號, GuāngFù South Road, Daan District
Taipei City, Taiwan

Hot Pot...on a train

After class, I was craving hot pot. Yuki knew of a famous "hot pot train" in DingXi (頂溪). It's just east of the DingXi MRT station, literally across the street. It's located on the second floor of the Sushi Express building. Apparently one single company owns all the restaurants there. They're more famous for their AYCE (all you can eat) places, but they have a la cart places too. The restaurant is clean and offers unlimited drinks, red bean tapioca soup(紅豆湯圓) and ice cream along with your meal. It's $300 for AYCE hot pot on a train. It's like sushi boat but with hot pot ingredients. Also disappointingly, it's not really a train. More like a flat moving walkway like you see at the airports. One minor thing I'd like to mention that I like, is the individual hot pots are built into the table, not placed on top of it. So there's a better view of what's simmering in your broth for the height challenged. They don't serve a lot of meat. Mostly vegetables and cheap filler ingredients. So grab more meat as it rolls on by. They have pork, beef and lamb, thinly cut and of mediocre quality. But still, I really liked my meal. And it's affordable. I think I need to start eating healthier, but I'll be my "go to" cheap hot pot place after school. I have a question. How do Taiwanese stay so thin when there's such an abundance of AYCE places for so cheap!? It's ridonkulous!

Maokong and Shin Yeh

Today, I tagged along with Yuki showing her friend from Japan around Maokong. We headed to the Maokong Gondola station and headed back up the mountain to the same tea house as last time. It's called Yao Yue (邀月茶坊) teahouse. They remembered us from a few weeks ago, which was nice. So they gave us a 10% discount. The waiter, same as last time also, escorted us to another picnic table with a view and an umbrella. Out of all the dishes we ordered, the blackened chicken with ginger and fried tofu were by far the best! I'm usually not a fan of ginger. But the spices they used to cook the ginger made it taste salty/sweet. We ended up eating ginger pieces like potato chips! Of course, we ordered the bamboo in tea oil dish too. Thats a must and one of Yuki and I's favorites. Afterwards, I joined my family and relatives for another AYCE stomach busting adventure at the Shin Yeh japanese buffet on the 5th floor of the Shin Yi Shin Kong Mitsukoshi(新光三越) A11 building. I'm still thinking about that ginger chicken..hehe. I want some more!

Minimal Cafe and Shaorou Sukiyaki

Today I took it easy and went decided to visit the "cat cafe" that my friend Yuki has been so highly recommending. But first things first, I had to pick up the Leica. It's back from repairs and TLC and ready for shooting! We'll get back to that once my first roll is exposed and after I finish my previous roll of 120 through the Rollei. This cat cafe is called Minimal Cafe in the Shida night market. It's at No. 42號, Lane 2, TàiShùn Street, Da-an District, Taipei City, Taiwan 106. Lets put it simple. Cafe + 30 lovable well mannered cats + Coffee. It's just so ...CUTE in there.After my quick sammich (sandwich) and a coffee, we went around searching for cats to pet. They're laying around all over the place. Some black, some white, some mixed. Mostly sleeping or walking around. Some on the counters, some on the chairs, some on the tables and some even in the ceiling lights. Yes, they have "Ceiling Cat" there! A celebrity. The cats there are so friendly and maybe a bit sleepy. Maybe we visiting at the wrong time. But while petting some, one black cat jumped up on my nap and started to sleep there.I loved it, and they're so used to humans you can even play with their little kitty paws. All was well, except that I had to make a dinner reservation with my relatives. But I didn't want to disturb the cat napping on my lap. So i waited a good half hour before he woke up, stretched, yawned and took his leisurely time departing from my lap. :) Ahhh the life of a kitty. Enjoy the numerous pictures. Yuki and I couldn't stop taking pictures! Back to my busy life. I met up with Yoh-Yi and her two sons and only daughter to eat dinner at Shaorou Sukiyaki. It's all you can eat. Yummm! Now I know why teenagers line up for this place all the time and you need a weeks advanced reservation to get in. The service and meat was spectacular. Mind you, you have to cook it yourself sukiyaki style, so you must know how to cook good meat. Overcooking it will make it taste bad. They have several different cuts of beef, pork and lamb. Some with more fat, some more lean. They even have sliced cow tongue. All imported from Australia (Taiwanese prefer Australian over American meat). Ohhh, and the dessert! Out of this world! They have a server come by with a japanese white charcoal grill (binchotan). Then he grills some mochi (Japanese rice cake made of glutinous rice). It puffs up, then he cut it open like a pouch and fills it with your favorite flavor of ice cream from the Haagen-dazs freezer. Or if you prefer, he'll roll it in peanut powder. Either way you choose, it is absolutely delicious! Come starving, leave fat! I highly recommend this place. Sooooooooooooooo stuffed! Somebody come and roll me home. Additional pictures can be viewed here.

Chez Jimmy

Today my school homework was very light for the first time since it started. My class has been so good and motivated that we're completing the semester early. We're going into the second book and the teacher informed us we'll be going at a slower pace. So this allowed me some free time today to have lunch with my auntie and family members. We headed to Chez Jimmy which is Taipei famous french restuarant. I've heard of this before today, however I don't quite remember why. The dining area is large and and definitly has the decor of a 4 star restaurant. I ordered a steak. I don't remember what fancy name it had, but it had cheese on top of it and was cooked to perfection at 3/10. In taiwan, they'll ask you how you want it cooked and it's on a scale of 1-10. Typically people will order 三分 or 六分 (3 or 6). I also saw rack of lamb and duck confit on the menu. Each entre comes with a salad bar. Both the meal and the salad bar were excellent. Of course the salad bar having Lox was a huge +1. I haven't had lox for a while, not even in the states. Expect to spend about $1000 NTD each person. But we were waited on hand and foot and the food was excellent. I will be returning with good company!

Back to my uncle's Rollei and Leica. I discovered an old and tiny "hole in the wall" analog camera shop next to Shida University. Walking in there was an old man in a rocking chair to greet me. It's a store that deals with analog stuff so probably not alot of visitors for this digital age. But the old man was holding on despite the fact he probably only gets business about once a week. His face lit up when I started talking to him about folding cameras, Rollei and 120mm film. I'm so glad to have made an old man happy to see the younger generation interested in the old school TLR and medium format 120 film. Through his store front, I saw that he was selling a mint condition Carl Zeiss folding Contessa and a Carl Zeiss Ikoneta. Both dating to the early 50's and very rare. He also had several Hasselblads and Mamiyas and a very special, very rare Rolleiflex SL66. You just don't find that stuff in mint condition! I'll definitly be going back to him for repair and cleaning work as well as 120 film stock. Maybe if my Chinese is good enough, a decent conversation. When I get that Rollei working, I'll take a picture of him in his shop. That would be nice! So here's to meeting new people and discovering new places! Cheers!

Shin Yeh Buffet @ Mitsukoshi building 11A

So today I went with my realtives to Shin Yeh AYCE buffet at the Mitsukoshi building A11 by the 101. It's smaller than the Ming Yao buffet, but the quality is slightly better. It was really good! I'm so stuffed. I still think it's good to experience both. Quality or Quantity? It has the usual items in a asian buffet. Top grade Sushi, chinese food, fried food and delicious delicious deserts! Oh almost forgot, endless Yakult (養樂多). Also they had passion fruit halves. Not a drink, but the fruit itself. Kind of looks alien doesn't it? But Super sweet!