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The day my husband and I left for our little trip back to the States we decided that we would treat ourselves with one last authentic Chinese meal, as the Chinese food where we live back home is mediocre at best. The meal we decided to eat was at Shanghai Shanghai, located in A9 of the Mitsukoshi by Taipei City Hall. (This restaurant is a chain, so there are several other locations as well.)
We don't often eat at Shanghai Shanghai, not because it's not good, but because it can be a little pricey if it's just two people. When we go it's usually with family or friends, and then it doesn't feel like such a splurge. But then we heard that they offered our favorite thing in the world - the set menu, hooray!
For 450NT per person, you can pick three dishes, plus soup and dessert (you don't have a choice for dessert). Oh, and this is for lunch - I'm not sure if they offer a set menu for dinner.
One of their specialties, tiny shrimp with sweet peas. Yum.
I can't remember what this vegetable was called, but it had a wonderful crunchy texture, and it came with slices of pork and fermented soy beans.
Here is one of Luke's favorite foods ever: fatty pork. And my, was it ever fatty.
I didn't like the soup. Luke thought it was ok, but I thought there was way too much noodle, and the soup itself wasn't flavorful enough. Next time we go, I would order the other choice of soup.
Here's our dessert. I liked those square things on the bottom left hand corner the best. They had the consistency of marshmallows, but not as sticky or sweet. And you can't go wrong with watermelon. But I wasn't a fan of the sweet soup on the bottom right hand corner (but that's just me, I'm just don't really like those kinds of soups in general), and the dates with - I can't even remember what it was anymore; I've blocked it from my memory - were so gross I spit it out.
So the soup and dessert were the most disappointing part of the meal, but I think all the entrees were good enough that I was able to overlook everything else. And for 450 a person, it's really not a bad deal at all.
Shanghai Shanghai
www.shanghaishanghai.com.tw
A9 Mitsukoshi, Song Shou Road
(02) 8771-5511
Oh, horror of horrors, I stupidly left my camera at my friends' apartment back on the other side of the ocean! Alas, it might be awhile then before I post about any new restaurants, as reading about food is not quite the same without the pictures to go with it.
In the meantime, here are some pictures to horrify you Taiwanese readers out there. My husband told me the other day that a study found that based on their BMI, 2 out of 3 Americans are overweight. You'll see why when you look at the picture:
Wait, you're saying, those portion sizes don't look big at all. That looks like the regular portion sizes you'd get at The Diner! Well, that's because I already ate HALF of my breakfast here. That empty space on the plate arrived completely dominated by a monster omelette and a pound of potatoes. Top that off with a stack of three pancakes.
I know I'm perpetuating all sorts of stereotypes about fat Americans now, and of course not every restaurant in the States is like this. But because my parents live in the suburbs, the only restaurants you can find are chain restaurants, where more often than not the portions sizes are enough to feed a small nation.
I might not have missed the heat and the hustle and bustle of Taipei while I was back in the States, but I definitely missed eating out here!
I'm heading back to good ole Taipei tomorrow. In honor of my last night here in the States, I decided to do all the things that I won't be able to do in Taipei for the next several months. So I went to Target and H&M, my two favorite stores here in the States. I visited my best friend's mom, one of my favorite people in the world. And, I made these Inside-Out Carrot Cake Cookies to commemorate the last time I will be cooking with a normal sized oven and without fear of cockroaches scurrying out to eat every last crumb (not that this even happens, but I'm paranoid).
I'll be back to my regular posting schedule sometime next week (depending on my jet lag), so look out for some new reviews!
It's my dad's birthday and so we baked him this almond cake with berries. We wanted to go all out with this crazy cake, but my dad is mildly diabetic and we didn't want to send him into insulin shock on his birthday. So we settled on this cake.
Back when we had a normal sized oven, we used to make this quite often. Sadly, the cake pan doesn't fit into our Easy-Bake Oven in Taipei, so we hadn't made this cake in quite awhile, which makes it seem to taste even better this time around.
The recipe is courtesy of Gourmet, and it's really easy to make - it takes about an hour or so, and in the end you get this delicious cake. It's light, it's summery, and it's pretty to look at. And every one liked it and I think my dad had a nice birthday.
I know that every food blogger and their mom has posted about "Ratatouille" already, but this movie just came out in Taiwan a couple of weeks ago, so that's why I was slow in jumping on the "Ratatouille" bandwagon. But for food lovers and non-food lovers alike, this movie is definitely worth watching. Luke wrote a much better review than anything I could ever write here, so read his review and then go watch the movie!
When my husband and I first moved to Taipei about a year ago, I would crave non-Asian food so much that I would force Luke to eat at all the American chain restaurants like TGIFridays, Chilis, and sometimes even – gasp! – McDonald’s, just to have a taste of home. It’s funny because these were the sorts of places that I looked down my foodie nose at back in the States – places that were too “mainstream,” not to mention unhealthy. But the first few weeks here, we didn’t know of any places besides the big chain restaurants, and sometimes I was really homesick and just wanted to be somewhere that reminded me of home, even if it meant that I had to eat hamburgers the size of my head.
Luckily for us and our waistlines, we discovered Olala not long after we came here, and were thrilled. The French cuisine at Olala is authentic and fantastic, with a cozy ambience and friendly staff.
For 1000NT, you can get a set meal that comes with a soup, salad, entrée, dessert and coffee/tea. I recommend going for this option, since unlike some other restaurants that have it so that you don’t have a choice of the entrée in a set meal, at Olala you can pick your entrée off the regular menu. You definitely get more bang for your buck this way.
Usually I’ll order the special set meal of the day, which doesn’t include soup but does include a pasta. My husband likes the duck confit, so he almost always orders that. The last time we went though, I ended up ordering the duck confit and he got the special set meal of the day.
Carrot soup with creme fraiche.
Romaine and frisee salad.
The skin on my duck confit was nice and crispy, and the meat was so tender that it just fell off the bone when you cut into it.
Here’s Luke’s steak and frites, cooked "si fen so" (medium rare). Last time he ordered his steak "wu fen so," (medium) and he said it's better "si fen so."
For dessert I had the crepe flambee with a scoop of strawberry ice-cream, and Luke had the crème brulee. As an added bonus, the ice-cream was from Movenpick, which happens to be my favorite brand of ice-cream here.
Oh, and they also have special nights that feature salsa and other kinds of dancing. I think they might have lessons on those nights as well. We’ve never been to any of those, but maybe we’ll check it out sometime.
Olala
Ren Ai Road, Section 4, No. 371*
(02) 2773 – 9577
*I would recommend calling for directions; it might be a little bit hard to find the first time you go, since it’s a little hard to spot it from Ren Ai.
