[TAIPEI] Cute Bistro

ATT 4 FUN, despite the most playful shopping mall name I've ever heard in my life, it turns out one of my favorite place to go in Taipei for some quick shop, because almost all my favorite brands are in there, Pull & Bear, Bershka, and GU! (I still wait for the time where Uniqlo opens there). They also are famous for the selection of food truck, cafe, beer shop, or restaurant. I happened to go there wandered around to have a place for dinner, and found Bingirl in a quite opened area.

First, we welcomed by the free flow mineral water and luckily they have their English menu! It all is Western food. I came here with my friend and we opted for the balance orders, which are savory for the main dish and sweet for the dessert!

The main dish we chose is Spaghetti Carbonara Sauce (230 NTD). The portion was just right, quite fulfilling. The pasta was al dente, with generous amount of ham slices and mushroom, sprinkled with cheese. The carbonara sauce was creamy with the right level, so I didn't feel any cheesy at all. My point plus for this pasta dish was it came fresh and still warm from the kitchen.

Give another room for the Peanut Butter and Chocolate Pancake (280 NTD)! It came out with 5 stacks of original pancake with peanut butter on every layer, YUM! It was my favorite of the night, because it combines my favorite three things: peanut butter, nuts, and pancake~ The choco fudge was poured into the pancake along with the maple syrup. Sound so sweet? 'Fret not, it was not that sweet. It was all perfect balance, you could trust me. One thing to be bothered was they put the generous amount of whipped cream which is not my favorite thing at all.

The place is so pretty for girls to have a chit chat. Their staffs were quite helpful and quick response. We even didn't ask for water refill, but they came initiative with all of those. Good job!

Cafe: 冰果甜心 BINGIRL (ATT 4 FUN branch)

Address: 110, Taipei City, Xinyi District, 松壽路12號4樓

Business Hour: 11 am - 10 pm

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[TAIPEI] Cozy Coffee Shop

Dwi has just through a quite rough midterm exam week, but didn't mean that I ever stopped discovering cool places to eat in Taipei, LOL. This time, I would like to review one of cozy coffee shop that happened to be my favorite place to hang out at! Long story short, my friend and I would like to study for the midterm but we wanted some place different other than library, or our dormitory, so we wandered around our campus neighborhood and found this hidden gem.

Why I said hidden gem? Because it is on the second floor at Lion Travel Agent building. Who would know that there's coffee shop at the upper floor? LOL. Once we got into the shop, we were welcomed by the cute white stairways and the kind waitresses. Apparently, there were many students beside us studied there at that time, but luckily we got table with electric socket, yippie! The space for each other table is perfect, not too narrow. I love the minimalist ambience this coffee shop offers.

Because we just had our big lunch before, we just ordered something light. I chose for the Berry smoothies, consisted of pineapple, strawberry, blueberry, yoghurt, and milk. It was a perfect balance between sweet and sour and not too tangy. As for my friend, she ordered Hot Latte and the latte art was cute and neat. She said it was perfect, came out not too strong but it had some kicks! For the meal to be shared, we ordered Matcha Pancake with Red Bean and Brown Rice. First, it was intrigued us because of its Brown Rice, turned out we didn't see anything with brown rice over there.

Maybe it was not the best pancake I've ever tried, but it was quite decent, there are 2 matcha pancakes (actually from the form, it was more into waffle), red bean paste, topped with whipped cream and there is the yoghurt with some berries for the side and matcha sauce. The red bean paste was so generous and it was sweet. I happened to pour the matcha sauce into some bite of pancakes along with the red bean paste and some drops of the yoghurt to figure out what kind of the taste they were trying to give us. But still, not that impressed me much.

We stayed for long hours, probably 4-5 hours because the place was just cozy, we felt like we were in our home LOL. The wifi was strong but they limit the usage into just 3 hours only.

PS: their toilet was so neat, clean, and fragrant.

Coffee Shop: Lion Café 讓旅行更有味道

Address:台湾, No. 331, Section 3, Roosevelt Rd, Da’an District, Taipei City, 106

Business Hour: 10 am - 9 pm

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[TAIPEI] Favorite Hot Pot Place!

What I have told you previously that Taiwanese people are taking their hot pot seriously, so do keep in mind that it is very convenient to find the restaurant, let it be the upscale one with super fancy decorating place until the one with more affordable near campus area. This time, I would like to tell you about one of the famous hot pot places near my campus, Tarng Lao Ai Shabu Shabu. Expect for the long line when you reach at dinner time (let it be weekdays or weekend). The longest time I've waited here was around 30 minutes. The place is popular among students because it is in the heart of 3 campuses (NTU, NTUST, and NTNU).

Why are we willingly to wait for that much of time? First, because it is just near my campus. Second, it's cheap! The beef one only costs you 150 NTD, including 8 thin slices of beef (with fat yum), vegetables like carrots, enoki mushrooms, portabello, cabbage, chinese cabbage (pok choy/ bok choy), corn, tofu, crab sticks, fish sticks, meatball, and dumplings. For desserts, there are 6 selection of free flow Meiji ice cream! You can opt for peppermint (my least favorite), cookies and cream (my ultimate favorite!), mango, milk, chocolate, and raisins & bubblegum.

Actually, if you are vegetarian, they have their vegetarian hot pot (180 NTD). For meat lovers, besides beef, they also offer chicken (140 NTD), lamb (150 NTD), pork (140 NTD), seafood (180 NTD), and don't worry if you are in a low-fat diet, they have low-fat beef (200 NTD) ready for you! The soup is the clear one (by default), but actually there are another options like milk (if I'm not mistaken), spicy, etc., but to be honest I like my soup clear as much as possible, so I can create my own taste, just like what I describe in the previous post. 

At my first several comings here, usually I chose for beef, but after that I chose for chicken (just for the sake of restricting my fat-intakes LOL). What I like here is they have broad bean paste as one of the condiments! Oh yeah, to clear your mouth, besides ice mineral water, they also have iced sweet tea, iced tea, red tea (Gosh, I forgot what's the name of that herb err), and self-served coffee.

The portion is so big and usually I come here with an empty stomach or just simply when in rainy days~

For the place, it's divided into 2 areas, for the main meals and for the dessert. So, once you've finished with your hot pot and feeling like to eat the ice cream or simply you want to chit chat for a little bit longer, you can go to the dessert area. They also provide many comic books (but it's all in Chinese). The light is a little bit dim (you can see from my photos) and the space between one table to another table is quite packed but not that narrow.

Restaurant: Tarng Lao Ia Shabu Shabu

Address: No. 3, Lane 70, Section 3, Xinsheng South Road, Da’an District, Taipei City, 106

Business Hour: 11 am - 10 pm

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[TAIPEI] 洋庭坊義大利麵 Pasta

Hi, everyone! Actually, we will try to keep posting regularly and I, personally, have to admit that it is quite hard. But, with the love of food and I kind of think it's a waste if I don't share with everyone (even if it's only just couple of person LOL), so here I go.

This time, Dwi would like to review about place to have a decent taste of pasta in Taipei. The place is near NTU Hospital station and just view walks from the Hot Pot place I've reviewed before. Just like almost every restaurants in the neighborhood, this place offers a quite packed place with just probably only 7-8 tables and I have to say that the space is narrow and you could easily bumped in to your next table. The menu is all in Chinese *sigh* and you should use your apps translator if you don't know Chinese language at all. You can't ask the owner as well, because they simply cannot speak English.

The selection is divided into 2 kinds of dish: cooked and baked, and actually they does not only offers pasta, but also rice! Yes, people you heard me, rice, not risotto.

First order is this kind of pasta. Actually, when I translated the name, it supposed to be Mushroom and Chicken with Tomato Sauce (120 NTD). Well, I could see quite a lot of breast chicken and mushroom here, but to be honest the sauce didn't meet my expectation. As you can see, it was way too creamy and runny and milky. Fortunately, the level of its cooked is nearly perfect al dente! The portion I should say that it was big enough, even I couldn't finish my plate. Comparing the size, taste, and price, I would like to rate it 4/5. The downside for me was just (again) its sauce.

Next one is my friend's order. She chose from the baked selection and have penne inside it! When translated, the menu was kind of Penne Baked with Ham and Cheese (180 NTD). As you can see that it was so eyegasm with the pull-apart cheese. If you are so into cheese, I highly recommend you this one. The penne was good, the cheese was there, yet not so-overwhelming. The portion was huge as well! This one is worth to be rated 5/5. It was baked to its perfection!

Another information to be added, expect for one-two lines whenever you came here at weekend, because I can see they are running out their business quite well. Despite the packed place, people love to eat here because I should say they have a decent pasta.

Restaurant: 洋庭坊義大利麵

Address: No. 15-2, Nanyang Street, Zhongzheng District, Taipei City, 100

Business Hour: 11 am - 9 pm

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[TAIPEI] 品森鍋物 Affordable and Nice Place!

Taiwanese people loves to eat hotpot so much, either it is hot and dry in the summer or even just in a cold winter. Dwi bumped into this restaurant accidentally, when strolling around Zhongzheng District. From the outside, it looks like an upscale restaurant compared to the restaurants surrounding. Fret not, all the dishes here are pretty affordable and the variant is quite vary.

What I love about this place is the space. Although it is not that big, you will be not easily bumped into the person at your next table. It also has a clean and neat table. Every person will have their own personal stove (errr yeah, you don't say...). It has two floors and their restroom is the cleanest restroom I've ever met so far in Taiwan! Even they have toilet spray (bidet)! Actually, it is quite important for Indonesian people. Let's review the dish!

I instantly chose the original broth since I was not in the mood to try another kind of broth like spicy broth, kimchi broth, or sweet and sour Thai broth. I just wanted to create my own personal taste, because I am very confident when it comes to it LOL. You can opt for beef or pork, and I go for beef. It only costed me 130 NTD. Here, you also gets 8 thin slices of beef, vermicelli (glass noodle), tofu, fish cakes, sausage, mushrooms, veggies, and some innards plus black pudding... (ew, I didn't touch it).

Since the soup is clear, you can taste almost nothing unless you put your own condiments. You can go to the bar in the corner to pick and create your own personal taste for the hotpot such as cuts of garlic, chillis, scallions, BBQ paste, soy sauce, and salty soy sauce. My recipe for the broth is 2 tsp of garlic, 1.5 tsp of chillis (yes, I like it spicy), 1 tsp of soy sauce, and so much scallions. As for the dipping sauce, usually I will just use broad bean paste, but since they didn't have it, I just create 3 tsp of BBQ paste and a little bit of soy sauce.

The beef is so thin, and it was not so lean, so I could chew the tasty meat (50:50 ratio of meat and fat). And by far, this restaurant is so generous in putting the glass noodle in your hotpot LOL. Oh, and if you like some additional in your dish, such as more set of veggies, ramen noodle, or even meat, you can just tell them and it will cost you extra. At the bar, you can also see the pot for refilling your soup and free flow of iced lemon infused water and cold tea.

Restaurant: 品森鍋物

Address: 100, Taipei City, Zhongzheng District, 信陽街6-2號

Business Hour: 11 am - 10.30 pm

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[TAIPEI] The Adventure of Finding the Best Zhenzhu Naicha (Part I)

Must eat when you are in Taiwan? Of course the famous Bubble Milk Tea (Boba Milk Tea or Pearl Milk Tea) because this is the mother land of those chewy balls in the sugary milk tea. Believe me that there are a lot (like freaking a lot) of bubble milk tea stores here where you can easily spot them, like you can easily find 7-11 or Family Mart, because they are just everywhere! That is why I put this post as the first part of my adventure finding the best bubble milk tea (珍珠奶茶; zhēnzhū nǎichá).

The first one is 50嵐 (read: Wu Shi Lan). They are famous for their selection of latte. Being different from another bubble milk tea store, they offered a small version of those tapioca balls (but Dwi's preference is their original size where you can chew with so much joy LOL). Some people said that they are just the same like KOI (you can find in Indonesia, especially in Jakarta) which is originated from Hong Kong. I have tasted their Matcha Green Tea Latte with Pearl, Oolong Tea with Pearl and Coconut Jelly, and Green Tea with Pearl. But all the best is the first one. Beside the sugar level and how much ice we want, they offered two size of cups as well, medium or go large. The price is ranging from 40 NTD - 50ish NTD.

 

The cheap one is Coco where you can get one tall cup of zhenzhu naicha for just 35 NTD! IMO, teir pearl is the best so far. Chewy with the right size. I also have tasted their Milk Tea with Grass Jelly, and The Three Gems Milk Tea (coconut jelly, egg pudding, and pearl). All of it are good especially the Three Gems where you can get different three toppings in just one sip! Coco is my favorite so far!

I promise that there will be another post dedicated for this must-drink-when-in-Taipei, so just stay tune!

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[TAIPEI] 3 Idiots Toast & Curry

Da'an district is quite popular for the variety of cute stores, cafes, and shops. Not really too far from the Taipower Building area, there is an alley which is filled up by vegan and vegetarian restaurants, bars, and cafes. One of it is this tiny restaurant in the corner of 4-intersection (further details, please read this through :p). Dwi came in the lunch time and it was quite full, even they asked whether we have made a reservation or not. Luckily, there was one space, so no need to wait for a seat.

They served an Indian cuisine which focused on the vegetarian food. All the main dishes are separated into 2 kinds: toast or rice. It was kind of hard to choose what to eat because the menu is so attentive and invited. They also have the combo packet for 2 people but I personally think the price is quite expensive, so we chose for a la carte. Beside the main dishes, they also have the famous Indian appetizers such as Samosa and Pani Puri.

Dwi chose for the Grilled Masala Mushroom Curry Wheat Toast (180 NTD). This is a grilled wheat toast with mushroom, spices, lettuce, tomatoes with a mozzarella and cheddar cheese. Because they are a vegetarian Indian restaurant, I believe that they should carefully choose what kind of the bread they use. It should be egg and dairy-free. But having said that almost all of the toast menu are came with cheese, I believe this is a lacto-ovo vegetarian restaurant. Fortunately, they are put every details of the food in their menu with 2 languages available, Chinese and English so people would not be mistaken.

The toast is quite thick and the outer layer was crisp enough. It came as a 4-pieces fresh and warm, completed with Indian condiments such as chutney. As for the filling, the mushroom curry is a little bit too plain and the spices/herbs they use were not that any help. If you expect the mozzarella would make your appetite spikes, sorry not sorry that would be quite a high expectation because they didn't put that much on it so you won't see any pull-apart-cheese-entertainment. What I like about this dish  was the bread they use and their chutney sauce.

Another menu that I tried is their Curry Rice, Alu Gobi (240 NTD) and opted for the combo packet B consisted of salad and 1 drink which is Masala Milk Tea Hot. The portion was huge. It consists of rice (which was cute because of the heart-shaped), 2 pieces of toasted bread, cauliflowers and potatoes curry, and the salad itself. I expected the curry sauce would be rich of herbs and the authentic scents of Indian food but not that much. They cooked a little bit too long for the cauliflowers so it was overcooked, but the potatoes was just right. Their salad was standard, cabbage and cherry tomatoes with walnuts, chestnuts, and edamames!

The Masala Milk Tea has gave me another experience of milk tea because I could feel some kicks of fragrant in there.

All the waitress and the chefs are Indian, they can speak English and Chinese very well! So kind and quite helpful for the first timer like us, LOL. Oh, they also offered free water even if you didn't order their beverages. But expect the hassle during lunch or dinner time because the space from each tables are quite narrow.

Address: No. 28, Lane 283, Section 3, Luosifu Road, Da’an District, Taipei City, 106

How to get there: Stop at MRT Gongguan Station and take Exit 3 National Taiwan University

Opening Hours: 11.30-14.30 (Lunch) and 17.00-22.00 (Dinner)

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