Restaurant: The Tavern

Michel Blanc is in a sporting mood. Just when his eastside pub, The Tavern, has pulled its umpteenth pint and become an institution in Taipei, Blanc has decided to re-invent it. The change? Televisions, televisions and more televisions.

The Tavern re-opened on Wednesday after a three-day overhaul in which Blanc unplugged all the old tubes hanging on the walls and installed eight 42-inch flat-screen panel displays and a small flat-screen display for every seat at the bar.

Can customers choose their own channel? "Yes. If you don't want to watch the game that's playing on the big screens, you go to the bar and you can surf 90 channels," Blanc says pointing to where a trio of Japanese customers sit. He notices them staring blankly at the screen above the bar and gets up to tune the television to the same Japanese football game they're already watching -- only telecast in Japanese -- and returns to his seat.

"If you can't find the game you want to watch then it's not on TV," he says.

Televisions aren't the only change. The NT$2.5-million renovations have seen the old wooden stools replaced with padded leather chairs, the tables swapped out, the lighting improved and the whole joint done up in British racing green. About the only thing that hasn't been changed is the service staff.

And the menu; The Tavern retains the best of the city's pub grub despite a bit of monkey business that's started in central Taipei. Still, some improvements have been made in recent months. Traditional bangers and mash (NT$220), for example, have been one-upped by Craig Hardy Boerwors (NT$250). But favorites, such as fish and chips (NT$280) and the all-day breakfast of bacon, fried eggs and mushrooms (NT$200) are still available, as is The Tavern's specialty, chicken in a basket with fries.