Impeccably dressed in a formal suit and silk tie the manager of Wasabi, Ken Chen (陳偉德), placed a live abalone and tiger shrimp on a dish piled with steaming stones, then added sake. There was a whoosh and the air became scented with alcohol, herbs and seafood.
Other diners looked around, surprised by the sound or fragrance, and watched as Chen discreetly covered the plate with a lid that had a small hole in it, allowing a jet of steam to escape. We were told this was done so no-one had to witness the death throes of our tasty mollusk and crustacean.
It doesn't get much more natural or fresher when the catch-of-the-day is live abalone from waters near the South Pole.
PHOTO: JULES QUARTLY, TAIPEI TIMES
“Abalone is the king of seafood,” said the executive chef of Wasabi, Yankee Yang (楊正全). “These shellfish are from the least polluted seas in the world, off the Tasmanian coast by the South Pole. This live performance is a traditional and creative way of cooking. You really can taste the sea.”
The “Live Australian Abalone Set Menu” is a seven-course meal of fusion fare crafted by Yang, who learned the arts of preparing sashimi and sushi in Japan.
The meal began with abalone salad, which was served with green asparagus and bamboo shoots. The bream soup was artfully prepared as the fish was given a thin covering of flour before being steamed, so it retained its full flavor and moisture.
As may have been expected the quartet of sashimi slices — abalone, octopus, fish and shrimp — were excellent, partly because they came with wasabi made that day, grated from the root rather than recombined from powder. The sushi platter offered four taste explosions, notably the foie gras, which was outstanding.
The only dish your reviewer had reservations about was the grilled and buttered abalone in apple. The various fish elements were overpowered by a fruity, creamy, almost cheesy taste. Asian palates, we were told, are tickled by this combination but it left us unmoved.
Over 1 million Japanese visitors a year pour into Taiwan because it's relatively close, has the tallest building in the world and has many of the trappings of home: namely good shopping, hot springs and fresh fish prepared in a Japanese style.
Wasabi in the Taipei 101 Mall, therefore, is a popular destination for these tourists. So, unless you want to wait for a table and perhaps be disappointed, booking is advised.
A few weeks ago I found myself at a Family Mart talking with the morning shift worker there, who has become my coffee guy. Both of us were in a funk over the “unseasonable” warm weather, a state of mind known as “solastalgia” — distress produced by environmental change. In fact, the weather was not that out of the ordinary in boiling Central Taiwan, and likely cooler than the temperatures we will experience in the near-future. According to the Taiwan Adaptation Platform, between 1957 and 2006, summer lengthened by 27.8 days, while winter shrunk by 29.7 days. Winter is not
Taiwan’s post-World War II architecture, “practical, cheap and temporary,” not to mention “rather forgettable.” This was a characterization recently given by Taiwan-based historian John Ross on his Formosa Files podcast. Yet the 1960s and 1970s were, in fact, the period of Taiwan’s foundational building boom, which, to a great extent, defined the look of Taiwan’s cities, determining the way denizens live today. During this period, functionalist concrete blocks and Chinese nostalgia gave way to new interpretations of modernism, large planned communities and high-rise skyscrapers. It is currently the subject of a new exhibition at the Taipei Fine Arts Museum, Modern
March 25 to March 31 A 56-year-old Wu Li Yu-ke (吳李玉哥) was straightening out her artist son’s piles of drawings when she inadvertently flipped one over, revealing the blank backside of the paper. Absent-mindedly, she picked up a pencil and recalled how she used to sketch embroidery designs for her clothing business. Without clients and budget or labor constraints to worry about, Wu Li drew freely whatever image came to her mind. With much more free time now that her son had found a job, she found herself missing her home village in China, where she
In recent years, Slovakia has been seen as a highly democratic and Western-oriented Central European country. This image was reinforced by the election of the country’s first female president in 2019, efforts to provide extensive assistance to Ukraine and the strengthening of relations with Taiwan, all of which strengthened Slovakia’s position within the European Union. However, the latest developments in the country suggest that the situation is changing rapidly. As such, the presidential elections to be held on March 23 will be an indicator of whether Slovakia remains in the Western sphere of influence or moves eastward, notably towards Russia and