"If you build it, they will come." What was true for the baseball diamond cut out of an Iowa cornfield in the movie Field of Dreams was true for The Diner, which overnight became one of Taipei's most popular Western-style restaurants when it was opened several months ago by a couple who used to work at TGI Friday's.
"I told my friends that, since I was going to be my own boss, I would have time to chat with them on MSN," said Amy Du (杜湘怡), who owns The Diner along with her boyfriend Dean Liu (劉世偉). "But we've been too busy."
Like its counterparts in New York, this diner's menu lists standards like Philly cheese steak sandwiches (NT$180), pastrami or turkey reuben sandwiches (NT$260), and meatloaf with mashed potato and gravy (NT$280). There are 10 different burgers (NT$180 to NT$260), seven kinds of milkshake (NT$120 to NT$160) and five omelets (NT$180 to NT$240). The menu also lists hard-to-find treats like root beer ice cream floats (NT$90) and fruit smoothies (NT$120).
The star attraction is The Diner's all-day brunch. The two-egg breakfast (NT$150), breakfast burrito (NT$160), pancake breakfast (NT$180), and three kinds of eggs benedict (NT$240 to NT$280) all include a glass of fresh orange juice, fruit, and bottomless coffee or tea. Wash one of these down with a Bloody Mary (NT$180) or glass of red wine (NT$150).
Calling these dishes "authentic" would not do justice to Liu's recreations — he got his recipes from friends or the Internet — because everything sampled here tasted pretty good. In a pleasant change from the diners this reviewer used to frequent in Manhattan, the food didn't leak oil, nor did it appear to have been poured from an envelope or box. Du said condiments like the honey-mustard salad dressing and hollandaise sauce for the eggs benedict are made fresh every morning. The mashed potato is made from real potatoes, not powder, the eggs are organic, and the pastrami is obtained from the company that supplies upmarket grocery stores like Jason's Deli.
It's hard to find anything bad to say about The Diner, except that it's too popular. Expect to spend time in line if you arrive on a weekend during brunch hours. Even visitors on weeknights sometimes have to wait a few minutes for a table.
The Diner is located near Da-an Park and the Chinese Culture University's continuing education center. To get there, walk east on the north side of Heping East Road, cross Jianguo South Road, pass a tiny alley, and turn left on Ruian Street.
In late October of 1873 the government of Japan decided against sending a military expedition to Korea to force that nation to open trade relations. Across the government supporters of the expedition resigned immediately. The spectacle of revolt by disaffected samurai began to loom over Japanese politics. In January of 1874 disaffected samurai attacked a senior minister in Tokyo. A month later, a group of pro-Korea expedition and anti-foreign elements from Saga prefecture in Kyushu revolted, driven in part by high food prices stemming from poor harvests. Their leader, according to Edward Drea’s classic Japan’s Imperial Army, was a samurai
The following three paragraphs are just some of what the local Chinese-language press is reporting on breathlessly and following every twist and turn with the eagerness of a soap opera fan. For many English-language readers, it probably comes across as incomprehensibly opaque, so bear with me briefly dear reader: To the surprise of many, former pop singer and Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) ex-lawmaker Yu Tien (余天) of the Taiwan Normal Country Promotion Association (TNCPA) at the last minute dropped out of the running for committee chair of the DPP’s New Taipei City chapter, paving the way for DPP legislator Su
Located down a sideroad in old Wanhua District (萬華區), Waley Art (水谷藝術) has an established reputation for curating some of the more provocative indie art exhibitions in Taipei. And this month is no exception. Beyond the innocuous facade of a shophouse, the full three stories of the gallery space (including the basement) have been taken over by photographs, installation videos and abstract images courtesy of two creatives who hail from the opposite ends of the earth, Taiwan’s Hsu Yi-ting (許懿婷) and Germany’s Benjamin Janzen. “In 2019, I had an art residency in Europe,” Hsu says. “I met Benjamin in the lobby
It’s hard to know where to begin with Mark Tovell’s Taiwan: Roads Above the Clouds. Having published a travelogue myself, as well as having contributed to several guidebooks, at first glance Tovell’s book appears to inhabit a middle ground — the kind of hard-to-sell nowheresville publishers detest. Leaf through the pages and you’ll find them suffuse with the purple prose best associated with travel literature: “When the sun is low on a warm, clear morning, and with the heat already rising, we stand at the riverside bike path leading south from Sanxia’s old cobble streets.” Hardly the stuff of your