The Peak Restaurant Cafe sits alluringly at the edge of the winding way on the route to Yangmingshan National Park not far from Chinese Culture University (中國文化大學). It sports a stylishly rustic exterior, a pleasant garden and a formal interior dining area, but years of dining at so-called “scenic restaurants” had disillusioned me, and I didn’t embark on this culinary journey with particularly high expectations. I was pleasantly surprised. Despite the Western decor, the menu is made up predominantly of Cantonese-style Chinese food, and there was a nice balance between innovation and good old-fashioned fundamentals. Sweets are Western in style and generally quite elaborate, ideal for topping off a romantic afternoon enjoying the beauty of nature. The chef formerly officiated at the banquet kitchen of the Westin Taipei, and the five-star hotel flair can be seen in the elegant presentation.
If the weather is fine, outdoor dining at The Peak is highly recommended. The garden furnishings are of very high quality, and the seats wonderfully comfortable. There is the added bonus of a reclining function so that you can put your feet up and relax over tea after your meal. While the traffic on Gezhi Road (格致路) is invisible, hidden by a high hedge, it is sadly not inaudible.
Even for outside dining, The Peak uses an attractive matte black dinner service ornamented with cherry blossoms, and a wide range of elegant glazed ware that nicely complements the presentation. The fried rice with Chinese toon sprouts (香椿芽炒飯, NT$220) looked unusual, and its presentation in a pyramid flecked with brightly colored vegetables had an element of flamboyance. It was also flavorful and light.
The shrimp and squid with XO sauce (XO醬煲雙脆, NT$320), a more traditional dish, was lavish and richly flavored, impressing with the size and crispness of the shrimps. The green of the sugar snaps, with the lustrous red sheen of the XO sauce veiling the lighter colors of the seafood, gave the dish, a simple enough stir-fry, a boisterous energy that made it worth the price tag.
The lavishness of the shrimp contrasted rather poorly with the stinginess of the lamb cutlets (生抽羊小排, NT$480), which were perfectly tasty but just insufficiently generous in quantity. The Peak is not a particularly cheap eat, but for most of the dishes the food presented more or less justifies the price tag. The lamb unfortunately disappointed on this count.
Service is friendly if not particularly well informed, and on weekends the inexperience of staff shows through as crowds jostle for tables. There is also plenty of action on the afternoon tea front, and for those unwilling to splash out on a full meal, the dessert menu provides plentiful proof of the chef’s skill. The most widely touted item is the baked ice cream (脆皮冰心, NT$280), a hot pastry shell filled with ice cream. Tea and cake sets are NT$270, and for those who want something stronger, there is a very respectable wine and spirits menu, which is notable for its good range of single malt whiskeys.
Oct. 27 to Nov. 2 Over a breakfast of soymilk and fried dough costing less than NT$400, seven officials and engineers agreed on a NT$400 million plan — unaware that it would mark the beginning of Taiwan’s semiconductor empire. It was a cold February morning in 1974. Gathered at the unassuming shop were Economics minister Sun Yun-hsuan (孫運璿), director-general of Transportation and Communications Kao Yu-shu (高玉樹), Industrial Technology Research Institute (ITRI) president Wang Chao-chen (王兆振), Telecommunications Laboratories director Kang Pao-huang (康寶煌), Executive Yuan secretary-general Fei Hua (費驊), director-general of Telecommunications Fang Hsien-chi (方賢齊) and Radio Corporation of America (RCA) Laboratories director Pan
The consensus on the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) chair race is that Cheng Li-wun (鄭麗文) ran a populist, ideological back-to-basics campaign and soundly defeated former Taipei mayor Hau Lung-bin (郝龍斌), the candidate backed by the big institutional players. Cheng tapped into a wave of popular enthusiasm within the KMT, while the institutional players’ get-out-the-vote abilities fell flat, suggesting their power has weakened significantly. Yet, a closer look at the race paints a more complicated picture, raising questions about some analysts’ conclusions, including my own. TURNOUT Here is a surprising statistic: Turnout was 130,678, or 39.46 percent of the 331,145 eligible party
The classic warmth of a good old-fashioned izakaya beckons you in, all cozy nooks and dark wood finishes, as tables order a third round and waiters sling tapas-sized bites and assorted — sometimes unidentifiable — skewered meats. But there’s a romantic hush about this Ximending (西門町) hotspot, with cocktails savored, plating elegant and never rushed and daters and diners lit by candlelight and chandelier. Each chair is mismatched and the assorted tables appear to be the fanciest picks from a nearby flea market. A naked sewing mannequin stands in a dimly lit corner, adorned with antique mirrors and draped foliage
The election of Cheng Li-wun (鄭麗文) as chair of the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) marked a triumphant return of pride in the “Chinese” in the party name. Cheng wants Taiwanese to be proud to call themselves Chinese again. The unambiguous winner was a return to the KMT ideology that formed in the early 2000s under then chairman Lien Chan (連戰) and president Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) put into practice as far as he could, until ultimately thwarted by hundreds of thousands of protestors thronging the streets in what became known as the Sunflower movement in 2014. Cheng is an unambiguous Chinese ethnonationalist,
RSS