Lan Ting (
The name of the restaurant and many of the design motifs are taken from the Lan Ting Prologue, conventionally regarded as one of the most influential works of Chinese calligraphy. Calligraphy created from backlit plexiglas lines the corridor to the main dining area, which is nicely lit in the afternoon by large windows, and affords a view of Taipei's bustling Chungshan North Road by night. A large number of private dining areas are also offered, some with views onto the street, while others aim at the intimacy of total seclusion. These rooms, which combine installation art with calligraphy, coupled chairs upholstered in cream-colored leather and highly polished black wood tables, have the serenity of a museum.
PHOTO: COURTESY OF GRAND FORMOSA HOTEL
The set menus provide individual servings that allow even individual diners the opportunity of working their way through four or five dishes. Both lunch and dinner set menus feature items such as shark's fin, snow frog cream (雪蛤露), whole Chinese scallops, abalone and even ostrich.
Presentation is elegant but relatively simple, and while some specialties like the braised shark's fin with chicken consomme speak for themselves both in terms of appearance, texture and taste, not all the dishes are able to stand out sufficiently. The fresh scallops with spicy sauce, while tasting fine, made one just a tad suspicious about what all the fuss is about. Catherine March, PR specialist for the hotel, said that the restaurant was still in the process of fine-tuning the menu.
A definite must from the a la carte menu is the milk pudding with mango, a light-as-a-feather concoction of the hotel's executive chef Huang Lai-fa (黃來發).
Service is formal yet friendly, but fails to quite live up to the atmosphere of sophistication established by the design, a frequent failing in hotel restaurants. For all that, dining at Lan Ting is a "dining experience" that is almost worth its price.
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