Hot pot goes upscale at Qimin Organic Hotpot (齊民有機中國火鍋), which offers organic produce and high-quality meats served in an urban chic setting.
Qimin’s minimalist, gallery-like interior is what you would expect on Zhongxiao East Road (忠孝東路): white walls and ceilings, wooden floors and retro tables, also in white.
The restaurant is a venture of Yuen Foong Yu Biotech Company (永豐餘生技), which specializes in organic fertilizers and runs an organic farm in Yilan County that supplies much of the fresh produce served at the restaurant.
The concept behind Qimin is an odd fusion: back-to-nature idealism and a fussy, elitist air given to this humble, communal Chinese cuisine. That said, “nature” prevails in this combination. The food is simple and simply good — the vegetables taste fresh and robust in flavor and the meats are choice cuts. Two persons typically share one hot pot, which can be divided in half.
Fine dining is the emphasis, with a ceremonial sequence of courses in the set menu. Diners start by sipping on “welcome tea,” which the restaurant’s Web site says is organic oolong (烏龍) grown in the mountains of Nantou County.
Next comes the appetizer, which changes seasonally. I was served a trio of small dishes: pickled cucumber and carrot, a slice of cold chicken soaked in rice wine and garnished with a date, and a chunk of taro topped with a savory cream sauce and slices of shitake mushroom.
For the consomme tasting course, the waiter brings broth in a stainless steel pot and turns on the hot plate, leaving you the soup before the vegetables arrive in a neatly arranged basket. Qimin offers three choices of broth: chicken, dried bonito or kombu (鰹魚昆布) and vegetable.
While the broth starts out tasting subtle and fragrant, be aware that the meats and vegetables can thicken the stock quickly. By the end of my meal, the soup was too rich and intense.
My main course choice, prime sirloin (NT$920), was melt-in-the-mouth delicious. It was cut in eight slices thick enough to carry a tender, juicy flavor, but thin enough to cook in just a few seconds. The accompanying sauce was an earthy concoction made of cumin and chili oil.
Other choices include an “assorted seafood” selection (NT$980), Matsusaka pork (松阪豬, NT$780) and a house specialty, Huoshan Shihu chicken (霍山石斛, NT$2,500 for two). The restaurant says their chickens are raised free-range in Nantou County and fed herbal Chinese medicines and mountain stream water. A strictly vegetarian meal is also available (NT$680).
The waiters, dressed in Chinese-style uniforms, were attentive but cold. They announced and explained each course impatiently, as if they were sick of the routine and just wanted to move on to the next table.
All in all, Qimin lives up to it slogan “From Farm to Table,” but it’s a pricey table at that. Visit with a big appetite and in the mood to splurge.
April 28 to May 4 During the Japanese colonial era, a city’s “first” high school typically served Japanese students, while Taiwanese attended the “second” high school. Only in Taichung was this reversed. That’s because when Taichung First High School opened its doors on May 1, 1915 to serve Taiwanese students who were previously barred from secondary education, it was the only high school in town. Former principal Hideo Azukisawa threatened to quit when the government in 1922 attempted to transfer the “first” designation to a new local high school for Japanese students, leading to this unusual situation. Prior to the Taichung First
The Ministry of Education last month proposed a nationwide ban on mobile devices in schools, aiming to curb concerns over student phone addiction. Under the revised regulation, which will take effect in August, teachers and schools will be required to collect mobile devices — including phones, laptops and wearables devices — for safekeeping during school hours, unless they are being used for educational purposes. For Chang Fong-ching (張鳳琴), the ban will have a positive impact. “It’s a good move,” says the professor in the department of
On April 17, Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Chairman Eric Chu (朱立倫) launched a bold campaign to revive and revitalize the KMT base by calling for an impromptu rally at the Taipei prosecutor’s offices to protest recent arrests of KMT recall campaigners over allegations of forgery and fraud involving signatures of dead voters. The protest had no time to apply for permits and was illegal, but that played into the sense of opposition grievance at alleged weaponization of the judiciary by the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) to “annihilate” the opposition parties. Blamed for faltering recall campaigns and faced with a KMT chair
Article 2 of the Additional Articles of the Constitution of the Republic of China (中華民國憲法增修條文) stipulates that upon a vote of no confidence in the premier, the president can dissolve the legislature within 10 days. If the legislature is dissolved, a new legislative election must be held within 60 days, and the legislators’ terms will then be reckoned from that election. Two weeks ago Taipei Mayor Chiang Wan-an (蔣萬安) of the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) proposed that the legislature hold a vote of no confidence in the premier and dare the president to dissolve the legislature. The legislature is currently controlled
RSS