Blanco’s staff members are perceptive — they know how to spot a restaurant reviewer. They show initiative and are shrewd operators. But resorting to bribery with a discounted bill should be verboten, especially as there’s no need in this instance.
The restaurant may not go in for the esoteric culinary pleasures of Italy’s regional cuisines, but its menu, which is reassuringly limited, features a decent selection of Italianesque dishes: risotto, pasta and pizza.
Made from rice grown in Taitung, which has a smaller carbon footprint than arborio rice imported from Italy, the lunch menu’s organic risotto with mushroom in cream (NT$270) can be ordered with the addition of black truffle sauce for an extra NT$40. And who wouldn’t? The fungus’ pungent, earthy, meaty flavor and musky aroma can rescue the most mundane fare and turn it into something verging on exquisite.
The organic risotto with shrimp and tomato (NT$290) brightened the table with its yellow/red glow, the result of adding saffron, and tasted sun-kissed.
Three sets are available. The lunch version (NT$220 to NT$320) is served from 11:30am to 2:30pm and includes a choice of soup or salad, a main course and, for the addition of NT$80, a drink or gelato.
The tea set (NT$160 to NT$260), available from 2:30pm to 5:30pm, features a choice of sandwiches, pizza, cake, waffles or, the most tantalizing option, egg with truffle and tomato with basil toast platter (NT$220), and a drink.
For dinner, options include lamb (NT$680), salmon fillet (NT$580) or chicken (NT$480), all with seven-year balsamic vinegar, a choice of salad or soup, gelato or cake, and a drink.
The soup on a recent visit was boring, but the salad, made with lollo rosso, cherry tomato, yellow pepper, olives, frisee, cucumber and romaine lettuce accompanied with a slightly sour cream dressing, while not quite a revelation, put many of Blanco’s peers to shame with their limp iceberg and thousand island dressing.
The gelato further sets the restaurant apart. Of particular note are the lemon, chocolate and blueberry flavors, the latter made with tomato, which deepens what can sometimes be a sickly sweet dessert.
Split into a main dining room — walls painted white and green with a dark charcoal ceiling, furnished with white wooden tables, cabinets filled with pottery and X-back wooden chairs upholstered in beige fabric — and the area adjoining the open-plan kitchen, which is completely done out in white, Blanco exudes a cool air of sophistication. A private room at the back of the restaurant seats 10 around a heavy undressed wooden table.
At the front, imported Italian produce is displayed in brightly lit cabinets, including wine (Torre A Cenaia, sangiovese 2006, NT$880; Tosc Torre Del Vajo 2005, NT$1,190), vinegar (Il Grande Vecchio 100 years balsamic vinegar, NT$18,500 for 68g), sauces (Villa Reale Sicilian pesto sauce, NT$290 for 180g), Giuliano Tartufi whole summer truffles (NT$455) and oil (Lorenzo No1 D.O.P. Valli Trapanesi Organic extra virgin olive oil, NT$1,380).
Blanco is located up the alley adjacent to Taishin International Bank Tower (台新金控大樓) on Renai Circle (仁愛圓環).
Sept.16 to Sept. 22 The “anti-communist train” with then-president Chiang Kai-shek’s (蔣介石) face plastered on the engine puffed along the “sugar railway” (糖業鐵路) in May 1955, drawing enthusiastic crowds at 103 stops covering nearly 1,200km. An estimated 1.58 million spectators were treated to propaganda films, plays and received free sugar products. By this time, the state-run Taiwan Sugar Corporation (台糖, Taisugar) had managed to connect the previously separate east-west lines established by Japanese-era sugar factories, allowing the anti-communist train to travel easily from Taichung to Pingtung’s Donggang Township (東港). Last Sunday’s feature (Taiwan in Time: The sugar express) covered the inauguration of the
The corruption cases surrounding former Taipei Mayor and Taiwan People’s Party (TPP) head Ko Wen-je (柯文哲) are just one item in the endless cycle of noise and fuss obscuring Taiwan’s deep and urgent structural and social problems. Even the case itself, as James Baron observed in an excellent piece at the Diplomat last week, is only one manifestation of the greater problem of deep-rooted corruption in land development. Last week the government announced a program to permit 25,000 foreign university students, primarily from the Philippines, Indonesia and Malaysia, to work in Taiwan after graduation for 2-4 years. That number is a
In a stark demonstration of how award-winning breakthroughs can come from the most unlikely directions, researchers have won an Ig Nobel prize for discovering that mammals can breathe through their anuses. After a series of tests on mice, rats and pigs, Japanese scientists found the animals absorb oxygen delivered through the rectum, work that underpins a clinical trial to see whether the procedure can treat respiratory failure. The team is among 10 recognized in this year’s Ig Nobel awards (see below for more), the irreverent accolades given for achievements that “first make people laugh, and then make them think.” They are not
This Qing Dynasty trail takes hikers from renowned hot springs in the East Rift Valley, up to the top of the Coastal Mountain Range, and down to the Pacific Short vacations to eastern Taiwan often require choosing between the Rift Valley with its pineapple fields, rice paddies and broader range of amenities, or the less populated coastal route for its ocean scenery. For those who can’t decide, why not try both? The Antong Traversing Trail (安通越嶺道) provides just such an opportunity. Built 149 years ago, the trail linked up these two formerly isolated parts of the island by crossing over the Coastal Mountain Range. After decades of serving as a convenient path for local Amis, Han settlers, missionaries and smugglers, the trail fell into disuse once modern roadways were built
RSS