gastronomy/fusion: i strongly recommend RAW

RAW
No. 301, Lequn 3rd Road, Zhongshan District
台北市中山區樂群三路301號
(02) 8501-5800

MRT: Jianan Road

website: www.raw.com.tw

hours: Lunch: Wed- Sun / 11:30 AM - 2:30 PM
Dinner: Tues - Sat  / 6 PM - 10 PM
Closed Mondays

$$$$ (NT$1850/per person plus 10% service)

Kid friendliness: only set menus available so only probably only foodie kids will appreciate

Visit reviewed: 4/7/2015 & 3/4/2015

Extremely happy and fortunate to have gotten to try RAW a few times since its opening late last year. It pays to have a group of friends that love food as much as I do to snag reservations and invite you along. Unfortunately I didn't get the chance to see or meet Chef Andre Chiang since I had heard he greeted diners and explained some of the dishes in the first few months after RAW's opening (as I saw photos on my Facebook feed). It would have been nice to hear directly from him about the food on my visits, but it's understandable that he's busy running his other restaurants in Singapore and Paris.  Taiwanvore has a great write up about Chef Andre Chiang and his recently published autobiography, which helped explain to me how RAW became one of the hottest reservations in Taipei and the cult of Chef Andre. 

Love the secret drawer in the table at each seat. It's where you'll find the menu, all the utensils for the meal and way in the back of the drawer, a napkin.

The menus come in English and Chinese and alternate between each seat, so if you get one you can't read, try trading with your dinner date. The 8 course menu is like a word puzzle to decipher at first glance- it's read across each row, and describes the main ingredients in that dish.

The bread (NT$150) is not part of the set, but I ended up getting it each time after I first tried it. Spread the whipped butter and buckwheat generously on it and devour. I probably ate half a loaf while waiting for my dinner date.

Toasted cauliflower / chicken masala / couscous 
on a crispy chicken skin chip. Like a fancied up gastronomic chip and dip. A lot of crunch and flavor and a great start.

Rose champagne/ Tomatoes / Ohba sansho

So many flavors at once from this dish- sweet, sour, shiso, the sea, floral, fruity.. Green, yellow and red tomato salad and an icy shiso sorbet to pair with the kanpachi sashimi hiding under the cucumbers cut so thin they are nearly translucent.

Perfect Egg / Praline / Wild Veg

The fun part of this dish was they brought a wreath of herbs for each person to pick and adorn and season your dish yourself. The pralines added a nice crunch to the slow cooked egg as did the zucchini and wild vegetables.

Always love an oozing slow cooked egg that melts in your mouth. 

Cappellini / Sakura ebi / CCC

Paired with a mushroom broth tea, the umami flavor (and smaller portion since it's part of a set course) of the capellini left you wanting more. 

Clam / Corn / Kelp Jus

The ingredients on the menu sound like a strange combination, but I loved the sweetness of the corn steamed egg along with the briny clams. Loved the crunch of the corn crackers too, like those fried shrimp chips mom used to make. Creamy, crunchy, sweet- hard to imagine the layers of flavors from the bowl of algae green seaweed purée. This dish might be too sweet for some, but I liked it. 

Burnt Cabbage / Cod / Soubise

Perfectly cooked cod, this dish was one of my favorites both visits. The cabbage was less burnt this time around and I found the soubise (onion béchamel sauce) a tad too sweet for me this time.

Mushroom Salad / Pork / Chinese Olive

On the menu, the mushroom salad and pork look like two separate courses, but they are actually one. While I enjoyed the crispy pork belly skin, I cut out all the fat in the pork belly 

Strawberry / Pink Guava / Roast Apple
There are inevitable comparisons between RAW and Mume, and even more in my mind with this strawberry dessert since I really enjoyed Mume's deconstructed strawberry cheesecake. I liked it more than this, since this tastes like something you could do at home yourself. Sliced strawberries, pink guava sorbet, a pouring of cranberry juice and the odd partner of a piece of roasted apple which at first glance I thought was a banana. I liked the sorbet and the strawberries were less sour this time than my last visit, but I haven't been crazy about RAW's desserts yet.

Pineapple Cake
More cake-like than the typical Taiwanese pineapple cake which is more of a shortbread, it's a playful interpretation that doesn't quite work for me.

Note that the tea and coffee is not part of the set and is an extra charge (NT$220), as is the still or sparkling water by the bottle. I'd skip the tea and coffee and get a lychee bubble drink instead if you have to order one drink.

It was odd to me that I liked many of the dishes more tonight than my previous visit, but a pleasant surprise. It goes to show that there are always so many elements that happen with a meal- the ingredients, the chef, the dining companions, the mood, the level of hunger- even eating the exact same dishes you can have different experiences. 

The following are photos from my previous visit with this menu, my second visit to RAW. They had just switched to this new menu in March which will go until the end of May 2015. Some of the dishes had subtle changes from one month to the next, such as more tomatoes and cucumbers in the second dish, or the cabbage not being as burnt in the cod dish.

Peeking inside the kitchen.

baking/supplies: i recommend YIXING DIY BAKING SUPPLIES

YIXING DIY BAKING SUPPLIES
No. 578 Fujin St., Songshan District
台北市松山區富錦街578號
(02) 2760-8115

MRT: Songshan Airport Station

$-$$

Visit reviewed: 12/3/2014

If you love to bake, I'm sure you've done your share of searching Taipei and the internet, wondering where to find baking supplies in Taipei. Looking for things like the most basic cake pans, baking powder, cupcake paper cups, sprinkles seem elusive when you're used to going to your local supermarket or Target and finding whole aisles for it. I've lamented about this over the years- looking for things at Ikea, Muji, City Super, Carrefour, Jason's, Hands Tailung, Nitori, the Taipei International Baking Show and Bake it Yourself and sometimes paying a premium. 

But there's actually a lot of little local shops, usually with the words DIY on the store's sign, that have a treasure trove of goods and supplies if you're willing to sift through it. This shop on Fujin Street has shelves crammed full of flour, ingredients, baking tools, mixes, cake pans, cookie cutters and even ready to bake pie crusts, phyllo dough, mixers and waffle irons. No English signage for the non-Chinese speaker and the store isn't as pretty as Bake it Yourself, but the lower prices make it worth the trip.

don't these look like Runts? remember those?

#exploretaipei/taiwanese: i strongly recommmend BITAN 碧潭

BITAN 碧潭

MRT: Xindian

$-$$

Kid friendliness: great day trip for families, pedal boats to rent, boardwalk and street market to browse.

visit reviewed: 4/3/2015

I always thought Bitan sounded so far away, but it's only a 20-30 minute car or  MRT ride outside of the center of Taipei. My day trip to Bitan was a nice escape from the city- being able to walk around the scenic area surrounding the Xindian river, enveloped by the lush, towering green mountains. It was like a macro version of Sun Moon Lake, but a lot easier to get to as Sun Moon Lake is three hours south of Taipei.  Bitan has the best of both worlds- activities for nature lovers with pedal boats available to rent and a long suspension bridge to cross and take selfies, as well as street food to devour for food lovers, or restaurants along the river if you want to chill with a view instead. 

The Bitandiao suspension bridge is for pedestrians only and the entrance is about a 5 minute walk from the Xindian MRT stop on the green line. You can't miss the food vendors lining the street on the alley where the bridge is, as well as on the other side of the suspension bridge. 

the view from the foot bridge

Taiwanese sausage on a stick NT$35

snacking at the bridge's entrance. see the Bitan sign in the background?

i liked this taiwanese sausage vendor better than the other one.  you can do your own taste test!

did not like this vendor's aiyu jelly drink. watery and no flavor at all.

Don't forget to get an ice cream wrap/burrito run bing NT$35 if you spot it! Three scoops of taro, pineapple and red bean ice cream with crunchy bits of shaved peanut candy wrapped in a thin flour wrapper. Cilantro optional. If you've read my blog or follow me on instagram, you know I loooooove this (and you should too). This vendor knows how to market itself, glossy signage and photo to catch people's eyes. Sometimes it's hard to find if they just have the block of peanut candy sitting out and signage in Chinese.

Also near the entrance to the foot bridge and the Xindian MRT stop is a long boardwalk of waterfront restaurants and cafes that is really well designed. The tables face the river and were very clean and comfortable looking, and seating areas were covered in case of rain. Even in the afternoon, there were tons of people eating and enjoying the view, and I would totally come back to try it out. There was a selection of pizza, pasta, tea shops, curry, noodles, ice cream and dessert places. I really was pleasantly surprised by the waterfront boardwalk because I thought it was very tourist and family friendly area with open and clean spaces. I've been to quite a few beaches, mountainside and waterfront areas in Taiwan that didn't take advantage of the opportunity to develop its area into more of a destination than for its natural elements. 

Pedal boats are easy to rent- just walk down to the riverside and look for the rental sign/shack. There are different sized Swan shaped boats, for 2 people up to 6 people, and cost a few hundred NT depending on how many people in your boat. Everyone wears a life jacket and you get a mini work out pedaling, breathing the fresh air.  It was fun to try and relaxing to be out on the water, though you have to kind of coordinate pedaling with other people because the machinery is all linked together. You can rent boats on either side of the river, and you can also rent from one side and return the boat on the other.  

Such a nice day! 

the view from my boat :)

After walking down the boardwalk and walking back towards the main area, I passed by Green Hornet Cafe which I heard about a few years ago from a friend and readers. I didn't get a chance to try it, but they have Mexican food on the menu! Has anyone tried them? Will have to come back to try the enchiladas!

#hungryinbitan! I'll be back again soon!

Before you leave Bitan, try some of the sheng jian baos (NT$10 each) from this yellow signed vendor. Crispy on the bottom, the steaming hot pork and cabbage baos were a perfect bite to end the evening.