If you think most Taipei urbanites are stuck in the rat race and would be too busy to stand in line for over 30 minutes to secure a pork chop for lunch, check out the tonkatsu eatery hidden behind the Cathay General Hospital on Renai Road. A beneficiary of the influence wielded by bloggers and online chat room gossipers, the restaurant's sets, consisting of a breaded, deep-fried pork cutlet served Japanese-style, are hot property.
Is the wait worthwhile?
Dinners can choose to fill up on the popular Japanese meal in two ways: traditional or innovative.
PHOTO: HO YI, TAIPEI TIMES
One option is pork chop served with daikon, or white radish, mash.
If simplicity is not your style, the restaurant does a range of pork cutlets stuffed with various fillings. For NT$310, patrons can make their own combinations of pork chop with two choices from over 10 options including cheese, kimchi, tuna salad, egg, crab meat and curry sauce.
Cheese tonkatsu seems to be the restaurant's tour de force. In one bite, the gooey cheese coats the chop's crispy layer and succelent meat creating a sumptuous trio of textures. The cheese and curry chop, on the other hand, tries too hard, and packs too much of a punch with a confusing array of flavors.
The kimchi option is sour, sweet, spicy and piquant, without one flavor dominating the dish. For those who want a feast for the eyes as well as one for the stomach, the laver and steamed eggs set and the plum sauce and crab option are must-tries.
Adding condiments to the meal is a treat in itself as diners are provided with pestles in which to grind white sesame seeds and other spices.
Fresh shredded cabbage, miso soup and high-quality rice come in unlimited supply with the sets.
As the establishment is pretty much full day and night, weekdays and weekends, the motto of the wait staff is to serve up the fare as quickly as possible with passable courtesy. Dishes are served at an admirable speed while wait staff politely ask permission to clean up empty plates from time to time. It is not an ideal venue for a lengthy tete-a-tete with an old lover. Don't hesitate to prevent the eager wait staff from taking away your half-finished food and be careful with the mustard dressing, it is fiery stuff and could have you wincing and blubbering through your entire meal.
That US assistance was a model for Taiwan’s spectacular development success was early recognized by policymakers and analysts. In a report to the US Congress for the fiscal year 1962, former President John F. Kennedy noted Taiwan’s “rapid economic growth,” was “producing a substantial net gain in living.” Kennedy had a stake in Taiwan’s achievements and the US’ official development assistance (ODA) in general: In September 1961, his entreaty to make the 1960s a “decade of development,” and an accompanying proposal for dedicated legislation to this end, had been formalized by congressional passage of the Foreign Assistance Act. Two
President William Lai’s (賴清德) March 13 national security speech marked a turning point. He signaled that the government was finally getting serious about a whole-of-society approach to defending the nation. The presidential office summarized his speech succinctly: “President Lai introduced 17 major strategies to respond to five major national security and united front threats Taiwan now faces: China’s threat to national sovereignty, its threats from infiltration and espionage activities targeting Taiwan’s military, its threats aimed at obscuring the national identity of the people of Taiwan, its threats from united front infiltration into Taiwanese society through cross-strait exchanges, and its threats from
Despite the intense sunshine, we were hardly breaking a sweat as we cruised along the flat, dedicated bike lane, well protected from the heat by a canopy of trees. The electric assist on the bikes likely made a difference, too. Far removed from the bustle and noise of the Taichung traffic, we admired the serene rural scenery, making our way over rivers, alongside rice paddies and through pear orchards. Our route for the day covered two bike paths that connect in Fengyuan District (豐原) and are best done together. The Hou-Feng Bike Path (后豐鐵馬道) runs southward from Houli District (后里) while the
March 31 to April 6 On May 13, 1950, National Taiwan University Hospital otolaryngologist Su You-peng (蘇友鵬) was summoned to the director’s office. He thought someone had complained about him practicing the violin at night, but when he entered the room, he knew something was terribly wrong. He saw several burly men who appeared to be government secret agents, and three other resident doctors: internist Hsu Chiang (許強), dermatologist Hu Pao-chen (胡寶珍) and ophthalmologist Hu Hsin-lin (胡鑫麟). They were handcuffed, herded onto two jeeps and taken to the Secrecy Bureau (保密局) for questioning. Su was still in his doctor’s robes at