Cats are known to be finicky, so when I spotted one rubbing against the door of Joyce Cafe and purring to get in, I figured there must be something good inside.
Turns out the cat was a connoisseur. The water at Joyce's costs NT$30 and the fresh bread that's brought to your table will cost that much again. Add an extra 10 percent service charge and 5 percent VAT and you've spent nearly NT$70 without even ordering.
Happily, at Joyce Cafe the emphasis in fine dining is on the dining. The fine stuff is left in the background where it belongs. This is something many local restaurants serving Western cuisine don't seem to understand. A month ago, this column reviewed a fine dining establishment that also traded in motorcycles and lingerie. "We have LV upstairs," the owner told me by way of establishing his credentials. At Joyce, if you don't like the food, there's no browsing to do. Not to worry, you're sure to like the food.
PHOTO: DAVID MOMPHARD, TAIPEI TIMES
The first of two set menus for this month (NT$1,380) offers sauteed fresh mushrooms and escargot in a puff pasty and seafood chowder to start, followed by either pan-fried fillet of catfish served with dill sauce, oven-roasted boneless chicken served with green pepper sauce, or braised veal knuckle with fresh rosemary and lemon grass in a white wine sauce. Dessert is an orange and strawberry flavored pancake and coffee or tea. The pricier set meal (NT$1,680) begins with a romaine salad topped with goose liver and giant scallops in black truffle sauce and a roasted leeks and crab meat veloute.
Diners are then confronted with difficult task of choosing between a pan-fried tiger king prawn wrapped in a fillet of sole and covered with lobster sauce, roasted herb-crust veal served with porcinni mushrooms or grilled lamb chops topped with bleu cheese in a red wine and shallot sauce. Hot chocolate cake a la mode and a cup of coffee or tea will send you waddling contentedly home.
Diners wanting a delicious and filling meal for less should try any of the pastas, priced around NT$380. Lunch diners should look at the salads, especially the chicken-breast Caesar, priced round NT$400. Be sure to save a piece of chicken for the cat huckstering everyone into the restaurant -- as he's worked hard for it.
A vaccine to fight dementia? It turns out there may already be one — shots that prevent painful shingles also appear to protect aging brains. A new study found shingles vaccination cut older adults’ risk of developing dementia over the next seven years by 20 percent. The research, published Wednesday in the journal Nature, is part of growing understanding about how many factors influence brain health as we age — and what we can do about it. “It’s a very robust finding,” said lead researcher Pascal Geldsetzer of Stanford University. And “women seem to benefit more,” important as they’re at higher risk of
Last week the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) said that the budget cuts voted for by the China-aligned parties in the legislature, are intended to force the DPP to hike electricity rates. The public would then blame it for the rate hike. It’s fairly clear that the first part of that is correct. Slashing the budget of state-run Taiwan Power Co (Taipower, 台電) is a move intended to cause discontent with the DPP when electricity rates go up. Taipower’s debt, NT$422.9 billion (US$12.78 billion), is one of the numerous permanent crises created by the nation’s construction-industrial state and the developmentalist mentality it
Experts say that the devastating earthquake in Myanmar on Friday was likely the strongest to hit the country in decades, with disaster modeling suggesting thousands could be dead. Automatic assessments from the US Geological Survey (USGS) said the shallow 7.7-magnitude quake northwest of the central Myanmar city of Sagaing triggered a red alert for shaking-related fatalities and economic losses. “High casualties and extensive damage are probable and the disaster is likely widespread,” it said, locating the epicentre near the central Myanmar city of Mandalay, home to more than a million people. Myanmar’s ruling junta said on Saturday morning that the number killed had
Mother Nature gives and Mother Nature takes away. When it comes to scenic beauty, Hualien was dealt a winning hand. But one year ago today, a 7.2-magnitude earthquake wrecked the county’s number-one tourist attraction, Taroko Gorge in Taroko National Park. Then, in the second half of last year, two typhoons inflicted further damage and disruption. Not surprisingly, for Hualien’s tourist-focused businesses, the twelve months since the earthquake have been more than dismal. Among those who experienced a precipitous drop in customer count are Sofia Chiu (邱心怡) and Monica Lin (林宸伶), co-founders of Karenko Kitchen, which they describe as a space where they
RSS