October 01, 2006
三井日本料理
Had a nice little overtime bonus from doing over-time at the China factory. Spent most of it on a spiff new cell phone to replace the old one which was gravitationally challenged by a very hard floor. Had a little leftover to do something nice for the GF, so decided to check out the fancy Japanese restaurant located discreetly in the basement of a bank building.
The decor is one of the advertised high-points of the establishment and it didn't disappoint.The room is dramatically lit with bright spots focused on the tables and diffused background lights for a warm glow. Fabric curtains partitioned the large room to provide intimacy without being a hard separation. Clean modern furniture and heavy Japanese porcelain servingware complete the effect.
The menu offered the standard array of Japanese standards, but it seemed more expedient to just go with the set meals. The appetizers arrived promptly with monkfish liver for her (tastefully liver-y without being fishy or overly offal-icious) and uni on shredded one-imo for me (wished there was more rich uni-goodness to go with the naturally bland-ish root).
The dishes came steadily at a good pace. Of course, the foundation of a high-end Japanese restaurant is made on the sashimi and they didn't disappoint, with a large plate of ruby red maguro, sweet orange shrimp, and many other fancy seafaring critters. Most of the follow-up dishes also featured seafood. Charcoal grilled, delicately steamed, and even a mini-hotpot nabe full of boiling-hot rich broth. The salt-grilled crab legs was especially simply good. A french-style lamb chop dish added diversity and red meat.
Sure was a heck of a lot of food, and all of it was good to great, but in the end we weren't really sure if it was quite worth the 2500NTD/head prix fixe, when 吉園 features food that's 99-101% as good for half the price with more attentive service from the sweet obasans. Decor isn't that big a deal for us.
三井日本料理
Mitsui Japanese Cuisine
台北市松山區敦化南路1段108號B1樓之1
02-27413394