I can understand that Russian food is a bit of a hard sell for people. Really, I get it. I’d say some would have images of standing in line waiting to be served by a hooded, wizened old crone wearing finger-less gloves ladling out you some colourless slop. After you receive your slop, you and your rag tag companions find your places around the trash can bonfire, and wait out another cold, cold night.
Today I was joined by Lady Whirlwind. Lady W had been a student of mine some time ago, and on seeing I was doing my blog she asked if she could come along. She lives in Hsinchu which is a city about an hour and a half away from Taipei, so it makes me feel warm and lovely that she would come on one of my adventures. We had originally agreed to do this early on in the year, but family obligations ( Lady W’s husband is Hakka which means the Chinese calendar stuff they follow is slightly different to the rest of Taiwan), the virus (what else?) and various other switcheroos meant we kept postponing until now.
I have yet to meet Lord W, and was keen to, however he had stayed at home. I’d heard about their wedding preparations a year earlier; honeymoon etc. when Lady W was skiving off work and pretending, on the boss’s dime, that she needed English class for two hours a week. An accomplished cellist and bit of a foodie herself, Lady W also has many bizarre stories by way of her father who at one time worked as a doctor in the Taiwanese countryside. Some of the folk remedies and craziness he has seen would make your brain hurt and stomach roll, and it all happened within her lifetime.
Anyway, we went to Russian Castle at lunchtime. I would normally have had wing chun class a day earlier and look suitably battered and bruised, doing nothing to dispel the myth that I look like a Russian gangster as I entered a Russian restaurant. This time however, all I have is a scraped knuckle, from Wednesday. I woke up late yesterday, and had to take care of sick wife and Preschooler Bao who is in the “why?” question phase. Wednesday’s class witnessed a truly horrific injury in that “Rex” didn’t tighten his fist enough when punching the sand bag. He hit it so hard, that he bent his little finger outward, some really nasty dislocation action there. He will apparently be out for a few months.
So I wandered in slightly wide eyed, greying hair I haven’t shaved off for a while and that scraped knuckle. She of course, looked the picture of health. Damn you youthful vigor!
Our venue today serves as both a delicatessen of sorts and a restaurant. There were the now obligatory TV in the corner playing music of that country’s music/dancing as well as antiquey things on the walls and what looked like Russian national dress costumes that maybe customers could wear. I dunno.
The menu deals only in set meals, where you get salad, borscht, a choice from ten mains, a similar number of desserts and a drink. All for 399NT- which is a pretty good deal on the face of it.
Of all the things your mother warns you about, like not talking to strangers, not dissing Russian salad is probably not part of many peoples’ upbringing. I was conscious of this as we waited for it to arrive.
The words “They’re very proud of their salad” echoed in my ears as the emotionless Russian waitress put it on our tables. I have to admit it wasn’t as bad as I had feared; it was certainly colourful with beetroot, carrots, and onions and tasted a bit smoky, and as salads go it was unusual. It wasn’t “enjoyed” neither was it “endured”. I finished mine, however my sparkling wit meant Lady W didn’t eat all of hers. Today’s best in show was undoubtedly the borscht. The beef was tender, the soup was warming. There just wasn’t enough of it. I could probably eaten/drunk a whole vat of that stuff, if it was on the menu proper. Lady W particularly liked the sour cream in the borscht.
For the mains we went for chicken dishes, and I feel we both came away feeling a little cheated. The plate itself was big enough, with rice, pickles, chilies and cabbage but the chicken parts were mostly wing or bone so not enough meat. For the record, she had sour cream chicken and had expected more creaminess, and I had baked chicken with apple, both interesting but not memorable.
Next up was dessert; I went for olate (sour cream filled pancakes) which I enjoyed. Something in the batter works very well with the sour creamy/yoghurt stuff; there were only three on the plate but they were satisfying. Lady W though went for kefir with brown sugar, which we guess was natural yoghurt with brown sugar. Of all the different things I’ve eaten this year- this one is the closest to the negative stereotype I mentioned at the beginning. Adding the brown sugar changed the texture and made it weird. This reminds me of the time when as a student (and thus, poor) I bought a three litre bottle of coke and by mistake I had picked up the then new Vanilla coke. We brought it home and found out our mistake too late. We drank it and it was disgusting, but being impoverished students we couldn’t justify throwing away a three litre of bottle of coke. So it hung around in the fridge for months while we passed it off to guests with a hearty “Have you tried vanilla coke yet? What, no? Well good sir or madam now is your chance!” and after they spat it out, it went down incrementally until we could eventually get rid of it.
That would happen in my house again if I bought kefir.
For drinks we had coffee, a drink I believe you have tried before and in my case Siberian milk tea which reminded me more of Indian tea. Nice stuff, but not a go to.
I saw another menu of different pancakes, which I’d be sure to try if I went again, but it will be a while before I do so many more things to go back to.
The conversation was good and the atmosphere was fun and despite what I write here I did enjoy myself, Lady W is really good fun to be around, despite the fact it looked like I was a divorced father out with his wee daughter on a Sunday. A fun time to be sure with not an old crone in sight.
Menu:
Address: No. 14號, Lane 333, Section 3, Roosevelt Road, Da’an District, Taipei City, 106
52 Cuisines? 