Taiwanese Food Promotion @ Tai Zi Heen, Prince Hotel & Residence Kuala Lumpur

From 18 - 30 November 2011, Tai Zi Heen Chinese restaurant will be running a Taiwanese Food Promotion. Executive Chef Wang of the 5-star Taipei Garden Hotel is specially flown in from Taiwan to showcase his delectable dishes of contemporary Taiwanese delicacies. Chef Wang is known for his expertise in creating dishes that preserves the original essence of Taiwanese traditions.

Dishes of interest from the a la carte menu are stir fried oysters with preserved black bean, wok fried morning glory with sliced beef, braised chicken leg with black sesame oil and ginger, sun cake and pineapple cake.

Chef Wang from Taipei Garden Hotel and Chef Michael Wong, new chef of Tai Zi Heen

During our dinner, we managed to sample a variety of Taiwanese delicacies. A popular seasoning in Taiwanese cuisine is pickled daikon (radish), which is used in the Pan fried egg omelette with three month preserved dried daikon (RM20 for regular). Other than flavouring the dish, the daikon provided a nice crunch to the fluffy omelette.

One of Chef Wang's specialty is the Traditional Three-Cup Chicken with Superior Stock, Black Sesame Oil and Dark Soy Sauce (RM28 for regular) -- which also turned out to be our favorite dish of the evening. The name "three cup chicken" comes from the combination of 3 ingredients to make the sauce for this dish -- 1 cup black sesame oil, 1 cup rice wine and 1 cup of soy sauce. The chicken was moist and very flavorful.

It is often said that "A restaurant that cannot cook three cups chicken is not a true Taiwanese restaurant". 

Since it has been a cold rainy day, the next dish was well-received -- Thick Vegetables and Seafood Soup. The soup is quite clear and mild tasting and laden with Napa cabbage, dried shrimps, mushrooms, prawns, clams and fried beancurd.

A bowl of soup to warm us up

The Steamed glutinous rice came with 2 portions of crab (crab meat and crab roe all included). This is another Taiwan specialty. The rice was surprisingly nice, though I'm not a fan of peeling the crab meat (that's when husbands come in handy :P)

Poached squid with five spice sauce (RM20 for regular)

Another egg dish that we tried, a luxe version this time.. Stir Fried Shark's Fin with Egg (RM60 for regular). I prefer this over the other egg dish, it tasted good when eaten with the glutinous rice. 

When the sun cake and beef tongue cake was introduced to us, we thought that the filling of the pastries would be beef tongue and maybe sun(flower) seeds? Turns out the name refers to the shape of the pastry rather than the filling. Sun cake is a popular pastry from Taichung in Taiwan. Both pastries were filled with malt sugar. I prefer the beef tongue cake over the sun cake since the pastry is more tasty (I think it's been fried and sweetened, while sun cake is just baked).

Beef tongue cake and sun cake

Chef Wang also demonstrated how pineapple cakes are made. Pineapple cake is the national dessert of Taiwan. I've never made these before, so it was fascinating for me to watch the chef make it -- never knew the pastry were made with things like milk powder and custard powder! Texture wise, it is different from the pineapple tarts Malaysian eat during Chinese New Year.. not as crumbly, a bit more dense (more like shortbread). The shape is also different, the tart is rectangular. A sweet end to our meal.

Pastry and filling

Taiwanese Pineapple cakes (RM21 for 6 pcs)

Variety of Taiwanese Tea - Ginseng Oolong, Tung Ting Oolong, Jin Xuan, and Four Seasons Tea

There is a 10-course Family-style set menu (for tables of 6-10 persons) for RM98 per person, which includes deep fried lobster and vegetable sandwiches, braised chicken leg with black sesame oil and ginger and steamed grouper with codia seeds, scallions and chillies. Alternatively, there are 2 set menus available at RM78 (lobster, stir fried oyster, steamed clams) and RM88 (shark's fin soup, grouper, abalone) nett per person. A la carte dish prices range from RM20 to RM60 for regular. This promotion is available for both lunch and dinner.

Verdict: Chef Wang's Taiwanese Food tastes very light and non-oily, would be perfect for those who are more health-conscious. 

Click here to read about my previous experience at Tai Zi Heen.

Full set of photos available to view here.


Pork-free.

Opening times: Lunch; 12.00 pm - 2.30pm, Dinner; 6.30pm-10.30pm.

Location: Tai Zi Heen, Level 2, Prince Hotel & Residence Kuala Lumpur, 4 Jalan Conlay, 50450 Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.

Tel: 03-2170 8888

Website: http://www.princehotelkl.com

GPS Coordinates: 3.150179, 101.714516