Here’s an interesting food & travel article from Clarissa Wei, about what’s certainly my favourite of the local styles of food to eat. Rechao restaurants apparently mainly date back to the 1990s, which I found mildly surprising; I’d have thought they were older.
Not the main point of the article but a factoid I found interesting: “rechao restaurants account for nearly 45 percent of all beer sales in the country”.
I tried to find another thread to put this with, but there aren’t that many positive threads about Taiwanese dining! I’m a little surprised that - unless I’m doing something wrong - there were only 24 results total in the whole forum for “rechao”, two of which were mine (six from @Brianjones, four from @OrangeOrganics; there are a few more if I use Chinese 熱炒).
She’s wrong, you’re right. I was eating at rechao restaurants in the mid-80s. The spot where my favorite one used to be later got turned into a small park (corner of Heping E. Rd. and Jianguo S. Rd.).
They’re basically sit down restaurants where dishes are placed in the center with a rotating table. The concept isn’t new, though restaurants with the name 熱炒 might be.
We always have family gatherings in such places or more upscale versions of such restaurant.
Rechao = a restaurant with a lazy susan? No, that seems pretty inaccurate to me. This is like saying “steak places are restaurants which give you knives and forks.”
I think you’re getting rechao places mixed up with beer houses, which date back to the '80s. I still miss the beer house/garden strip along Zhongcheng Rd. in Tienmu where you could dine alfresco in the summer breeze, and of course, the dinosaur-themed Indian beer house on Bade.
No, I’m talking about rechao places. I went to the beer houses sometimes too, but they were a little far away for my convenience-loving, central Taipei self.
I lived on one of the most famous rechao streets, Sanming Lu in Xindian. Didn’t need to go far to get my fix. Many places were so similar I would often confuse them and then realise I meant to go to the other one.
My Taiwanese boss dragged myself and the sales team across half of Taipei’s rechao back in the day. Many beers were drunk and cigarettes smoked! And the drinking games and the shouting! Used to be really rowdy places. Are there any places like that still ?
I brought my Japanese boss out to one years ago she absolutely loved it. Also some of our visitors thorugh the years.
There’s one right on the road I’m on, next to the police station and the steak house. Those rechao places can look a little decrepit at times. At my old place prior to it being bulldozed, they had opened a new rechao place like a year before the demolition took place. I guess they were after quick cash.
