
Taipei restaurant launches Chilean culinary month
Today we take you to a Taipei restaurant that serves up delicacies from different countries. From March to May, diners can enjoy eight Chilean dishes. FTV reporter Stephany Yang finds out more.
Stephany Yang
FTV reporter
For its first culinary food month event of 2024, this restaurant has prepared eight Chilean dishes.
First up is tortilla de penne, also known as Chilean pasta and sausage omelet. In Spain, people use eggs and potatoes to make omelets, while in Chile, they add noodles and vegetables.
Camilo Cheng
Restaurant founder
It is like a Spanish-style tortilla made by potato. But in Chile, they mix with penne, the pasta, Italian pasta penne with egg and other ingredients which is very delicious as well.
There is also a traditional Mapuche farmhouse stew. This dish was inspired by the Mapuche, a group of Indigenous inhabitants of south-central Chile and southwestern Argentina.
Camilo Cheng
Restaurant founder
Mapuche is the name of the Indigenous people. Mapuche, and they have a stew in their daily lives mixed with sausages and vegetables. This is quite unique of Chile. Another dish is barbecue because Chileans they will enjoy their weekend with their families in parks and riversides to have barbeque together.
Chilean cuisine is mainly derived from traditional Spanish cuisine, but it’s shaped by local Indigenous culture, local ingredients in Chile, and other European cuisines. Chile is also home to many agricultural products, whose diverse flavors make its traditional cuisine famous.
Fernando Schmidt
Chilean Trade Office director
I would highly recommend the pastel de choclo. Even though they are all amazing dishes. Pastel de choclo is very traditional for Chileans and it is something that we always like to have on our tables, particularly during the weekends when we meet with our families. And of course, the empanadas which are not only from Chile, they are from all of Latin America. We have different variations of empanadas. Bilateral trade between Chile and Taiwan is very stable. It has been very stable over the past decade I would say. We are the largest exporter of salmon. Frozen salmon to Taiwan. As well as one of the key exporters of giant squid, king crab, and abalone.
This restaurant in Taipei is offering a three-month culinary event featuring Chile. Camilo Cheng founded the restaurant in 2015. In 2021, he began partnering with embassies of Taiwan’s Caribbean allies to serve up authentic dishes, to help locals better understand the nation’s allies. He later also expanded to include countries from South America.
Camilo Cheng
Restaurant founder
My undergrad major is Spanish. My professor is Chilean. He is also a father. He went back to Chile this year so I want to do something special for him. I asked him if there were any Chilean dishes I can make in my restaurant. He gave me lots of information so to remember him and try to promote Chilean culture, so we have this Chilean food season.
The restaurant’s “culinary months” have featured dishes from countries including Saint Kitts and Nevis, Belize, Haiti, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, and Saint Lucia. Now the restaurant will serve up Chilean cuisine till the end of May.
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2024-03-19