Skylark — Restaurant in Shilin District

Twice in the last couple of weeks, I have hosted a meal for a larger group here (12-16 people), with mixed results.

Positives include the friendliness of the wait staff, and food quality has been acceptable. Food is advertised as "California cuisine" but there is really no such thing; this is really just a euphemism for American-style food. Although both the Americans and the Taiwanese at the meal enjoyed it, it is really American food with a Taipei twist. Prices are reasonable for the area.

On the down side, wait staff really needs better training. On both occasions, servers had no system for associating an order with a customer; they simply showed up at the table with a tray of food and expected customers to pick out what they ordered, creating lots of problems--several of us did not recognize our orders by appearance, and some got dishes belonging to others. (The same group lunched at Ten Ren Tea across the street the day after, and the servers there executed flawlessly despite the fact that there were 16 people at the table.)

On multi-course meals, servers kept bringing out dishes before the previous courses were cleared; desserts were even served while customers were still working on their meals. Also, on our second visit, one end of the table completely finished eating before some of us were even served our appetizers. This restaurant really needs to improve the way they serve the food.

In summary, food prep and quality was good, prices were acceptable, service was friendly but...

I’ve passed by Skylark so many times and never had a desire to go until it was suggested today. This isn’t the type place I would frequent when I’m in Taipei. The menu and concept is similar to American chain restaurants like TGIFridays, Denny’s, etc... The menu has a good variety of western options and also have a kids menu. Food was better than I expected and the price is wallet friendly. The food is catered towards the Taiwanese palette and the taste of things is different than wha type would expect in the states.

Food: 3.5 stars Value: 4.25 stars Overall: 4 stars

The bake the bread in house and although I don’t think it’s made by hand the freshly baked aspect does make the rolls and croissants taste much better than expected. I had the sea bass risotto on my visit. You can opt to make it a set which will include an appetizer and a drink. The fish was cooked nicely and paired well with the curry sauce. Portion size was a bit small but the taste was quite good. I really enjoyed the lemon soda. Not too sweet and had a nice tartness too it. I would come back again if I am craving some...

I can’t believe the service can be this awful. We sat there waiting for a seat, yet they just won't bother to offer one, despite having plenty of. We asked, “can we have a seat there? It’s empty now”, and the waiter complained to us! “We don’t have enough workers, can’t you just sit there and wait?” he said. So, Is it OUR problem causing their labor shortage? Or do they just want to slow down so that they don’t need to work? Later we just sat down, but nobody served us. For several minutes, the two waiters just ignored us. If you want to pay to suffer, or wait to destroy your good mood, come to this restaurant. They hired only 3 waiters cleaning and taking orders, and they feel obliged to...