The Maple Café — Restaurant in Taichung

As an Australian I think this is a pretty good Aussie big breakfast. Pros first: I LOVE the crispiness of the bacon. AND the the creamy, buttery scrambled eggs that were perfectly cooked🙌. A few cons: the mushrooms were nicely seasoned and cooked to perfection, but not the right mushrooms? The restaurant uses Taiwanese mushrooms but of course they're not used in Australia (but since it's in Taiwan, and button mushrooms are more expensive, so that can be understandable). The tomatoes were fresh, and seasoned with some herbs, but the cook was way off. They were only slightly scorched and were still very much raw. In Australia, they're usually cooked until they're soft. Tha heat brings out its wonderful, rich, tomatomy flavours and just warms up your morning breakfast! When it's raw like that it doesn't have much flavour. The sourdough bread was the one I was looking forward to the most and ended up being the most disappointed with. Because it wasn't really sourdough bread. The bread itselfs nice. It's soft, and is toasted nicely (not toasted enough for me, I like mine golden brown, but I have noticed that Taiwanese people don't give their toasts too much colour), it has a BEAUTIFUL crust!! But it's just not what I'd expect when the menu says "sourdough bread"? "Bread/toast" might be more fitting (I'm not a professional baker but it feels like the starter hadn't had enough time to develop it's flavour). Last things the salad, which was nice and fresh. Those pickled oranges were amazing! You don't normally see that on the side in Australia, but I do see that a lot of Taiwanese restaurants like to put salads on the sides of western dishes, so I suppose it's a Taiwanese thing, and this is in Taiwan, so I respect that (like, the locals might think it's weird if it's not on the side?). Overall, I'll give it a four, as I can see that the owners have put a lot of thoughts into the restaurants menu, giving Taiwanese people a taste of Aussie food. But I'd give it a five if the details were fixed, as it'll be more authentic and a better representation of Australian food to...

I found a cafe near home through Google search and went with the mindset that it might be a hit or miss. To my surprise, it was completely a hit! The calm atmosphere is just what I like, and the staff were very friendly (I initially started speaking in English, and they responded politely and fluently)!

As for the food, my husband ordered a beef burger, and I ordered the full breakfast. I’m usually afraid of a strong beef flavor, but I tried a bite of the burger, and the flavor wasn’t overwhelming – it was delicious! I also loved the sourdough in my meal!

Later, we ordered an additional pulled pork sourdough and a slice of burnt cheese (and in the end, my husband also ordered fried chicken with fries). Overall, it was a great experience and a place I would...

My new favorite brunch spot. There's car parking, space is roomy enough for our stroller to fit next to the table, and the staff are attentive without being annoying about it. I ordered the eggs benedict with chai latte, and my husband ordered the Australian breakfast with a flat white. Although a bit small, the chai latte was the best I've had in Taiwan, not too sweet thank God. I enjoy sourdough bread but I hate when it's so hard that it almost hurts to bite into, so I was glad that their sourdough was still soft enough to cut and eat easily. There are a couple of vegetarian and vegan options on the menu, but be sure to let them know if you're vegan just in case because they do add cheese to a lot of the...