Mitsui Cuisine M Japanese restaurant in Taipei (三井)

The Mitsui F&B Group (三井餐飲集團) operates a number of Japanese restaurants in Taipei City. At last count, there are eight outlets including the Addiction Aquatic Development (上引水產), an innovative seafood market and multi-restaurant project.  We decided to try Mitsui Cuisine M, the branch at Xinyi (near Taipei 101) as it is in a central location and looked very good in the pictures.

Cuisine M restaurant is located on the ground floor of an office building. It is not obvious as its existence is hidden by a wall of bushes with only a small sign to indicate its existence.  It turned out to be as good-looking as the pictures on its website.   It is a huge square room. The lights are dimmed to create a posh look. Light jazz music, with Ella Fitzgerald being one of the most played artistes, streams softly in the background.  The place was empty when we first arrived but quickly filled up soon after. It is a popular place and prior reservations are a good idea.

Mitsui Cuisine M Menu

Mitsui’s Cuisine M Taipei has an extensive ala carte menu. Fresh seafood is obviously their forte. It was however easier to just pick one of the set menus available. There were six meal combinations, three of which were only available for lunch. We picked the “Drizzle Combo” that costs NT$1,500 (approx. S$72)  per person. Here are some sample pages from the Mitsui cuisine M menu and sake list.

There is a vast selection of Japanese sake available, some served in small 300ml bottles. We tried one of these (NT$600).  It was a nice simple sake.

Cuisine M Drizzle Combo Lunch

The first two courses were mixed sashimi and crab salad.   Both items were good.  The crab came in the form of a king crab leg. It would have been better if the meat was extracted for us.  Digging meat out of the leg was not quite in keeping with  the elegant dining setting.

The next two items were pan-fried scallop and deep-fried pieces of fish. The scallop was very good.  The fish was also good, except that it was pieces of chunks of fish with meat and bones included. A bit troublesome to eat but the taste was delicious.

The beef dish was not great. it was chewy and tough.

Next was a bowl of soup with what appears to be internal parts of a fish. They were soft and tofu-like but with a seafood taste. Quite a nice clear soup.

The last savoury item of our lunch at Mitsui Cuisine M was a sushi platter with three items.  It was the least liked dish of the day. The fish looked dry and sad.  We gave this dish a pass.

The meal ended with a simple dessert and a cup coffee.

Ratings:

Food: 3

Service: 3

Value: 3

Atmosphere: 4

Overall Rating: 3 TOPs 

Mitsui cuisine M:1F., No.1, Songzhi Rd., Xinyi Dist., Taipei City
Reservation Tel: 02-23451101

Business Hour:
Lunch 11:30-14:30 (last order 14:20)
Dinner17:30-22:00 (last order 21:20)