VIBE

Opulent, Versailles-inspired seafood restaurant tucked away in the HuaXi Street (Snake Alley) Night Market. While the night market can get rowdy, inside the restaurant, the ambiance is pointedly refined and upscale. After selecting seafood from the tanks out front (yes, it’s so fresh that it’s still swimming at the beginning of the meal), diners are escorted into the chandeliered, gilded dining room where the tables are dressed with Royal Daulton china and Christofle silverware. The food–a high-end take on Taiwanese classics–is consistently delicious, and there's a great selection of local seafood preparations unfamiliar to most Western palates.

CROWD

Tourists (particularly from Japan) and an upper-crust crowd of loyal locals.

WHAT WE WOULD WEAR

Definitely go elegantly casual. This place is popular with the label-flashing set, but since you have to push your way through the Snake Alley crowds to get in, we’d skip the Chanel cocktail dress and just wear slim black pants and a fancy top with a Chanel handbag.

GO HERE WITH

Seafood lovers; parents; colleagues

WHY WE LIKE IT

The incredibly fresh seafood and the namesake noodle dish (tantsumien) are both delicious. Plus, the bling décor is almost surreal given the pedestrian surroundings just outside the door.

WHAT WE WOULD CHANGE

The set menus tend to be a rip off. Go a la carte.

GOOD TO KNOW

The signature dish, tantsumien (also known as dandan mian), consists of yellow noodles in shrimp broth topped with minced pork. A bit of Tainan Tantsumien history: it actually started out as a humble noodle stall, just like the other places in Snake Alley, before going ultra upscale in the 1980s.

CLOSEST COMPS

Shin Yeh (Taipei)