With at least five well-known Indian restaurants in downtown Taipei alone, Indian cuisine is clearly finding a place in the palates of Taiwanese diners. Taj Palace Restaurant, according to owner Johnson Yang, is the oldest of them all, and serves what he claims to be the most authentic Indian food in Taiwan. 

Yang explained that he insists his Indian chefs not adjust recipes to suit Chinese tastes, and keep the dishes as faithful to Indian cuisine as possible. 
My companion and I decided on a few appetizers: vegetarian and mutton samosas, tandoori naan, tandoori paratha, hommous, and chutney, which cost from NT$40 to NT$90. The samosas, served four per order, were quite small, but flavorful; the finely ground mutton in a nest of herbs and spices succeeded in whetting our appetites. 

The hommous, made of skinned chick peas, oil, lemon juice, and a touch of garlic and olive oil pureed to a thin sauce, was delicious. The chutney, however, was our favorite -- an absolute taste delight for those who like a little spice in their meal. 

Of course, it is a must to dunk bread in your hommous and chutney, and paratha and naan are served fresh and steaming hot. Paratha, wheat flour and butter baked tandoor-style, is thicker than naan, and I found it to be the better of the two. 

My companion and I decided to share an order of tandoori chicken (NT$260 for a small order), which was spicy and, pleasantly, not as dry as tandoori dishes tend to be. For my main course, I chose the Taj special chicken curry (NT$260), while my companion decided on mutton masala (NT$270). 

The chicken and mutton were cut into bite-sized morsels, and smothered in a gravy rich with several kinds of herbs. Portions of the two main courses are modest, but definitely worth the price. The curry chicken sauce had the distinct taste of coriander, and was much more spicy than the mutton sauce. However, the mutton was certainly a treat as well; mild, but exuberantly flavorful -- the ginger flavor massaged the taste buds, rather than setting them aflame. 

For dessert, we chose "kulfi" (NT$75), homemade  ice-cream containing crushed cashew and pistachio nuts, and "gulabjamun" (NT$55), small fried balls of bread served in a hot sugary syrup. The kulfi, though a bit hard, was very good, while the touch of lemon in the gulabjamun perfectly balanced the sugary contents. We also tried the Indian masada tea (NT$75), a milky concoction with a sumptuous vanilla after-taste. 
 The decor in the Taj Palace is less than extravagant, even verging on tacky and rundown.