A Datong basement built from driftwood and a salvaged fishing boat — the Taipei room of a Taiwanese chef and her Australian partner. Aussie-izakaya share plates, proper pizza, cocktails, and live blues and jazz Thursday to Saturday.
Bad Mama hides one floor down from Chang'an West Road, a few minutes' walk from Zhongshan MRT. You take the stairs into the dark and the room opens up — driftwood beams overhead, a bar counter built from the hull of a real fishing boat, salvaged objects and hand-made art on every surface. It reads more like a gallery that happens to pour drinks than a basement bar, which is exactly the point.
The room
Almost nothing here came out of a catalogue. The owners describe their approach to the interior as having "no plan" — they built around what they found. Driftwood, net floats, weathered planks, reclaimed timber, all of it beachcombed and reassembled into furniture, fixtures, and wall pieces. The fishing-boat bar is the centrepiece, and it's not a prop — it's where the cocktails actually get made. The Taipei room has won a gold award for hospitality interior design, but on the floor it just feels warm, lived-in, and a little bohemian — the opposite of the city's polished hotel-bar circuit.
The people behind it
Bad Mama is the fifth venue from Gemma Lin and Adam Hunt — she a Taiwanese chef and artist, he an Australian designer. Gemma was born in Yehliu and grew up in the port city of Keelung, studied and worked bars in Japan, then moved to Sydney, where the couple ran a string of restaurants in Bondi and Surry Hills across roughly fifteen years. They came back to Taiwan to open Bad Mama Keelung — a bar literally built inside an abandoned fishing boat — and then this Taipei basement. The maritime salvage and the coastal-Taiwan thread running through both rooms is Gemma's childhood, more or less furnished.
What to eat and drink
The food is pitched as a "Eurasian-Aussie izakaya" — share plates that pull from Japanese, Taiwanese, European, and Australian bar food without committing hard to any one of them. Pizza is the thing regulars come back for, and Thursday is the night to do it — all-you-can-eat pizza is a long-running fixture. The small-plates list rotates with the season, so the specifics shift; expect things like burrata with grilled stone fruit when summer produce is in.
The cocktail list is ambitious and the boat bar takes it seriously, though more than one visitor has found the cocktails priced a little higher than they hit. The beer and craft-beer side gets steadier praise and is the safer-value order if you're just settling in for the night. The early evening, from 6 to 8pm, carries food deals for anyone arriving for dinner rather than a late one.
Music and the week
Live music runs Thursday, Friday, and Saturday — bluesy jazz, soul, singer-songwriter sets, the American-leaning kind of music that's genuinely hard to find in Taipei. It's loud enough to feel like a gig and still quiet enough to talk over. The week is themed beyond that — Wednesday is ladies' night, Thursday leans toward couples, and the staff make a real fuss over birthdays. Service is bilingual and Australian-relaxed throughout, and the room pulls a real mix of locals, expats, and the city's design-minded crowd.
Open every evening from 6pm — till midnight Sunday through Thursday, till 1am Friday and Saturday. Reservations are worth it for a group or a live-music night.
Bad Mama Taipei
A Datong basement built from driftwood and a salvaged fishing boat — the Taipei room of a Taiwanese chef and her Australian partner. Aussie-izakaya share plates, proper pizza, cocktails, and live blues and jazz Thursday to Saturday.
Bad Mama hides one floor down from Chang'an West Road, a few minutes' walk from Zhongshan MRT. You take the stairs into the dark and the room opens up — driftwood beams overhead, a bar counter built from the hull of a real fishing boat, salvaged objects and hand-made art on every surface. It reads more like a gallery that happens to pour drinks than a basement bar, which is exactly the point.
The room
Almost nothing here came out of a catalogue. The owners describe their approach to the interior as having "no plan" — they built around what they found. Driftwood, net floats, weathered planks, reclaimed timber, all of it beachcombed and reassembled into furniture, fixtures, and wall pieces. The fishing-boat bar is the centrepiece, and it's not a prop — it's where the cocktails actually get made. The Taipei room has won a gold award for hospitality interior design, but on the floor it just feels warm, lived-in, and a little bohemian — the opposite of the city's polished hotel-bar circuit.
The people behind it
Bad Mama is the fifth venue from Gemma Lin and Adam Hunt — she a Taiwanese chef and artist, he an Australian designer. Gemma was born in Yehliu and grew up in the port city of Keelung, studied and worked bars in Japan, then moved to Sydney, where the couple ran a string of restaurants in Bondi and Surry Hills across roughly fifteen years. They came back to Taiwan to open Bad Mama Keelung — a bar literally built inside an abandoned fishing boat — and then this Taipei basement. The maritime salvage and the coastal-Taiwan thread running through both rooms is Gemma's childhood, more or less furnished.
What to eat and drink
The food is pitched as a "Eurasian-Aussie izakaya" — share plates that pull from Japanese, Taiwanese, European, and Australian bar food without committing hard to any one of them. Pizza is the thing regulars come back for, and Thursday is the night to do it — all-you-can-eat pizza is a long-running fixture. The small-plates list rotates with the season, so the specifics shift; expect things like burrata with grilled stone fruit when summer produce is in.
The cocktail list is ambitious and the boat bar takes it seriously, though more than one visitor has found the cocktails priced a little higher than they hit. The beer and craft-beer side gets steadier praise and is the safer-value order if you're just settling in for the night. The early evening, from 6 to 8pm, carries food deals for anyone arriving for dinner rather than a late one.
Music and the week
Live music runs Thursday, Friday, and Saturday — bluesy jazz, soul, singer-songwriter sets, the American-leaning kind of music that's genuinely hard to find in Taipei. It's loud enough to feel like a gig and still quiet enough to talk over. The week is themed beyond that — Wednesday is ladies' night, Thursday leans toward couples, and the staff make a real fuss over birthdays. Service is bilingual and Australian-relaxed throughout, and the room pulls a real mix of locals, expats, and the city's design-minded crowd.
Open every evening from 6pm — till midnight Sunday through Thursday, till 1am Friday and Saturday. Reservations are worth it for a group or a live-music night.
