RAVE - Florio

This was our third time visiting, but first time reviewing Florio.

It's an energetic brasserie at the better end of Filmore Street - "better" if you're interested in eating or drinking rather than listening to live music.

My pate de campagne with rabbit and pork, black Jonathan apple and fennel compote was perfect. Pavey's soup - roasted kambucha and french butter pear puree, with creme fraiche - was lavishly named but otherwise un-noteworthy. My hanger steak frites with bearnaise sauce was above average. Pavey's oxtail ravioli, roasted early girl tomato sauce, gremolato, and grana padano, was excellent, if a bit heavy on the sauce.

Those "lavish" names blotted the otherwise great menu. Whoever wrote this menu is pretentious and probably still choking on the "Dictionary of Overblown and Pointless Ingredient Names". For example: "sausalito watercress". What on earth differentiates the watercress - something just a little bit fancier than grass - from Sausalito, from watercress grown in any other damp patch of earth in America?

It sounds like our food was just average, rather than rave-worthy, doesn't it?

However, the frenetic activity - we sat near the front bar, rather than in the quieter back, or in the semi-private room - and people-watching made this an enjoyable Friday night dinner.