Duckworth Lane

83 Main Street, Charlestown; 242-6009
Open daily, 5:30 to 11 p.m.
Beer and wine
AE, DC, MC, Visa
Sidewalk-level access

By Stephen Heuser

I used to worry that Boston's foodie restaurants were too casual for their price range -- even some of the best have paper napkins and Formica tables, and the no-reservations thing really needles me when I'm spending $15 and up per entree. Then I find a restaurant that does so many things right, crossing the t's and dotting the i's -- good service, good atmosphere, not all that expensive -- and I have trouble with the food. You can't win.

Duckworth Lane comes off as a more casual version of its Newbury Street sister restaurant, Chanterelle. Both are notably pleasant places to eat, with the same dark, tapestry-upholstered bench seats; both have unfailingly pleasant staff. Duckworth Lane is situated right between the Warren Tavern and Figs, in that really charming part of Charlestown that looks like Beacon Hill, only with parking. The room is set up very nicely: a long open space that doglegs into a single back room, and a bar running through the space the long way. Most of the seating is at wooden booths, and there's something amusing happening with the wall décor: the theme is "yard art," which means a portrait of a distinguished-looking businessman from some years ago hangs alongside a roughly late-Impressionist bullfighter, a cityscape that looks like New York with four World Trade Centers, and various still-lifes of fruit. We liked the idea -- you can certainly get a lot of art on the walls this way without spending much money -- but we were glad that the theme didn't extend into yard-sale silverware or mix-'n'-match wine glasses.

Mix-'n'-match, though, would be one way to describe the menu. Duckworth covers all the bases: unadorned bistro food, New American experiments, and the occasional ethnic dalliance. The thing to do here is stick to the basics, and branch out occasionally into the mildly intriguing. Smoky seafood chowder ($4), for instance, worked out nicely, with a slightly watery broth but plenty of cod, salmon, and potatoes. And a dish called "crab smokies" ($6), described on the menu as a traditional English pub favorite, was entertaining: a ramekin of haddock, crabmeat, tomato, and cream, served hot as a spread for toast. Not bad for English food, though the crab taste didn't come through all that well. We found ourselves preferring to eat it on the soft bread from the basket, rather than the toast provided. (I suspect -- and this is just a guess -- that smokies are traditionally served on limp, English-style toast, and not the crisp little rounds of baguette that came with them.)

Instinct tells us that something like bread salad is better avoided, no matter how trendy the New York Times tells may say it is. The "Tuscan bread salad" ($5) here consisted of croutons, tomatoes, and black olives, which sounded (and tasted) like a stack of garnish. But we really went for the straight-ahead crostini ($4), which were long slices of crisp bread with an intense tapenade, a nice pesto, and a purée of roasted red pepper.

Give points to Duckworth for being a really well-run operation. For one thing, the place takes reservations for any size party, unlike its famous neighbor Olives. For another, our courses arrived perfectly timed, with a little break between appetizer and entree, and nothing was conspicuously rushed or late. The patrons of a full house, dressed up a bit, all seemed to be enjoying themselves, talking warmly over their meals as only a very smooth dinnertime allows.

They probably weren't talking much about their meals, though. Duckworth's purist approach to bistro food means that each meat plate comes with more or less the same set of vegetables arranged around it, an approach that can work if the vegetables have a bit of interest or variety. Our nights, we got garlic mashed potatoes, carrot-parsnip purée, and a toss of cabbage and caraway seeds. Alone, each was merely undersalted; taken together, they gave us the feeling of being in a Gerber's test kitchen. The best dinner we had -- a special of baby lamb chops ($16) -- perked itself up with a roasted beet.

Those four little chops were broiled till the fat on the bone had a nice crackly texture, and garnished with branches of rosemary. The spinach ravioli ($7) was fine, too, with spinach pasta encasing spinach filling, all in a cream sauce that was almost a stew of green pepper, onion, and tomato. But the vegetarian curry ($7), which offers a choice of three of six vegetables (we chose chickpea, lentil-potato, and black bean) left us a little cold; even for a mild curry, this was a lot less complex and satisfying than what you can get for the same price at any number of little Indian places around town.

Two other dishes represented opposite ends of the menu's spectrum. The salmon with mushroom cream sauce ($15) was the thing you'd order for your parents: rich and competent, but nothing zesty. The duck with apricot and ginger ($15), on the other hand, was way zesty: order this if you like ginger, or if you want to see something weird done with duck. Fruit and duck is a classic combination, and the apricot had a nice stewed taste; ginger and dinner, though, sit uneasily together. Especially when it's this much ginger.

The dessert menu is long and consistent. The crêpes maison ($6), with berries and thick almond cream, are a pleasant memory jog for those of us who wondered what ever happened to restaurant crêpes. The berry sundae ($4), a tall glass of vanilla ice cream with a choice of fresh berries, was as nice as you'd expect -- the raspberries were particularly tart and appealing. The surprise interesting choice was something called "Orange Blossom" ($4), a "Thai-inspired" dessert consisting of a handful of peeled orange sections floating in a goblet of water scented with anise and orange, served with a light, crisp sugared biscuit.

The wine list at Duckworth is right in the middle of the usual range -- about $5 to $8 -- and carries a few interesting choices, particularly among the whites: a Rabbit Ridge viognier for $7, for example, and something called Chappellet Old Vine Cuvée ($8), which was a Chablis-style California wine with a lot of fruit in the nose. Like the restaurant itself, the wine list will keep a lot of people happy without really challenging their palates.