On a Tuesday evening, it can be subdued in the understated bistros and cafes that lay claim to the corners south of South Street where the western edge of Queen Village gives way to Bella Vista.
But on one Tuesday last week, not all of them were in character. At tiny Salt and Pepper, at Sixth and Fitzwater, for one, the doors were wide open and health experts from as far away as Oslo were sipping a lovely BYO zinfandel and taking hacks at cheeses set out on the counter.
One of the cafe's regulars, Henry Glick, had reserved the entire (20-plus-seat) room to host conferees attending a meeting at Penn on medical decision-making; as in, how often one ought to be screened for a dread disease.
So there was, despite that agenda, an un-Tuesday feel to the place, an air of festivity that had owner Robert Reilly musing expansively about whether, even in a recessionary climate, he should be keeping an eye out for larger digs.
At Coquette Bistro and Raw Bar, at Fifth and Bainbridge, the mood was more sober. The weekend before had been one of its best in a while. But this night the pickings were slim: Cary Neff, the owner, was doubling as the oyster shucker du jour, proudly touting his latest find, a lively, salty number from Canada called Little Shemogue.
Neff had lowered entree prices a few weeks ago, and knocked 50 cents off his Happy Hour oysters, now selling them for $1 apiece, 40 cents over wholesale. (That's not the only food cost in play. Do you buy California romaine, he said, with a five-day shelf life? Or cheaper Canadian romaine which might last two days, thereby voiding any savings because there's more potential waste?)
A fresher French bistro - Bistrot La Minette - a newcomer at barely eight weeks old, was still being test-driven on Sixth Street at Bainbridge across from Beau Monde, the creperie.
For years, this was a dead zone, blank-eyed beneath a big Dalmatian mural. But it glowed now, softly crimson and butter-yellow - the anti-Parc, where the noise was on mute.
Here was a bistro, blessedly, where conversation was not only possible, but where on this day it flowed with effortless abandon.
There were unfussy, undeconstructed French bistro standards - a simple chopped endive salad with walnuts and Roquefort, lemony trout meuniere, and, were you in the market for grilled sardines, possibly the best recent example in the city - sweetly unfishy filets striped alternately (gray and red) with roasted red pepper in a delicate lemon vinaigrette.
