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TABLE 17

782 Queen St. E., Toronto, 416-519-1851. Dinner for two with wine, tax and tip, $140

I think it's fair to feel suspicious of a restaurant that keeps a hayfork by the door. Bouncers, I can deal with. Even a surly maître d'. But at Table 17, the new neighbourhood bistro from chef John Sinopoli and partners Erik Joyal and John Dawson, there's a five-foot wooden trident propped up against the wall. It's an attempt at country kitchen chic, I suppose, though I'd pause before complaining that my water glass is being neglected.

And I have to admit that I pretty much loathed Sinopoli and Joyal's last venture, a big, bloated, soulless affair called Izakaya that pretended to be a Japanese gastropub.

What, then, is with Table 17's diver scallops? They're diver scallops, first of all, as opposed to the inferior, environmentally dubious trawled ones that most city chefs seem content to serve. They're perfectly seared to golden on either side, set atop a zingy citrus béchamel and scattered with fresh al dente peas and a round of salty, fatty, delicious guanciale, the Roman bacon made from pigs' cheeks. They're delicious.

The steak tartare is perfectly seasoned: hand-chopped beef sharpened with capers and finely diced peppers. Sinopoli's frites are crisp and dark and exemplary.

The service, though a bit bumpy (the place is still relatively new), is charming and thoughtful, and the menu - fresh, largely local, simple, relatively affordable - looks perfect for a weeknight out. Amazing what can happen when a chef and his backers think small instead of big.

Chef's spring onion soup floats tender, lightly caramelized onion pieces and their green tops in a delicate consommé that's enriched with more of the bacon - it's a lighter, more refreshing take on classic onion soup, though the kitchen could dial back the salt by about 20 per cent.

And Sinopoli seems to have a way with beef. When we ask what cut the kitchen uses for its steak frites, our server says it's Ontario chuck steak. Chuck is one of the most earnest of cuts. It's so tough, in fact, that it usually becomes stewing meat. But it's got a lot of flavour too. Intrigued, my date takes the plunge.

The result is a thick and beautifully aromatic piece of meat, cooked to medium-rare (the date asked for medium, but in Sinopoli's clogs I would have done the same; medium is for hospital cafeterias and killjoys) and sliced across the grain. It has a touch of chew, but not much, and the taste is robust and beefy without the marinade overkill you can often get in such challenging cuts of beef. It verges on exquisite, I'd say. The price? $19.

It isn't all so good. Sinopoli's seared Ontario pickerel is seared hot so it is slightly crusted outside and verging on translucent (the way it should be) in the middle. But the rest of the plate futzes it up. Chef sits the fish on a puddle of tomato coulis that's desperate for a squeeze of acid; it tastes thick and flat like tinned tomato juice. The accompanying grilled fennel stalks, though a nice idea, don't do enough to lift the dish. And the kitchen has an unfortunate problem with oil. Table 17's olive oil isn't spicy or fruity or even green. It's the colour of hay, and its slightly acrid tang says it's on the verge of going off.

This is bad enough when you're eating it with bread, but worse when it's made into mayonnaise, as it is here (to accompany the excellent frites), or tossed with fresh fava beans and house tagliatelle.

I love tagliatelle. I make it all the time. But the thin, wide, hand-cut noodles are tricky: All that surface area wants to stick. If you don't get it right, it can arrive at the table in doughy clumps.

This is what happens on my second visit, but worse because those clumps come sodden with that pongy oil. It doesn't look right, and it doesn't taste right. Would somebody taste the oil, please? It shouldn't have left the kitchen.

One evening's dessert list includes a cherry-studded sweet risotto, a fine idea that feels too heavy here and too sticky to launch. Another visit's well-balanced citrus velouté, on the other hand, is delicious, and the restaurant's well-accoutered, well-considered cheese board is excellent. And though Table 17 boasts an impressive selection of well-made cocktails, I'd like a more thoughtful wine selection. The short list at Table 17, though inexpensive, feels random. Any place that honours local ingredients as this place does should feature more than a token handful of Ontario wines.

But I have yet to visit a restaurant that doesn't stumble a bit in its first month. And the good here - the caring service, the friendly feel, that excellent steak and even (hayfork aside) the simple, rustic decor - more than outweigh the bad.

Every neighbourhood should be so lucky.