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In a city where bohemian is just another word for gently greying baby boomers mortgaged to the max, should we be surprised that The New Bohemian in west Kitsilano is so blandly bourgeois?

This new nightclub masquerading as a casual restaurant features a conventional menu, food that is barely edible and strangely confused decor.

Yet the place is packed.

On Friday night, the entire back half of the room is filled with groups of women, all in their late 30s and early 40s (ourselves included). The front is scattered with retirees. The demographic seems perfectly normal for the neighbourhood, but there seems to be an odd disconnect with the blaring techno music.

Are the owners expecting a younger crowd? Or perhaps a few more male customers to round out the shabby bordello design theme?

Owner Ivo Staiano, who previously ran the West End's Balthazar Restaurant Hideaway and Yew Street's Urban Well, has taken over the old Fiction Wine Bar on West Broadway. He and co-owner Paul Gibbons opened up the space by tearing down a dividing wall, but left the wooden support beams in place. The back area is a semi-sexy hodgepodge of red lights, tall mirrors and burgundy damask that stops halfway to the ceiling and looks weirdly unfinished.

Up front, a graphic mural of a modern-day flower child floats behind the bar, which is flanked on one side by a projection screen playing a short black and white loop of Federico Fellini's Amarcord and two stacked flat-screen televisions on the far end, set to TSN and the Food Network.

Over in the back corner, flaming silhouettes of fire flicker behind the DJ booth. Outside, a cute but completely incongruous patio is slicked in dark wood and cream leather.

Huh? It feels like a contrived attempt to emulate the over-designed eclecticism of Browns Social House or Pinkys Steakhouse & Cocktail Lounge, but with a much smaller budget.

The menu, which hops around the globe with no apparent rhyme or reason, is a similar grab bag of familiar crowd pleasers. It includes everything from organic beef burgers, pasta, South Asian curry and kefalotiri cheese ablaze with Sambuca.

Steak tacos ($13) are given

an Italian touch with crisp parmesan shells awkwardly wrapped around cumin-lime coleslaw, aioli and grilled strips of "clean-living" sirloin that are jaw-numbingly tough. Unconventional? Yes. Appetizing? No.

The Salt Spring Island mussels ($14) in masala coconut curry don't taste particularly fresh. A mixed bowl of yam and potato frites ($6) is mushy, which is only slightly better than starchy.

We take our chances with pizza, which gobbles up a good portion of the menu. We immediately regret the choice. As soon as our Un-Bohemian lands on the table, its flaky thin pastry crust loaded down with chewy cappicola sliced as thick as planks and a cement-like layer of mozzarella-havarti cheese blend.

What's this green stuff sprinkled all over? Cilantro? With Italian meats?

The original version didn't pack enough zing, our waitress explains. Well, the modified version is too disgusting to eat. We send it back and replace it with a roasted Mediterranean vegetable pie, sprinkled with feta and smothered by basil. The crust is practically raw.

I think the only way to enjoy the food here is to get bleeding-eyed drunk. That's what everyone else seems to be doing later in the evening, as the lights go down and the music is cranked up even louder.

The drinks are cheap enough ($5.25 for a cocktail) and the wines are decently priced (with most bottles under $40). On Monday and Tuesday nights, you can take 25 per cent off any bottle of wine or champagne.

The late-night crowd is younger, but hardly hip. The women of a certain age have been displaced by well-buffed jocks in jeans and attractive gym bunnies in soaring high heels and tightly cinched trench coats. They look like wannabe Yaletowners who couldn't be bothered to cross the bridge.

"Another bottle of wine?" our waitress anxiously asks, as the throng hovers restlessly nearby.

No, thank you. The New Bohemian obviously fills a niche. It just seems terribly trite and traditional.

The New Bohemian Local Restaurant & Social Lounge: 3162 West Broadway; 604-736-7576 Side dish

New chef, new digs

The Irish Heather is getting a shot of Scottish flavour. Colleen McClean has been hired as the new group executive chef of Sean Heather's Gastown restaurants. Ms. McClean, formerly of Lumière and most recently chef de cuisine at Rare, will oversee the kitchens at the Salt Tasting Room, Salty Tongue Urban Deli, Shebeen Whiskey House and Irish Heather GastroPub (which reopens the first week of July in a new location at 212 Carrall St.).

Top of the world

Vancouver's Blue Water Cafe (1095 Hamilton St.) and Vij's (1480 W. 11th Ave.) are among the Robb Report's 100 favourite restaurants worldwide. The two restaurants rub shoulders with Charlie Trotter's, The French Laundry and El Bulli in the May issue's compilation of luxury wining and dining. Meanwhile, The Cascade Room (2616 Main St.) has been named one of the world's 28 hottest night spots for 2008 by Condé Nast Traveler, which applauds Nick Devine's old-fashioned "potions" made from premium liquor and fresh-squeezed juices.

To market, to market

Asparagus, fava beans, mustard greens and spinach are all on the fresh sheet at the Trout Lake Farmers Market, which opens for the season this Saturday at 9 a.m. (at 15th Avenue and Victoria Drive in the parking lot of the Trout Lake Community Centre). The three other neighbourhood markets roll out next month as follows: Kitsilano (June 1); Riley Park (June 4) and West End (June 7). For more information: http://www.eatlocal.org

Alexandra Gill