Bar Idda

The joys of honest Italian food are all here, with charming service, without the red-gingham schtick. Owner/chef Alfredo La Spina puts sunshine in his garlic-spiked strattu (sun-dried tomato paste) that coats soft-fleshed smoked eggplant fritters, and sprinkles crystals of sea salt on potato, sultana, parsley and anchovy doughnuts. Share a procession of plates: a salad of cinnamon cauliflower, dried fig and pinenuts, smoky rockling fillets on peas or roast goat (brined for three days and cooked for five hours). Then, moist ricotta cassata. Plates come unadorned, much like the space itself: it's modestly furnished and universally appealing.