Robert Burns Hotel

THE Robert Burns Hotel has nurtured a surprising Spanish heart within its Scottish walls for almost three decades. Previous owner Urbano Gutierrez turned an unassuming red-brick corner pub into an Iberian oasis in 1982, a time when the misuse of the word tapas to describe anything smaller than an entree was only a glimmer in a lazy chef's eye, despite Casa Iberica two blocks west already stoking the flames for a small community of Spaniards and aficionados.

Well and truly after the Spanish revolution, new owners Colonial Leisure (the Botanical, Lamaro's, VicAsia et al) have kept the faith. And why not? The Robbie Burns, as it's more conventionally known, played to a full house most nights for most of my lifetime, rising above an unassuming dining room and an even less assuming position on what was, until its management consultant-driven gentrification, the mean streets of Collingwood.

A renovation has freshened the place rather than bulldozed its history. The exposed red-brick walls aren't the last word in style - but then, they never were. A new tartan carpet in the dining room alludes to the name, a wide-open kitchen adds life and the combination of banquettes, fresh white-tiled surfaces, cane-backed chairs and hanging ferns make it all pleasantly homely rather than cutting-edge.

It suits the menu, which is as classically Spanish as jamon. A collection of greatest hits that doesn't try to surprise, the tapas menu in the front bar starts at pork ribs and goes to patatas bravas. The restaurant proper also keeps it simple. Rustic to its heart, nothing too complex, overworked or overthought: pub grub meets Espanol, backed by a simple all-Spanish wine list that keenly favours the reds and offers slim pickings by the glass.

There are five paellas, all for two or more people and priced between $20 and $25 a head. If other mains, dominated by meats from the parrilla (grill) seem extremely well-priced, it's in keeping with their size, which is attuned to the desire of most diners these days to share a bunch of things. Not to have them all appear at once, mind you, prompting a case of mealus interruptus to try to find adequate table space.

If the kitchen is too eager to get the food out, it's outdone by the service, which is shambolic. I'll point the finger at the policy of hiring a quorum of Spanish (and Latin American, judging by the accents) nationals as waiters. There's a particularly humming city place of a Latin American persuasion that started with a similar policy, which was soon abandoned. Let's put it this way: if the Spanish waiters don't prove the catalyst for a great meal - an introduction to the best assets of the kitchen, a tour guide for their native gastronomy - then they're only a cheap version of window dressing.

And these guys, while sweet as anything, don't exactly proselytise the menu. They come from the strictly reactive school of waiting - ask and ye shall receive - but it's tiresome to have to ask for plates, for cutlery, a drink, the bill and for the bill again.

They could have warned, for example, that ''mollejas'', which the menu helpfully translated as ''deli lamb'', was, in fact, sweetbreads. No problem here - and the thymus glands were cooked properly, staying super-soft under a sticky pedro ximenez glaze - but others on the table weren't so au fait with the proposition. We did ask before ordering.

My pick of the raciones (starters) would be the fire-engine-red piquillo peppers stuffed with a tasty filling of picked oxtail. A piquant sauce was moppable with good-enough commercial bread. Also fair, the pulpo a feira - Galician-style octopus sitting on soft slices of potato, heavily dusted with paprika. Mussel and prawn croquetas divided the table - some appreciated the way their creamy innards oozed out from a salty, golden crust, while others thought they were the less for the muted seafood favour. And the clams, big imported things with a bit of chew, came swimming in a garlicky pool of salsa verde that could really have done with a hell of a lot more reduction.

The paella for two was big enough for a decent serving for four. Done in head chef Ivan Saiz's native Valencian style with chicken and rabbit, it lacked the crusty base tradition demands (the result of the 25-minute cooking time the waiter deemed it necessary to warn about?) but the flavours were sound, as was the firm bite of the bomba rice.

Basque-style barramundi is a dish singing of spring, with white asparagus, baby peas and more of those big clams in a white wine-based sauce. It's a good, silken-textured recipe for the quintessential Australian fish, sympathetic to its fall-apart tendencies.

No points for guessing what's coming at postres (dessert). Si, si: churros with chocolate sauce. No better and no worse than the churros at every second other place in town. They're hardly the stuff of critical assessment. The baked shortcrust cheesecake, dotted with mint and with a sweet blueberry marmalade tagging along, has the building blocks of success but there's that fridge thing going on - too cold, slightly dank.

It lines up with the unmemorable side of the experience, the quiet tragedy of simple food done poorly. But there's more going on here that helps balance the ledger. Nothing, mind you, to really trouble a town that's still in the throes of a passionate affair with Spanish food and drinking culture. The Robbie Burns is an entry point rather than its finest iteration but an easygoing local with a Spanish soul is always welcome at the party.

Food Spanish

Where 376 Smith Street, Collingwood

Phone 9417 2233

Cost Typical entree, $14; main, $22; dessert, $9.90

Licensed

Wine list All Spanish, skewed in favour of reds, accessible prices

Owner Colonial Leisure Group

Chef Ivan Saiz

Vegetarian One salad, two starters, one paella

Dietary Gluten-free available

Service Bumbling

Noise No problems

Wheelchairs Yes

Parking Street

Web robertburnshotel.com.au

Cards AE MC V Eftpos

Hours Mon-Thurs, 5pm-late; Fri-Sat, noon-late; Sun, noon-5pm