Where do I begin? When the Bristol, a new restaurant on North Damen in Bucktown, is packed to the rafters, you can't hear yourself talk. If you do want to engage in conversation while you dine, you have to shout. You have to shout in the server's ear to place your order; the server shouts into your ear to make sure she or he heard you right. Bummer. And those two communal tables in the center of the room don't help. (Imagine how loud you have to talk to be heard from one end of the table to the other.)

What to do? Get rid of the communal tables and take out a couple of two tops. It's a bit tight around the elbows here. Why should the Bristol get rid of some of those revenue-producing tables? Because in the long run it will make the restaurant a lot less noisy and a much more pleasant place in which to dine. Customers who come once and can't tolerate the noise are not going to return. (One of the biggest complaints I get from readers has to do with beyond-noisy restaurants.)

The Bristol does have possibilities, but it has its work cut out. In addition to the noise, there is the elephant in the room known as cost vs. value. It has to do with that concept known as "small plates" and "sharing." There is one menu that is all about small plates and even smaller plates. And there is a second chalkboard menu (both menus will go through regular changes) with more of the same. Both menus are arranged to encourage sharing -- the tapas approach.

You can come to the Bristol and have a couple of dishes and eat on the light side and not spend too much -- that's where the "snacks" part of the menu comes in. This could mean "roast Delicata squash" with honey chili butter, four small slices of squash for six bucks. Good but not great, considering the price.

Snacks could mean duck fat fries for $5. And that would be five bucks wasted, because not only was the portion small but the fries were dry, tasteless and just plain bad.

And I wasn't all that impressed with one of the chalkboard menu dishes called "chicken and dumplings," which amounted to a slurry of chicken and gravy in a deep bowl with some small pucks of dumplings. Was this a takeoff on chicken a la king? If so, it doesn't work. The dish cost $7. My enthusiasm was going down as the tab kept going up.

The Bristol doesn't serve bread, but you can order the "monkey bread" listed under "snacks." It costs $4 and is really good. The cute little loaf comes in a cast-iron baking pan, served nicely hot. And as it goes with monkey bread, you pull pieces off the loaf, dipping each piece, if you care to, in the dill butter that is served on the side.

You also can spend a lot at the Bristol. The grilled prawns were excellent -- four very large prawns, heads still on, were swaddled in a tasty anchovy butter. They tasted as good as they looked and the aroma was enticing. Good eating? Yes. For sixteen bucks? I can deal with it.

The best value in the house (and pretty much the best dish tried) was the grilled skirt steak with blue cheese ravioli. Everything came together here (including the sensible $18 price). Good, flavorful beef that was cooked perfectly medium-rare. And the trio of ravioli was as good as you could ask ravioli to be, from the texture of the pasta to the rustic goodness of the cheese.

I am still trying to figure out the "Parmesan crusted sausage." This entire dish consisted of three small pucks of meat (looking a lot like Jimmy Dean sausage) with a weird texture and hardly any flavor (you would think the Parmesan part would jump out at you). A layer of whipped potatoes glued the pucks of meat to the plate. How about that for $15? The Bristol has some interesting ideas but seems to have trouble executing them.

One dessert was wonderful and one was good. The wonderful was the chocolate sabayon with Nutter Butters. Served in a glass mug, the sabayon was terrific -- rich, creamy, luscious. Nothing more than a fancy chocolate pudding, but, oh, so good. And the two cookies were delicious.

The pistachio tart had something going for it with its layer of thinly sliced Bosc pears on top. But once past the pears, the rest of the tart was as dry as a bone and not worth the calories it was built on.

And with people waiting at the bar and on the sidewalk for a table, the idea of getting a refill on my $3.50 cup of coffee was not in the cards.

Pat Bruno is a local free-lance critic and author. E-mail brunoeats@aol.com. Listen to Pat Bruno talk about food and wine Tuesdays at 6:23 p.m. and 10:23 p.m. and Saturdays and Sundays at 7:53 p.m. on WBBM News Radio 780-AM.