It was my partner Vincenzo, who, like many Italians I know, is happily devoted to these unassuming dishes.
A dish of unassuming greens turns out be fiddlehead ferns dusted with bonito flakes, a smoky, faintly bitter treat.
Rice is the grain to have — an unassuming partner to sauced dishes.
9 place des Vosges, 75004 (01 42 78 51 45) L'Apicius Unassuming talent and sublime dishes (including the best calf's head in Paris) from chef JeanPierre Vigato in a grand nineteenth-century building off the Champs-Elysées.
We visit several other unassuming places to try their specialty dishes until at the fourth place we beg for the tour to stop.
That's a shame, because after encountering some of the unusual — and intensely flavored — dishes at this otherwise unassuming place, you might find yourself wondering whether the Wizard of Oz is working the controls back there.
But Royal Kabab and Curry, an unassuming restaurant near Morningside Heights, has perfected this dish, which makes a perfect summer appetizer or, with a double order, just the right light meal.
It's the sort of dish that turns up again and again at this popular, unassuming place, which wears the name "bistro" like a suit that grows more comfortable over the years but never goes out of style.
Les Racines 6thh arr) is an unassuming Latin Quarter bistro, where genial chef Jean-François Debert cooks splendid heritage dishes that are fast disappearing elsewhere – juicy Montbéliard sausages with lentils, succulent kidneys smothered with Dijon mustard, and brandade de morue, a creamy cod and potato gratin (plat du jour €14).
