I was introduced to La Mere Zou four years ago by Deirdre McQuillan. Since then I've gone there often and have always enjoyed it. It's just down the road from the Horseshoe Bar and I've yet to be turned away at the door even when I've gone on the spur of the moment and had no reservation. And selfishly, it's precisely for that reason that I haven't reviewed it until now. It's a place that I like, and I didn't want to share it.

It looks a bit incestuous and it probably is, but my lunch guest was Peter Cunningham whose picture you can find at the front of this magazine and which annoyingly is bigger than mine. I quite liked the idea that the front and back of the magazine could come together over lunch, and anyway, reading his weekly diary made me think he'd make an entertaining companion. What I didn't expect was to discover how much Peter and I had in common. We met in the Horseshoe and both ordered a Virgin Mary which seemed to set the tone for the lunch. We've both been culchies for more than twenty years, we've both done a large number of different jobs, both of us have been published by St. Martin's Press in New York, we've both had a novel published this year, he hasn't read my book and I haven't read his. Oh, yes. And we both like red wine.

We ensconced ourselves in La Mere Zou to begin our literary lunch - high on my agenda of things to talk about was Peter's new novel, 'Consequences of the Heart'. I suppose our conversation was, in the loosest sense of the word literary, but somehow we didn't talk much about his book. This is a man who has washed plates in Parisian restaurants amongst other things, so being in a French restaurant unleashed a stream of fascinating anecdotes. Given this kind of background it seemed only right to let Peter choose a wine for us. The wine list is almost entirely French, which is hardly surprising, but there are nods to other countries in the shape of one or two wines from the non-Gallic producers. It starts with half bottles ranging across the price spectrum; three house wines - red, white and rose at £10; house recommendations - four red, four white - which range from £13 to £16, and then the main list which has a fair and reasonable mark up. Only one puzzle: a Macon Vire a few pounds more expensive than a premier cru Chablis. Peter chose a Cotes de Beaune Villages Domaine Rodet 1992 at £18.50 which just got better and better as it sat in our glasses.

There are two kinds of lunch menu: a set lunch at £10.50 and quick lunches which comprise a starter and a main course served on the same king-size plate. There are several of these, but I'll only list a couple to give you the idea. There's La Landaise, which comprises a salad of green beans, lettuce and smoked duck with a main course of confit of duck leg; La Lorraine, which is potato, frankfurter, smoked bacon and chives with a main course of baked ham and brown lentils. A nice idea if you're in a hurry and want something quick. There's a few a la carte offerings as well and from this Peter chose the half dozen rock oysters and monkfish to follow. I chose from the set lunch and had asparagus with a mousseline sauce to start and then squid provencale.

Peter enjoyed his oysters, although rather chauvinistically he extolled the virtues of the now rarer Galway Bay variety instead of the non-natives before him. My asparagus was tender and tasty, but I was struck with how well the mousseline held together even on a very hot plate. A good sauce, and I made use of the sliced baguette that was on the table to mop up what the asparagus had left behind. Both our main courses came with a central timbale of rice with our fish arrayed around it, and both were good. I suppose the fact that neither of us left anything on the plate is some kind of testament to that. At this point our Burgundy had opened up nicely, the pangs of hunger had been assuaged, we were comfortable with our own company and we began to look around us.

Two tables down from us sat my Wicklow neighbour having what seemed to be a music business lunch. Looking around the room I counted more men than women, which is something of a rarity in Dublin these days, especially at night. The room itself is bright, even though it's a basement and the walls glow warmly in what I think is called Pompeian red. Certainly the Pompeian theme is visible in classical frescoes painted in alcoves on one wall. 'Odd that,' said Peter, 'that Neapolitan look in a French restaurant.' If you like paintings you can have fun trying to name the hundreds of famous paintings that are in collages all around the room at eye-line height. We never got to play the game because I was listening to Peter's reminiscences of his days painting Thames barges, which was much more fun. I wondered if I might extract a little more information out of him about the various jobs he's had, like being a lumberjack in Strasbourg or a bonds trader in New York's stock exchange. 'What's the worst one you had?' I asked. 'Injecting brine into the dead bodies of pigs' came the reply. I really ought to learn when to stop asking questions.

Desserts on offer were creme caramel, chocolate mousse, a rum apple tart and cheese. I declined, but Peter said 'I'm a sucker for creme caramel' and ordered one. While Peter ate his dessert I asked for an espresso which was good enough and Peter ordered a camomile tea which came in its own pot. 'Girlie tea,' I muttered. 'Feck off,' said Peter. Thank God for the gift of repartee. I was enjoying this lunch and even though he had to go off and sign books somewhere, I persuaded him to have a post-prandial something. A creme de menthe for him and an Armagnac for me in one of the biggest balloons I've ever seen.

There's nothing quite like a leisurely lunch on a Monday, it has a certain air of decadence which is much to my liking. La Mere Zou left me once again contented and well fed and I'll look forward to going back, provided of course that I can get in.