When I first discovered the delights of living in Dublin I was a student in Trinity College and, very conveniently, I lived in Herbert Street, just next to the Pepper Canister Church. Of the little that I remember from those hazed days, I do remember many nights spent just round the back of Upper Mount Street in a restaurant called Dobbins. Many of my friends had part-time jobs waiting at tables there, and it had a young, new and exciting feel to it back in the seventies. Life moves on, and so did I, becoming a bornagain culchie for twenty years. So it was with a touch of nostalgia for those bygone days of care-free youth that I set off to meet my dinner companion in Dobbins.

May Frisby has her own restaurant called Pasta Fresca, but like most people in the business she enjoys going out to other restaurants, partly because it's so nice to have a meal handed to you for a change, and partly to see how the others are doing. I got there a little before May, was shown to the table and was given menus and a wine list. A small bowl of olives was on the table as well as a tray of white and brown bread, both of which I picked at while going through the wine list carefully. It's a longish list with a higher than average mark-up with, I felt, slightly better choices in red than white. I chose the Torres Gran Coronas Reserva at £19.95, a mighty red with a long and supple finish. I also had time to look around me. The differences in the place between what I saw and what I remembered were linen table cloths and - this will come as no surprise - the prices. I can't imagine that there'd be many students who could afford Dobbins today.

As I re-read the wine list I reflected on the huge change in wine prices. Twenty years ago a bottle of a four or five year old Cru Bourgeois from the Medoc would cost between £35, which in many restaurants was less than the price of a meal. Today, depending on the mark up, you can pay up £50 for a similar wine, which is much more than the cost of most meals. Good French wines have gone up in price far more than inflation, which is probably why I find myself drinking them less and less frequently.

The restaurant is in a Nissen hut - not a garage for your Japanese car - but a war-time standard hut which is semicircular in section. When I was a boy growing up in England they were all over the place, and were mostly ex-army stock. I never did find out how one of them came to be lodged between Upper and Lower Mount Street. The Nissen shape gives the room a cosy, tunnel-like feel. The inside is painted in black and there's a black flag-covered floor scattered with sawdust. Both sides are lined with booths and the centre section has moveable tables and chairs. As I sat trying to remember how it used to be I slowly took in the fact that nearly every table appeared to be filled with men in shirtsleeves. I overheard a waitress taking a large group of men to 'the City Bank' table. 'Aha,' I thought, 'a wunch of bankers.' Certainly there was a corporate feel to the large tables, rather than the intimacy one gets with tables of friends.

When May arrived, slightly harassed from an absurdly busy day, we ordered a bottle of mineral water and set about the menus in earnest. The starters range in price from £6.25 to £10.50 and include trio of salmon, crab, smoked chicken salad, terrine of rabbit, linguini of lobster, fried goats' cheese and a confit of duck. There was also a special of prawns in filo pastry. From this May picked the west coast crab, I had the terrine of rabbit and we ordered the prawn special as well for both of us to try. The main courses included salmon, monkfish, veal cutlet, pigeon, venison and lamb and were nearly all priced at £17.50. This doesn't include vegetables which are priced separately at £2.75.

The starters arrived and we began to swap tastes. May's crab was presented as a round cake and was acceptable enough, if a little bland. Our shared dish, the prawns, were in little parcels like a wonton, which glistened still with the oil in which they'd been fried. Dishes like this, especially at £10.50 for six prawns, need to be perfect to justify their price and this didn't quite make it. I did enjoy my terrine, although it had that sheen to its surface that made me suspect it was one of those pre-packaged, pre-wrapped portion-controlled buy-ins, rather than something made in the kitchens. Good, though.

The main courses brought out similar feelings in me. May had the monkfish, which was a fair-sized piece of fish served on a bed of linguini which were not particularly well cooked. Mind you, with Dublin's pasta queen and an Italian sitting in judgement, the linguini had two discerning palates to please. I had chosen the pigeon which was, according to the menu, corn-fed and French. It was meat for the strong of jaw, but tasty. I suppose that in summary I'd say both main courses were good, but not above average. When you consider that with vegetables both dishes were over £20 - which is well above average - I would have expected a higher level of culinary expertise. We finished our meal as I so often do, with one dessert between us. May likes Dobbin's sticky toffee pudding, so that's what we had and I liked it a lot, too. To keep it company we had a glass each of Beaumes de Venise, which made a perfect combination.

Before we finished altogether I had an espresso, which at £2 is an pricey espresso. It was an OK coffee, but the temperature on the machine was set high, giving me a dark brown froth on the top and a slightly bitter flavour. The bill came to £115.50 which by any standards is an expensive meal. Looking at the bill I saw that mineral water comes at £4 a bottle, which for a litre of water starts to take on an air of insanity. That's seven times the cost of a litre of petrol, for God's sake.

What you get for your money in Dobbins is a pleasing room, attentive service and food that is good, but in no way exceptional. What is exceptional is the price, which were one to have a corporate pocket footing the bill, might well be inconsequential. However someone seeing the word 'bistro' in this restaurant's name might well be unagreeably surprised at the size of the bill.