I'm about to go down a well-trodden path, but bear with me. It's that old chestnut of value for money in restaurants. There's probably been more column inches on high prices in Irish restaurants than just about any other aspect of food writing in the past couple of years, and here's a few more. There's no doubt that Irish restaurants are expensive, but think about this: everything in Ireland is expensive. Mobile phone charges, electricity, insurance, cars, houses, every kind of service, building works, dentists, lawyers, doctors, supermarkets, wine and tobacco are just a few things that cost more here than they do in other countries. It follows that a restaurateur who lives in this country has to pay those prices for every aspect of his business life. If he charged you and me continental prices for his service, he wouldn't be able to afford anyone else's. It's that simple.

But - and it's a big but - there is such a thing as value for money. It's still possible to find restaurants that give you good food and service whose prices are reasonable by Irish standards. Sadly, the majority of these value for money restaurants are at the high end of the market. What has always been in short supply here is good value mid-range restaurants. Finding those is always a pleasure for me and every time I hear of one that might just fit that bill, I'm off to try it. Which is why I found myself with my daughter Isabella in the Montague Restaurant, which unsurprisingly is in Montague Street.

The Montague is small and cosy; dark walls, low lighting and privacy-ensuring booths give it an almost intimate feel. Isabella and I sat happily in a booth that may often serve for four, but becomes very spacious when set for two. I haven't seen Bella for a while since she's been busy making jewellery, so it was lovely to have a tête à tête. Our first task was to choose our drinks, so I started with the wine list. It's a short list with nine reds and ten whites which are priced from €17.95 up to €39.95, the bulk of them listed at under €26. There are some decent wines listed and the prices are reasonable, but opposite where we were sitting was a fridge with beer on display and one of them caught Bella's eye, the Hoegarden, which she likes. The decision was reached, it was a beer night, Bella had the Hoegarden I picked a bottle of the Czech beer Staropramen, which I liked.

The menu is quite short, something that never worries me as much as a very long one. Six starters and six main courses, followed by five desserts. Nothing unusual among the starters - crab claws, goat's cheese, chicken salad, mussels and seafood chowder. Bella was keen to try the seafood chowder as she's recently discovered the pleasures of seafood and to keep her company I ordered the steamed mussels. These turned out to be replaced on the night with a mussel paté, which sounded unusual and interesting, so I was happy to go with the change.

When they arrived they were nicely presented, the soup in a small <it>marmite and my mussel paté in a small round garnished with lettuce. It came with asparagus spears and something that was described as aioli, but in the event seemed closer to a white sauce.
I tasted Bella's soup and thought it good, as did Bella, and I enjoyed my mussel paté, although all my attempts at de-constructing the dish met with failure. It was a tasty paté, quite salty and with a strong flavour of smoking, but try as I did to work out its ingredients, I couldn't. Tasty as it was, what it certainly did not taste of, was mussels.

The main courses had Bella pursuing the seafood theme, this time picking the John Dory, which was served with a pea and crab risotto and leeks. I chose the free-range Gubeen bacon which came with buttered cabbage and a wholegrain mustard sauce. These were both competent dishes, the John Dory a little over-cooked to my taste, but pleasing to Bella, who after all was the one who eating it. It will come as no surprise that my free-range bacon was also quite salty, so between that and my starter I was working up a thirst, which meant another beer. All the main courses were priced between €19 and €23.50, but they do come as complete plates. Side orders are available at €2.95, but neither of us would have needed any more food than what we had.

The dessert menu had five choices: a crème brulée, a chocolate fondant, ice-cream, cheese and Scandinavian iced berries, which is what Bella ordered for us. As a rule I'm not keen on tart little berries, and these iced ones didn't change my opinion, but they were palate cleansing and refreshing in the same sort of way that a Finnish sauna might invigorate a masochist. I picked away at them in a desultory sort of way and let Bella have the lion's share. We finished up with a couple of espressos which were charged at less than two euros, a price that's beginning to look cheap in comparison with some restaurants. The bill for the night came to just over €80, which these days is a close to bargain as you're going to find. There's nothing exceptional in The Montague, but the service is good, the food is competent and the prices are fair.