When some friends told me that Il Tre was a non-smoking restaurant that served an original take on Italian food, my taste buds pricked up. I had seen Il Tre open about a year ago and admired the stylish interior, with its red walls, silver tables and black banquettes. I was at first put off by the overcrowding of the tables in the long narrow dining room, but things are slightly different when the person nearly sitting in your lap isn’t smoking.

My first impression on walking in was of a wall of sound as people struggled to make themselves heard over the music and the voices of other diners. My companion and I spent the evening exercising our lungs (smoke-free) along with them.

The next impression was that we must be in Paris, since the waiters (except for the head man) were so rude. On requesting a bottle of wine from the wine list, we were informed in no uncertain terms that they were almost out of wine and that we would have to make do with a choice from the little they had left. This from a place that says it is an enoteca, in Italy a place to enjoy good wine with your food.

We did finally come to an arrangement with the nice head honcho, who knew his job, but our waiter for the evening was upset with us from then on, plonking the food down unceremoniously on our table, laying the table for the second course before we had finished the first, and bringing the bill unasked before we had finished dessert. My American friend tells me that this is standard practice in the United States and is a way of being nice to you. Here, it means “Leave now!” I reacted by ordering another coffee and shouting a little louder.

The restaurant’s kitchen is very close to the dining room, and the three cheery South Asian employees doing the cooking were apparently very well ventilated, since the kitchen fans were wafting the smell of hot oil past us all evening.

And the food? The portions are huge, so don’t even think of ordering antipasti, primi and secondi, especially as the secondi are served with vast helpings of vegetables or pasta. This is a mistake, but not one which I think the twenty-somethings tucking in around me would worry about. In my book, though, our waiter should have suggested that I make another choice for my main dish, after the rigatoni with eggplant I had for my starter, I found that my involtini (veal and ham stuffed with cheese) came with linguine, while the vegetables served with Judith’s calamari alla griglia (grilled squid) were very similar to her starter of grilled vegetables. But then, the waiter was annoyed at us.

The linguine served with the rather dry involtini came with a very pleasant wild mushroom sauce, I must say. And the eggplant sauce on the stodgy, overdone rigatoni had a nice depth and intensity to it, but rather overwhelmed the pasta. Judith’s grilled squid was rubbery, not a patch on the delightful version I had recently at Dirigeable, and her vegetables were more like stew.

Il Tre is a success in its own way, that much is obvious from the crowded dining room, so it is unlikely to change its act to anything that will satisfy my taste buds and enjoyment of atmospheric good food. If you absolutely must have a non-smoking venue, then I suppose you could do worse. Personally, I shall keep looking – elsewhere.

Richard Hesse

Il Tre: 3, rue des Petits Carreaux, 75002 Paris. Tel: 01 40 13 03 29. Métro: Sentier. Open daily for lunch and dinner. A la carte: around €35 (not including wine).

© 2006 Paris Update

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Lisa Aidan writes: "Interesting commentary. We are regulars at Little Italy, down the road on the other side, and one night when there was 'no room at the inn' thought we would try out the new place. We were so put off by the attitude of the maiître d'hôtel (we are restaurant owners ourselves) that we decided to forget it. Glad to hear it was not worth the wait!" Dec. 7, 2006

Judy Knestis writes: There is one Italian restaurant in Paris that we love, and keep going back to: Gli Angeli at 5 rue St Gilles 3e (01 42 71 05 80). Real Italian food, in the best sense of the word, and they will have all the wine you want. Dec. 7, 2006