Heirloom tomato salad with candied fennel and crispy onions

What do you have to do to get some olives at Chaise Lounge? Apparently, it’s all about the timing. On our second visit to the restaurant, we sat down to dinner on Chaise’s outdoor patio, and watched as complimentary bowls of plump olives were set down at every table. Every table, that is, except ours.

“What’s this?” we asked, poking our forks into the bowl of a confusing pile of sea-green cubes on our table.

 “It’s melon left over from brunch,” she said.

We looked at the pitiful bowl of mushy fruit in front of us.

“We want the olives.”

This sort of gaffe can be forgivable at a restaurant if it only happens occasionally. But at this new, sleekly designed incarnation of the old Iggy’s space, things like this happened again and again. On one visit, it was explained that the menu eschewed labels like “appetizers” and “entrées.” With no direction on the size or nature of the dishes, we ended up with an odd meal of finger foods: grey, mushy fried oysters with a watery cucumber salad followed by pale, undercooked meatballs. Sure enough, on the following visit the menu had been restructured, with both dishes listed under the “starters” column.

And under “entrées”? The eggplant Florentine, a dish recommended by our server, involved slices of eggplant that were inconsistently pan fried, plated with some arugula and cherry peppers and sloppily dribbled with a tomatillo sauce. Who knows how this salad escaped being cast as an “appetizer.” But what’s really boggling is that this dish—as well as the thick, tough slices of beef carpaccio in the Surf & Turf Tartar—was highly recommended.

To be fair, that same server did vouch for the summery sweet-pea shrimp, meaty and served atop basic, but tasty, yellow split peas. On another visit, the kitchen nailed the duck confit. And for dessert, our server suggested the cheese plate, served with “Fig Newtons.”

“Real Fig Newtons?” I asked.

“Just…Fig Newtons,” she said.

Yes, that’s exactly what they were. And yet the cheese and Newtons dish at Chaise is one of the few I can solidly recommend; it’s impossible to mess it up.—David Tamarkin

1840 W North Ave between Honore St and Wolcott Ave (773-342-1840). El: Blue to Damen. Bus: 50, 56, 72. Brunch (Fri–Sun), dinner (Wed–Sun). Average main course: $14.