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What is the thing trying to do? How well does it do it? These should be criticism’s primary concerns, whether directed at a restaurant, the oeuvre of Yahoo Serious or an eight-hour-long piece of Laurie Anderson performance art dissecting the soul of a nation through polyphonic subtractive synthesiser. Sometimes the intent will take a bit of effort to whittle down. Sometimes the maker puts it right up front.

“I want it to be better food than you can cook at home,” says Manu Feildel to a nearby table at his new Rozelle pub bistro, “but not too good.” Perfect. Love that. Half my job’s done.

Manu (because writing “Feildel” feels weird, like using “Winfrey” or “Starr”) rose to first-name status through television programs such as Ready Steady Cook and My Kitchen Rules.

Every so often, the chef will also open a restaurant, and Sydney readers may recall Duck In Duck Out spruiking Quack Daddy burgers at World Square in 2018. It lasted a year. In 2014, Manu launched Melbourne’s Le Grand Cirque in partnership with George Calombaris. That one lasted four months.

Speaking to Good Food ahead of his new place opening in July, Manu said he wasn’t doing it “for the accolades or hats”. That’s fair enough. No tweezered borage, no problem. But when main courses hover around $40, a restaurant still has to get the basics right. Basics such as serving cutlery for the share plates, or the seasoning (there’s almost none) for a salad of flaccid leeks and truffle ($22).

There’s an excellent tarte tatin crowned with creme fraiche ($15), however, and delicious scallops gratineed under the grill with Cafe de Paris butter. I’m not giving up on The Red Lion yet.

Bistro by Manu came about after the pub’s owner, Laundy Hotels, decided the 196-year-old boozer needed a $1.5 million makeover. Manu, longtime mates with Laundy’s executive chef across the group, Jamie Gannon, was approached to collaborate on the revamped upstairs dining room. And for the first few weeks of the bistro’s existence, Manu was in the house and seemed to be having a hoot; no selfie request was too big or too small. (I was reminded of the restaurant at Disney World where you can meet Ratatouille.)

“‘I want it to be better food than you can cook at home,’ says Manu Feildel to a nearby table, ‘but not too good.’”

It’s an attractive space with soft lighting, flowers, linen napkins and the kind of art Provence obsessives buy on weekend trips to Berry. You may be inspired to order a Pommeau de Normandie apple juice and brandy blend over ice ($12).

A few of the floor staff seem fresh to the table-service trade, but everyone gives it their best: wine is offered for a taste, glasses are refilled. Ice-cream is even flambeed in front of you for the “Canele Suzette” ($22), where the little caramelised pastry rests on two scoops of vanilla. I cannot make a better canele at home.

I may have a better crack at French onion soup ($22), though: Manu’s broth doesn’t quite have the beefy richness required to take the bistro warhorse from “Fine, thanks” to “May winter never end”.

A double-baked comte souffle ($22) thumps with more confident flavours, however, and a crunchy tumble of fried school prawns ($21) is the smart order with a Stone & Wood Pacific Ale ($10.30) and a spot on the balcony.

Your best main course is the “butcher’s cut” steak: the other week it was a nice bit of wagyu striploin for $49, rosy-pink and slicing like butter. But its accompanying pommes dauphine needed more crunch, and the pepper sauce was on the wrong side of lukewarm.

The 500-gram chargrilled pork cutlet would be a cracking deal at $39 if it weren’t overcooked. Confit chicken ($35) also needed a shorter spell on the heat, although I’m all in for the chook’s bed of perfectly al dente, garlic-forward cannellini beans. A butter lettuce side ($9) is drowned in dressing on one visit; another time, its shallot vinaigrette needs more acid and va-va-voom.

Manu’s legion might say I’m being too harsh here, that the hospitality industry is suffering through staff shortages and rising costs, and now is not the time for criticism. I say let’s not forget that Laundy Hotels owns more than 40 pubs with God knows how many pokies. The group will be fine.

And Bistro Red Lion’s execution issues can mostly be fixed with more direction in the kitchen. Dishes new to the menu as we go to print sound promising too, such as flathead en papillote with vongole ($44), and sweetcorn veloute boasting spanner crab ($29). There’s a good (“but not too good”) restaurant here somewhere.

This review was originally published in Good Weekend magazine