Sometimes putting your money where your mouth is...doesn't taste very good. But not all the time. Sure, multimillionaire Scott Ginsburg has used his considerable shekels to assemble a world-class wine list (1981 Chateau Haut-Brion is served by the glass in the bar) and a stunning array of knickknacks. (They include an exploding dish chandelier by lighting designer Ingo Mauer and a bullet-proof glass case cradling a collection of Dale Chihuly glass sculptures.) But if great bottles and swell gimcracks made great restaurants, Woolworth's lunch counter would not have faded away. You gotta have tasty hors d'oeuvres to go with all that eye candy. Or at least tasty liver sans onions (which Voltaire does, only they call it foie gras). There are those rare moments while dining when you slip a forkful of food into your mouth and time stops, or least your Hyundai payments do (Voltaire isn't cheap). This is what eating at Voltaire was like on two occasions months ago. The food was perfectly prepared, the sauces well orchestrated, and the plates brilliantly assembled. But then the restaurant was afflicted with serious stumbles, most notably with service. Missteps spread to the cuisine when Executive Chef George Papadopoulos diverted his focus from the kitchen to grease the gears grinding in the front of the house. All those shortcomings have been smoothed over, however, and Voltaire is once again as good as it was. Now if we could only find some money to put this tasty cuisine in our mouth.

Lemonade. That's what Iris is. Here are the lemons: a space that has been home to dreadful or dreadfully performing restaurants over the last decade; a restaurant owner (Susie Priore) who fled to California to get a master's degree so that she could join the Peace Corps and teach English in Morocco; a Peace Corps mission that was soured by the prospect of a blond American woman in a Muslim country post-September 11; a Dallas restaurant mission spawned to pay off the loans used to acquire the master's degree to service the Peace Corps mission. What kind of person opens a restaurant to get out of debt? Someone who knows that the best restaurants are comfortable, engaging neighborhood haunts with food that intrigues but doesn't frighten. Chef Russell Hodges is a down-to-earth chap who comes up with dishes like a shrimp cocktail composed of two shrimp as thick as sumo wrestler thumbs surrounded by bread points, salmon carpaccio and a cleaved hard-boiled egg. Delicious foie gras, too. And rack of lamb. Don't forget the pan-seared sea bass with cannellini beans.

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George

7709 Inwood Road

214-366-9100

The browning of a chicken is an essential skill; just ask Julia Child. (Well, you could have asked her until a few months ago, anyway.) Mom told us the keys to a well-browned bird: Use quality olive oil, enhanced with butter; let the pieces warm to room temperature so they brown evenly; and dry the skin first with paper towels. Got that? Now we don't know exactly what Ali Baba Cafe does to concoct its "Golden Chicken"; we just know it's the most excellent chicken, a minor poultry miracle. The menu describes it as rotisserie chicken, but it's nothing like the squishy-textured stuff you get at fast-food joints. It's a half-chicken, and the skin, finished under the broiler, is perfectly crisp and spiked with garlic, lemon and spices; beneath it, the tender flesh is bursting with the flavor of...chicken. Yeah. Some chicken does have flavor. Try it with a side of fluffy rice pilaf or hummus; just get it when it's hot, because it isn't quite the same when it's steamed for a while in the takeout box.

We can't quite figure out the ownership status of ZuZu. It used to be a chain; now it isn't. Each of the restaurants bearing the name ZuZu in Dallas has a different owner--or so we were told--and some have different menus. Well, we can vouch for three places named ZuZu, one in Addison and two in Dallas, and all carry the original ZuZu menu of "handmade" Mexican food. And all are superb, much better than you'd expect for a counter-service joint. Try the grilled, marinated chicken or the "Poncho Dinner," which consists of a chicken enchilada, a beef taco and a chicken flauta. Everything appears to be made fresh, and you have a variety of salsas to accent your meal, including a bracing tomatillo version. Wash it all down with fresh-squeezed lemon-limeade.

A couple of these sly concoctions of Crown Royal, peach schnapps, and cranberry juice will turn a mousy brunette into a scarlet temptress. The pinkish red color and the deceptive sweetness hide the puissant punch that quickly brings out the tart in anyone. Drink at your own risk.

As if we have the dough for dinner at Pappas Bros. Steakhouse ($75 per person, minimum) or other such expense-account establishments. Nope, that wouldn't be us. Still, we do appreciate something a cut above your local Outback, with the waitstaff's forced familiarity, those stupid commercials and the decent but not great steaks. That's why we keep going back to Culpepper Steakhouse, just 25 minutes from downtown on the other side of Lake Ray Hubbard. We admit we have a soft spot for hunting-lodge décor; must be our Northern roots. We like the stone walls, the dark wood trim, the taxidermy menagerie and the Holstein hides. And we love the steaks--mesquite-grilled to perfection, like it was 1990 again--and available in a delicious array of "tops" and "bottoms," sauces such as the caramelized shallot, herb and Dijon compound butter. Add to that the best mashed potatoes in the area; delicious, skinny, fresh-cut fries; and professional, non-snooty service, and this is a steak house where you get excellent quality and value.

We watched for months as that place slowly went up off Highway 67. When they put up the sign, when cars started appearing in the parking lot, we started the calling. Are you open yet? OK, but when will you open? At last, a Pappadeaux opened in Southern Dallas--specifically, in Duncanville. It instantly became the No. 1 dining destination for us South-siders. In fact, if you go there on a Sunday, when the church crowds arrive in a steady stream, four generations at an extended table, you'll glimpse a perfect cross section of Dallas County's upwardly mobile black middle class. The Baptists come in the first wave, then the holy rollers at 1 p.m. or 2 p.m., all decked out in fancy hats and colorful suits. It couldn't be a happier place: Though there's usually a wait, everyone leaves satisfied after filling up on Pappadeaux's exquisitely fresh, generously portioned seafood plates. We like living in Southern Dallas. Now, we finally have a reason to dine there, too.

"No lard, no MSG, no freezer"--that's what Baja Fresh advertises above the order counter. They go further than that, with a good selection of low-carb and low-fat menu items that taste like they're full of the stuff. Don't hold it against them that they're owned by Wendy's; Consumer Reports recently cited Baja Fresh for turning out some of the tastiest, relatively healthful fast food. On the low-fat, lower-calorie side, we like the enchiladas verano, two charbroiled chicken enchiladas with grilled peppers and onions in a tangy verde sauce. They come with pinto or black beans, pico de gallo and rice. Another good choice is the "Bare Burrito"--a bowl of flavorful chicken, grilled peppers, onions, rice, pinto beans, pico de gallo and salsa verde. Don't miss the terrific freshly made salsas, especially the mild, totally addictive Salsa Baja. Baja Fresh has a few Dallas-area locations, but the one on Knox Street is the only one centrally located.

Never mind that there seemed to be a preponderance of overweight middle-aged men on our recent visit. Texas de Brazil, with restaurants in Dallas, Addison and Fort Worth, is a carb-counter's paradise. You probably know the churrascaria concept: Guys in baggy pants (and a few ladies) tote around skewers of roasted meat and carve you a hot slice of whatever you want--various cuts of beef, lamb, pork and chicken. There's also a lavish salad bar, with roasted peppers, blanched asparagus, smoked salmon, bacon chunks, imported cheeses, lobster bisque and lots and lots of other stuff. OK, so there's a little rice tucked away somewhere in the salad bar, and the "cheese bread" served with each meal is fairly irresistible--that's about it. You're barely exposed to temptation. Just meat and veggies, meat and veggies all the time. And that meat: melt-in-your-mouth leg of lamb, tender filet mignon, savory picanha--the house specialty, sirloin chunks roasted in a coating of rock salt--and at least a half-dozen other offerings that we saw making the rounds. You might avoid carbs altogether, but you'll still end up ingesting about 2,000 calories.

Everything at Cuba Libre goes down easy, from the (pretty 'spensive) pitcher of mojitos to the elegant desserts to the eye candy that fills this Knox-Henderson joint late at night. But, to paraphrase an old Nate Newton commercial, when we are hawngry, which is most of the time, we like to pig out on this dish. A huge salad with dollops of blue cheese and covered with the most succulent chicken tenders you've ever sucked down your gullet, Cuba Libre's TC-CCS is one of our guilty-pleasure (read: post-hangover) meals. Warning: A 20-minute nap is required after eating.