Aoife Cox reports from the Woodstock Café

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Aoife Cox admires the way in which Phibsborough's Woodstock Café is right in tune with its audience.

It can be hard to argue with popular.

Spend a late Sunday afternoon seated near the window in the Woodstock Café in Phibsborough and observe the steady turnover of clientele:  the young, the old, the mammies with kids, even the occasional stray hipster type (the kind who sport woolly hats not because they're warm, but because they're cool). It feels like a distinctly locals joint and you suspect that most of the customers live within walking distance - except, perhaps, on match days, when the population is swelled by the Croker-bound GAA contingent.

It is (and unapologetically so) the kind of place where you can go for a straight up, generously piled, meat-spuds-and-two-veg bit o' dinner - or, during breakfast hours, make that a properly full Irish fry-up - served by friendly and accommodating staff. Away from the carvery offerings, things get a little more diverse and interesting: a quiche with potato and feta which, though genetically predisposed to a certain heaviness, here is marvellously light, while amongst the regulation coleslaw and mixed leaves at the salad bar, you might, for example, find a less-than-usual mix of curried chickpeas and blue cheese. The sandwiches, from cajun chicken to BLT, and whether appearing panini-style or as wraps, come with a reassuringly old school handful of crisps on the side. Homemade desserts - whether rich chocolate mousse, pear and almond tart, bread and butter pudding or Victoria sponge with a better-than-jam raspberry curd filling - do what they say on the proverbial tin.

If, meanwhile, it's a tipple that you're after, they have just a couple of whites and a couple of reds on offer, but they include - and I can vouch for - the entirely quaffable Ventoux blanc from Irish-run Domaine Des Anges in the South of France. Their every-day €45 deal for two mains, two desserts and a bottle of wine is nothing if not exceedingly good value.

Unlike its namesake rock festival of legend, then, this Woodstock is neither breaking new ground nor pushing any boundaries. Its proprietors, on the other hand - Michelle and Liam Moloughney (of Moloughney’s in Clontarf) and Michelle’s sister Angela Ruttledge - are in tune with their audience, giving them what they are happy to have, and to return for, on a regular basis, and that, surely, is music to any local's ears.

 156 Phibsboro Road, D7 01 830 0265 www.woodstockcafe.ie