Evening Standard (London): Drinks

Frankie's Italian Bar Grill, SW3

3 Yeoman's Row, SW3 (020-7590 9999) Mon-Fri noon-2.30pm, 6pm- 11pm, Sat Sun noon-11pm ** (GOOD)

Of all the unlikely collusions in the hospitality industry, that which brings together a diminutive Italian jockey with a burly Yorkshireman who is a big noise in the restaurant biz must make for one of the most bizarre relationships.

The odd couple in question are Frankie Dettori and Marco Pierre White, who have somehow found common ground and launched this modern, Italian-style bar and very posh trattoria on the site of the former Chez Max.

A scary, well-upholstered man guards the entrance to this basement venue, but he lets me pass without warning me of the awful piped Italian music in the stairwell. Once inside, though, things take a turn for the better. This glamorous room part bar, part restaurant is handsomely accoutred in the style of an ocean liner's cocktail bar, with twinkling glitterballs and mirrored walls.

Frankie's looks every inch a place where people should be whiling away the hours over exciting cocktails. It isn't. A girl behind the bar tells me they're thinking of doing cocktails in the future and that she has just learned how to make a Mojito. I reckon she's also just learned how to tie her shoelaces, so I decline her offer.

Later, some young buck appears and reckons he can make me anything I like. I keep it simple and order a Cosmopolitan, which turned out to be a cosmopolitan interpretation of this classic drink he didn't use the essential ingredient, Triple Sec. Happily, prosecco, a fabulous, gently sparkling Italian wine, is available by the glass, so I have several.

Moretti and Nastro Azzuro bottled beers are available, and there's a good enough, optimistically priced Italian wine list.

Fellow punters include the usual suspects (for this area) of prosperous fops with Sloaney birds hanging off their arms, but there's a novelty gathering of what look like East End wide boys (although they could well have been black-cab drivers), which adds to the buzzy atmosphere of the place.

On the food front there's a short menu of pizzas, burgers, pasta and steak dishes. Whether or not a burger and chips (Pounds 12) or a Frankie's pizza of ham, mozzarella, tomato and rocket (Pounds 12.50) represent good value is open to debate, but I left with the content feeling that I'd been to a venue with a sense of occasion about it.

If Dettori and Pierre White ever decide to take this place seriously by introducing a quality cocktail list, I will put this venue at the top of my list of places to revisit. They could have a stunningly good venue on their hands.

The world's first black sambuca

Opal Nera was the world's first black sambuca an Italian liqueur made from elderberries and flavoured with liquorice and is internationally regarded as the best. It is becoming popular on the London social scene as a 'livener' for flagging partygoers in need of a drop of the short, sharp, strong stuff.

In cocktails, try making a Liquid Blackjack (25ml of Opal Nera, a generous squeeze of fresh lemon juice and served in a tall glass filled with cola and ice), and you have a liquefied adult version of Black-Jack sweets. Opal Nera is available in 50cl bottles from selected Sainsbury stores at Pounds 14.99; 70cl bottles are available at a RRP of Pounds 18.99 from Selfridges, House Of Fraser stores and Gerry's, 74 Old Compton Street, W1.

WHERE TO... FIND A DATE

DIGRESS ** (GOOD)

City Point, 1 Ropemaker Street, EC2 (020-7382 1690).

When office workers in the City finish their day, Digress is their playground of choice. The fun is gentle enough in the late afternoon, but it builds up into a full-blown party later in the evening, helped by an unusually late (for the City) midnight licence.

MAI TAI ** (GOOD)

39-45 Shaftesbury Avenue, W1 (020-7437 0847).

Young office workers in the West End regularly use this late- night venue as an opportunity to meet members of the opposite sex.

Don't turn up as a part of large single-sex gangs, and dress smart.

This is one of the West End's primary 'pulling' venues.

THE ROADHOUSE *** (VERY GOOD)

The Piazza, WC2 (020-7240 6001).

Covent Garden's most famous late-night party venue is a perennial hit for young geezers and gals out on the pull. This is not for the Bridget Jones and Mark Darcy relationships, but other indiscriminate folk won't fail to find this American-style roadhouse bar a complete joy.

PITCHER PIANO *** (VERY GOOD)

871-3 Fulham Road, SW6 (020-7736 3910).

An institution in London's drinking circles for its almost guaranteed snogfest (and usually more) on a Sunday afternoon.

Get there early to avoid the queues of (mostly) young Antipodeans in search of a touch of life's most basic instincts.

POINT 101 ** (GOOD)

101 New Oxford Street, W1 (020-7379 3112).

After-work party venue on the ground level of the Centre Point building.

This raw, concrete jungle makes for a good, unpretentious space to let your hair down at the end of the day.