Cool cafés and bistros have become as common in Parkdale as crack houses once were. And while The Parkdale Drink likes to count itself among the many hotspots in that ’hood, there’s a teensy little problem: it’s prime time on a Thursday night and you can hear a dirty needle drop; there’s not a soul inside.

In an old email from the Drink owners, they bemoaned that their lack of clientele was partly due to a less-than-nice review EYE WEEKLY published about a year ago. Until now, their pleas for another chance fell on deaf ears. But maybe, with a newly installed chef, it was worth giving them another look. A year is a long time in restaurant years and, in all fairness, if a place that we slammed is still in business, maybe they’re doing something right.

But as the eminently wise Pussycat Dolls sing, “Be careful what you wish for cuz you just might get it.” After another visit, we’re sorry to say that The Parkdale Drink’s problems stem less from a past negative review and more from an identity crisis. The wannabe high-end lounge/supper club is more polished-up pub serving standard fare like chicken wings, Greek salad, chicken supreme, et al. It’s almost as if the new chef (a bona-fide Red Seal, we’re told) stumbled across a stack of dusty old menus that fell behind the fridge 20 years ago. And though the food itself isn’t all that bad, it suffers from a lack of creativity and consistency.

A mini-burger plate ($11) — featuring a trio of three ounce sliders stuffed between nifty little brioche-style buns and topped with different cheeses — is certainly serviceable. The beef is both tender and moist, and the fries are respectable. But poor quality Swiss and cheddar, young enough to be carded, make them all but indistinguishable from one another.

One could do worse than the sesame-crusted tofu salad ($8). Coated with black sesame seeds and sitting atop a mound of lightly dressed très ’90s organic mesclun mix, the tofu is all texture with no bite, and in dire need of a little marinating.

Crisply fried shrimp wontons ($8, made by our affable server’s mother-in-law) served with a tangy dipping sauce and some small (though plentiful) chicken wings ($9 for 1lb) with a lovely sweet heat and some basil mayo round out an altogether good starter selection. If this came out of a pub chain, we’d be suitably impressed. But this isn’t exactly the image Drink conjures up with their slick art-house ads in Toronto Life.

What follows, unfortunately, are badly executed mains. A New York strip steak with frites ($19) is a culinary train wreck. Ordered medium-rare, a tepid, blue slab of over-salted beef arrives with a uniformly grey exterior suggesting somebody forgot to heat the pan before cooking. (Or, perhaps chef was too busy on her cellphone to set up properly.) A similar fate plagues the lemongrass pork tenderloin ($15) with baby bok choy and sautéed sprouts. It’s a stringy, overdone mess. And don’t get us started on the rubbery right-out-of-a-mould jasmine rice that you could literally use a knife on.

A creamy, homemade cheesecake with a moist graham-cracker crust and fresh berries ($6) is a step in the right direction, dessert-wise. But we can still see no reason why anyone would bother when there are so many other fantastic boites to frequent in this area. It’s just not good enough to have OK openers and one good dessert. And with a name like The Parkdale Drink, one might also expect a more extensive beer list, or, at the very least a pint of Guinness that doesn’t come from the can. How does the old saying go? Fool me once, shame on you; fool me twice, shame on me? As George W. put it, we won’t be fooled again.