Let me begin by saying I'm a huge fan of Richard Corrigan, the barrel-chested Irishman who owns Bentley's Oyster Bar & Grill. Last week, another Irish chef, Kevin Thornton, took him to task for participating in the BBC's Great British Menu series in which various chefs competed for the chance to cook for the Queen on her 80th birthday. But it would take more than a bit of forelock-tugging to turn Corrigan into an honorary Englishman. He's a one-man Celtic Tiger. When I last bumped into him at the bar of Bentley's about six months ago, he told me he'd spent the previous night sleeping on his doorstep since he'd come home so late -and so drunk - that his wife had refused to let him in. Corrigan is no Plastic Paddy. He's the real McCoy.

If anything needed an injection of convivial Irish charm, it was Bentley's. Founded in 1916, it used to enjoy a similar reputation to Scott's as one of London's premier fish restaurants, but by the time Corrigan took over in 2005 it was teetering on the brink. Acquiring the lease was a moment of triumph for him because he'd worked in the kitchen of Bentley's 12 years earlier. In the interim, he'd honed his skills at Lindsay House, winning a Michelin star in the process, and opened a bar and restaurant at the top of the Gherkin. He was just the man to restore Bentley's to its former glory.

To a very great extent, Corrigan has succeeded. Bentley's is on Swallow Street, which has been home to a number of insalubrious establishments over the years, including a lap-dancing club, so the customers aren't exactly out of the top drawer. Nevertheless, if you can get past the slightly chavvy clientele, Bentley's has a Hogarthian atmosphere that makes every trip to the restaurant enjoyable. I can sympathise with Corrigan's domestic problems because it's very hard to emerge from a night at Bentley's without being three sheets to the wind, something I know from my previous visits to the restaurant.

On my trip there last Thursday, I took the precaution of bringing along my wife, as well as two fairly sober, middle-aged friends, mainly in the hope that I'd be able to remember what I'd eaten afterwards. Between us, we gave the menu a pretty good going over, sampling the fish soup, the smoked eel, the stuffed squid, the lemon sole and - for my poor vegetarian wife - the lettuce and goat's cheese salad. Everything got an enthusiastic thumbs up, but the special I chose for my main course - a chicken and langoustine combination doused in plenty of spices - was less impressive. It wasn't bad, exactly, just a bit overcomplicated. I should probably have had the Dover sole.

If I have one main reservation about Bentley's, it is that the food is overpriced. For my pudding, I had a selection of cheeses accompanied by a glass of port which came to £18.50 and our total bill, which included two bottles of fairly ordinary white wine, clocked in at £253.80. You'd expect to pay these prices in somewhere ultra-fashionable like The Ivy or Le Caprice, but Bentley's isn't in that category. Corrigan is good, but not that good.

Perhaps it's churlish of me to complain. Bentley's was full to bursting on the night I visited, so it isn't as if Corrigan has misjudged the marketplace. The demand for tables at London's restaurants is greater than it's ever been and if prices didn't reflect this it would be impossible to get a reservation anywhere. Nevertheless, paying over £60 a head for an unspectacular meal still seems excessive. I wish Richard Corrigan every success, but I'm not sure I'll be helping him to fill his boots in future.