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Restaurants of all qualities still pop up on Brooklyn's Fifth Avenue, waiting to be discovered, but some stay out of the limelight, establishing warm relationships with diners who aren't looking to outpace the trends. Mulino persists in that vein, a friendly neighborhood establishment with Southern Italian-derived dishes that never veer far from the expected. Dangling vines cascade down the narrow dining room's exposed brick walls, but the mood is jarred a bit by the view through the front French doors of a supermarket parking lot. Still, the staff works hard, and some dishes, like an arugula salad strewn with an abundance of Gorgonzola dolce, are exactly as advertised. Others, like chicken Parmigiana, represent Olive Garden-level cuisine. Pastas like tagliatelle verdi Calabrese, with chicken, tomatoes and zingy artichoke hearts in a cream sauce, tend to be more satisfying, if only because they stray from the worn-out American-Southern Italian cooking canon. — Jack Robertiello

Arugula Gorgonzola salad, $7.95; tagliatelle verdi Calabrese, $13.95