There's a long tradition of going into the neighborhood corner tavern for a beer, but you'll probably be surprised at the sheer number of brews that are available to you at the Shaved Duck.

The Shaved Duck is a spin-off of the still-open Scottish Arms in the Central West End, moving into the space that was fashionably rehabbed as Pestalozzi Place a couple of years back. If it needs a categorization, it falls neatly under the "gastropub" file, with a relatively short but clever menu to complement its 50 or so North American craft beers. There are several dozen reasonably priced wines for those who still haven't made the beer-and-food leap.

It's also the kind of restaurant better enjoyed when you're not averse to passing plates and sharing. There are only four entree-size portions on the menu; 10 more are "small plates," requiring two or three to be built into a meal, or one to serve as a sizable appetizer.

Virtually everything on the menu illustrates an extra effort at ingredients and technique — a thyme candied apple with the duck confit, for example, or french fries cooked in duck fat. It also features a certain level of playfulness, as with the duck soup, described as "soup of the day: may not always contain duck."

You're apparently also supposed to do a double-take on the small plate listed as "scallop-wrapped bacon," but that's exactly what the two sea scallops do. They've been carved such that the bacon can be rolled into them forming a spiral, with the bacon thus taking on a lighter flavoring role than if it were used as the wrapper, and a syrupy honey-balsamic sauce for a touch of tangy sweetness.

The spring rabbit "cassoulet" puts that last term in quotes because it's inspired by, rather than an implementation of, the various versions of the French classic. For one thing, there's that rabbit (and no duck, confit or otherwise); for another, the legume of choice is lentils. The cured meat is pancetta. There's garlic, but it's subdued. The final result, however, is wonderful, as long as you're willing to work a little to detach the rabbit portion from its bones.

The duck confit also requires some knife and-or finger work, and the thyme candied apples are a nice rustic pairing, with little crisps of streussel also on the plate. This was one of two duck preparations I encountered, however, that seemed salty — in this case just slightly so, but in the case of the cured duck among the charcuterie offerings, distractingly so, with the duck breast also much firmer than I'd prefer.

The lamb prosciutto, another charcuterie offering, is a textural oddity — lamb served paper thin, dense with lamb flavor when you pack a bunch of it together, but much more subtle in small bites.

The large plates are moderately sized meals with key ingredients surrounded by one or two simple sides. "Meat & Bone" adds two interesting flavor elements to about a 6-ounce beef filet.

First, the meat is butter-poached, adding a fatty depth of flavor not found in a simple grill or pan-searing. Second, for the true carnivore, it's served with a marrow bone, with the intent of adding a touch of marrow as a condiment to the beef.

The "spring chicken" is a semiboned half-hen roasted with Meyer lemons, adding a slight citrus edge to the skin, with roasted-celery couscous as a rustic side.
On the positive side for desserts (or meal courses), the Shaved Duck offers a bona fide artisanal cheese selection, recently including Chistou Isara from France, manchego from Spain and, from America, Sally Jackson, Hook's Blue Paradise, Old Chatham Camembert, Mobay and Baetje Farms Chevre, all listed at $4-$6 "by the ounce," although our portions seemed slightly larger than that. Cheese orders are accompanied by fresh fruit, bread and an occasional orange marmalade or other preserve.

On the negative side, our grilled nectarine carried an off-flavor from the grill.

I would have liked to see some conscious beer-and-food pairing, but I was happy enough to see the pricing on the beer, which included such apparent bargains as Rogue in 750-milliliter bottles for $10, less than I've found it for recently at retail. (Watch out for the stout: At 11 percent alcohol, drinking a big bottle of it is like drinking a whole bottle of wine.)

A small bar area with a few cafe tables greets diners inside the entrance; the back room is eclectically decorated with artwork and with jars of preserved lemons and other food that's likely destined to find its way onto the menu.

Neither Pestalozzi Street nor Virginia Avenue are heavily trafficked in this neighborhood, so the Shaved Duck is going to have to rely on word of mouth to build an audience. The word from this source is that it's worth the few-blocks diversion from the South Grand strip.

(Top photo left - The Shaved Duck turns the usual bacon-wrapped scallops inside out ; Second top photo right - A terrine of rabbit and duck is served with blueberries and pistachios; Third photo left - Meat in bone served at the Shaved Duck located at 2900 Virginia. All photos by Katherine Bish, for the St. Louis Post-Dispatch)

jbonwich@post-dispatch.com | 314-340-8133