IT just so happens that when I drop Joe near his flat and lift my laptop on to his seat, a pale yellow menu with pale blue script slides out from between its folded halves.

Ah. That’s where I put it. Bloody menus. I’ve got a house full of them. Long ones, short ones, terse ones, menus that gush and coo like a Nigel Slater telly show.

“Can I keep this?” I usually say as a waiter or waitress darts in to prise it from my hands. This request often causes significant alarm. A menu on a table is a universal sign to restaurant staff that its occupants haven’t yet ordered. A menu left at a table that has already ordered? A wrongness, an aberration, a tear in the very fabric of the universe, causing confusion and inducing neuroses and twitches in restaurant managers who stand back feverishly and despatch legions of commando-like waiters to subtly get it back.

“Of course,” they always reply when I ask if I can have it. Whatever they really think. Once – when Joe was with me, funnily enough – I asked to keep the menu and as the waiter beamed at us joyfully I instantly knew he had assumed we wanted it as a keepsake because something special had happened. Like we had just got engaged. But then Joe does have a habit of saying at ordering time: “Pick for me. You always do.” Which attracts some strange looks, but avoids us getting steak and chips every time.

Funnily enough, tonight we do have steak. Charred and pink and seasoned, its edges all crunchy and sweet and salty, its interior pink and soft, but it’s Iberica pork rather than beef, honeyed and good. As it should be at £17. There are no chips but a bowl of vegetable fritto instead: courgette, aubergine and fennel, sliced and fried in a seasoned batter of supreme lightness. And another bowl of little meatballs, not dry and chewy but almost poached in a broth with peas. When I looked at the third menu – the first one fell from our high table by the open kitchen down a gap between the wall and the stairs and the second was rescued by a passing waitress who saw food and a menu on the table at the same time and probably swooned. Anyway, when I looked at it, as I do all the time throughout meals, I noticed it said there were prawns with the meatballs. I had to look again at the bowl to confirm they were indeed there, so little had they contributed to the flavour.

Nowadays with phone cameras being so good it’s easy to photograph menus, but the colours of this one are self cancelling and the lighting under the mezzanine here is so low – despite this being a bright, modern corner restaurant – that it doesn’t come out. Who can keep referring to a phone to check what’s supposed to be in a dish and what’s actually in it anyway?

We have tuna tartare, diced and shaped and served drizzled with olive oil, a slice of lemon and toasted bread with it, avocado underneath. “Is that raw?" Joe asks, aghast. “Aye,” I reply, but it's lovely and light. Light is not really how I could describe the courgette flowers which arrive attached to thick sticks of courgette and looking as if they have been battered in concrete. I turn to the menu for an explanation. Ah. They’re not on it. They were specials. Like the creamy octopus with a light fennel salad which had Joe recoiling with the words: “Whit the … It’s cold." In fact the courgette flower batter tastes much better than it looks and the reason for its firmness becomes clear when I bite into it and realise the flowers are stuffed with salted cod, which is salty, strange, oily and delicious.

There have been a wave of Spanish restaurants in Glasgow recently run by Spaniards, but Islena is simply inspired by Spanish food with Scots chefs in the kitchen. And menu aside, the food is fresh and pretty good.

Islena

51 Bell Street, Glasgow (islenaglasgow.co.uk, 0141 552 3530)

MENU Somewhere between old-school Scottish tapas and new wave authentic tapas. Menu too vague but dishes much better. 3/5

ATMOSPHERE Modern mezzanine on a corner with an open outlook and an open kitchen. Pleasant enough. 4/5

SERVICE Aside from the battle for the menu? Pleasant, enthusiastic and trying very hard. No complaints. 5/5

PRICE A £17 Iberica pluma steak sits alongside a great bowl of vegetable fritto for £4. A bit erratic. 3/5

FOOD Handsome, freshly flavoured Spanish-inspired dishes. The tuna tartare is lovely and the pork steak good. Overall very good. 8/10

TOTAL 23/30