With work being done on several new eateries, the area around Pest's nicely-restored Szent István tér continues to burnish its reputation as one of the city's key dining districts. Already, two new places have opened on the short leg of Sas utca running between the square and bustling József Attila utca. Well, not exactly two new places - more like one-and-a-half, or maybe 1.325.

One of the restaurants in question - Mokka Café-Restaurant (directly above) - has been around for five or so years, and was closed for just a few months for some renovations. Meanwhile, next door something called the Dió Restaurant and Bar (up top) opened in the premises of the late and (as far as we're concerned, not very lamented) Shakespere's. But not only do the two restaurants share the same address (Sas utca 4). From what we understand, Mokka and Dió may be the work of the same management and/or owners, among the latter being TV personality András Sváby. Which isn't surprising, because they are almost interchangeable, with similar décor, food, pricing and almost everything else, including websites utilizing irritatingly inappropriate technologies (flash for Mokka, .pdf files for Dió) and names involving something brown. ("Dió" in Hungarian means "walnut.") In terms of design, both fall into the tried-and-true category of Tom-George clone, though with an important difference. Whoever designed them seems to like the mixture of nice clean modernist lines and rustic accents. We don't.

Meanwhile, the food is a similar hodgepodge of super-complex international fusion dishes presented with daring architectural flourishes, and homespun Hungo standards made with luxury ingredients or otherwise sexed-up. Both also have menus with prices ranging from the unreasonable to the laughable - the red wines at both start at around Ft 6,000 (€24) a bottle - while at the same time offering excellent lunch specials that can only be called a steal. Consider that the very tasty rib special from Dió pictured up top cost less than a third of the pumpkin-seed butterfish with saffron and cinnamon honey sauce two snaps above, which came in at a whopping Ft 3,980, and less even than the quite delicious "Dio Soufflé" (Ft 1,180).

Just to confuse things even more, the excellent chicken liver and steamed beef specials we had a day or two later next door at Mokka (above) cost less than half the price of a tasty but un-exceptional plate of Székelykáposzta we paid a royal Ft 2,880 for at Dió. Or was it the other way around?

In truth, the main difference between the two self-consciously unique restaurants is that Mokka seems to be doing a brisker business. But that's likely just because it's been around longer, and the kind of people who like places like Dió and Mokka like to go eat where other people go eat. On the other hand, maybe all those people at Mokka every night actually meant to go to Dió, and just didn't notice the difference.