In some imagined Brooklyn, there’s a bistro like Restaurant Sorrel on every corner. In the real Brooklyn, it feels like a rare find, glowing like a lone beacon on a dark residential street, windows thrown open to the autumn evening.

All the simple restaurant’s charm can be found squarely on the plate. Though its menu is fairly traditional, Restaurant Sorrel seems to deliberately disdain the expected bistro trappings: no vintage Francophilic decor, no suave/sultry host, not even a sign. The single square room is brightly lit, with just a few small paintings and colorful light fixtures to break the whiteness. The tables are bare wood; napkins are paper; menus are printed daily on plain paper in an egregiously unstylish typeface.

And the management desperately needs to hire more waitstaff. One night, two servers sweated to serve and host a moderately full restaurant; another night, a single server with the same job was severely overtaxed. Even if she’s methodical and showing no strain, one feels bad about monopolizing a lone waitress with queries about wines when there’s a queue waiting to be seated and forlorn, hungry faces dotting the room.

But once the food starts to arrive, any doubts about the restaurant’s polish are forgotten. Simple, light preparations showcase superlative local ingredients – a familiar story, but one that never fails to stir the emotions. Chef Alexandre Tchistov’s daily-changing prix fixe menu offers three courses for $25, which is a dramatically good deal by Manhattan lights, especially when washed down with a $20-something bottle of French wine. An a la carte menu lists more starters and mains. These are less bargain-priced but still eminently reasonable, especially when, for example, an a la carte leg of lamb dwarfs its prix-fixe chicken tablemate.

Organic beets, cubed and roasted, with a few orange segments tossed in to amp up their sweetness, start the prix-fixe meal with a blast of fresh root-vegetable tang. A dark, chilled mushroom soup has even more resonant flavor. Its main ingredient is thick, fresh mushroom puree, enough so that it can be eaten with a fork. Snails ($7) comprise another excellent starter: unshelled and dosed with garlic, they peep their chewy black heads up from a field of buttery spaetzle. Not everything’s ideal: A brownish disk of steak tartare ($8) tastes primarily of mustard, with little of the bloody satisfaction of a classic tartare. And, while the components of a smoked mackerel salad – toothsome fish, juicy yellow watermelon, smooth potato chunks – sound great and excel individually, the dish as a whole doesn’t quite come together.

Main courses in particular have a lovely simplicity. The pale, moist sauteed chicken breast, swathed in crunchy, tawny skin, exemplifies its kind. It lies in a bed of rice, topped with intense-flavored “mushroom marmalade” that heightens the bird’s flavor. A filet of wild hake had a stronger taste and slightly coarser texture than other hakes I’ve known. With its skin crisped nicely, it reclines among earthy beans in a rustic, delicious arrangement.

The hanger steak ($18), that stalwart of bistro menus the world over, wears a nice sear but seems under-aged, its savor undeveloped and its stiff grain requiring far too much jaw labor. The a la carte roasted leg of lamb costs a whole $25 on its own, but warrants it. The hefty piece of organic meat has deep, supple flavor, complemented by a darkly sweet mustard-seed glaze, an ocean of tender flageolet beans, a stuffed tomato, and, perhaps, the well-balanced, lingering Chateau Ramafort Medoc (at $48, the priciest bottle on the list).

The list of about 30 bottles – half by the glass – averages $30 and is predominantly French, with more than a smattering of Austrian bottles. Three colors of Cotes du Rhone, “Les Grandes Vignes” from the Vignerons d’Estezargues co-op, head up the list – the $6/$24 white is particularly delicious. Bouquet’s Vacqueyras ($8/$32) is a little thin for the menu’s bigger flavors, but a number of lesser-known wines, including the Ramafort and a dense, harmonious, unoaked Corbieres from Domaine des Deux Anes ($7/$28), drink excellently.

The simplicity that works so well early in the meal feels a little austere when it’s applied to the dessert course: an orange panna cotta and a chocolate pot de creme have one keen flavor and that’s it. A concentrated watermelon soup is lighter but still superb, dotted with chocolate “seeds” and packed with flavor.

Brooklyn, in sharp contrast to Manhattan’s endless glamour stakes, seems to incubate these humble, cozy restaurants. The place feels like an escape from grand productions, its market-driven dinners not unique but often excellent. Restaurant Sorrel is worth visiting – even worth an inter-borough trip once it irons out some issues – not despite its humility, but for it.

Restaurant Sorrel, 605 Carlton Ave. at St. Mark’s Place, Brooklyn, 718-622-1190.