(This venue is closed.) Con Sõl's very dark dining room all but concealed some ambitious "Iberian cuisine," including a dense polvo guisada, octopus stewed with potatoes and red wine ($8) and somewhat stringy cordonizes, marinated quail grilled and topped with a red wine gravy ($6). Carne porco alentejana, chunks of pork loin stewred with clams and topped with cubed potatoes and onions ($11), was ample but lacked complexity; paella Valenciana, with clams, shrimp, scallops, chicken, and linguica (shown; $13) seemed busy, and not fully one with itself. Even so, the fact that everything was prepared and served by just one man suggests a lot of promise, once restaurant-permit problems and other growing pains iron themselves out.
Con Sõl
279A Broadway (Elm-Columbia Sts.), Cambridge, Massachusetts
617-868-3111
