Big Brasillian party

I try to visit the venues I review each week at least twice, the idea being to get a handle on the place and not report on an experience that might not be typical. It's inevitable, though, that an experience gleaned in the garden of a bar on a balmy August evening is going to be very different from that on a rainy Sunday night in February, when we all prefer to be at home with the hatches firmly battened down.

So long as the warm weather holds, fans of samba, salsa and all things Latin should keep their diaries free on Wednesday evenings and make tracks to the new Made In Brasil, where the Brazilian band Amigos Sem Compromisso (Friends Without Commitment) will be creating a carnival atmosphere in the beer garden with session-style, turn-up-and-casually-bash-out-a-few-numbers song and percussion sets.

It appeared that everyone and everything had been made in Brazil when I popped in on a Wednesday evening - staff, customers, etc - which means there's little to dislike. Brahma beer is available by the bottle at £3 and Cruzcampo beer is served by the half pint (£2) or two-pint jug (£7.50) - Brazilians like to share jugs in between bouts of taking to the floor for samba dancing.

Brazilians are also proud consumers of their indigenous spirit, cachaça - distilled from sugar cane and the base ingredient of a Caipirinha - and a mouth-watering 70-plus different brands are offered, almost making this the biggest collection of cachaça in the country. The Caipirinhas are fabulous, are served in many different flavours - kiwi, passion fruit, chilli, apricot - and show some restraint in the pricing with most of them at just £5.

The promised barbecue wasn't operating when I visited, but this was probably because the boys in the band were occupying most of the sun terrace. We didn't mind. We ordered several plates of appetisers - baked, stuffed crab meat shell, mini burgers with a blue cheese sauce, stuffed squid with grilled palm hearts, beef croquettes with a leaf salad, mango, figs and croutons -which, at £4.95 a plate, is a very sensible, economic way of eating.

This, with a few Caipirinhas, a warm summer evening, Brazilian girls shaking their booties to the upbeat tempo of the band, makes for an irresistible night of top-flight fun.

I returned again on an evening when the sun was hiding behind dark, threatening clouds that had brought some summer storms. The garden was open, but it didn't have the same magnetic pull I'd experienced a week earlier.

So we made do with a table inside, more excellent drinks and the full restaurant menu of Brazilian dishes prepared by Brazilian chefs. The space is long and narrow and spread over two floors, decked out in the summery colours of Brazil and with loud music contributing to the clattering cantina atmosphere that is authentically true to its homeland.

It was a bit like revisiting a holiday destination where you'd once had such a fabulous time - it never works. But I'm impressed enough with the drinks offering to give it several more goes in the future.

As the nights draw in and winter approaches, I might well use this place for larger, celebratory gatherings, but only if the promised timetable of live entertainment materialises.