When mother and daughter Marty and Lindsay Williamson moved FaerieTales Bakehouse and Catering to the old house on West Colorado Avenue that housed Le Bistro and Le Petite Maison (two iterations of a French restaurant with the same owner), they knew what to keep and what to toss.

For their casual lunch, dinner and brunch operation, they kept the quaint dining room, with its squeaky hardwood floors and old wood tables surrounded by good art. They kept the fantastic patio, with its shady maples and petanque court (the French version of bocce). But they ditched the French menu and high prices in favor of an efficient, affordable, enjoyable roster of brunch and lunch dishes inspired by their years in the catering business.

It was a shrewd move. How can anyone bemoan the loss of the only true bistro around, with its escargot and steak frites (it folded in February) when there is stuffed French toast covered in a fresh berry compote, or crab cake eggs Benedict? Perhaps a few will miss Le Bistro’s delicate New England cod crusted in fresh herbs. But to comfort them, there are things like flank steak rolled up in little pinwheels with asiago cheese, prosciutto and arugula.

A good place to start at lunch is the roasted-beet salad ($7), with cool, sweet wheels of red and golden beets that taste particularly refreshing on a summer patio. They get a nice, tart nudge from dried cherries and a spicy poke from tender arugula greens. The salad gets the classic crown of a bit of fried goat cheese on top for richness. It is a perfect summer salad.

Steer clear of the caprese salad ($7). Though FaerieTales tries to use good tomatoes (the menu says heirloom and they look gorgeous), and the dressing of good oil and balsamic tastes just right, the tomatoes are tough and tasteless. This dish is so dependent on perfect tomatoes that it is almost impossible for a restaurant to do well. Don’t blame them for trying, but don’t order it, either.

The entrees show the owners’ catering experience. Many of the dishes are divided into bite-size portions. Many arrive on a stick. The flavor is good, but you half feel like you should go up and congratulate the bride and groom. Old habits are hard to shake.

Some of those little bites are very good. The flank steak pinwheels mentioned above ($10) were perfectly cooked and expertly seasoned, and arrived leaning against a colorful pile of roasted fingerling potatoes, wilted spinach and what tasted like more of that good asiago. It was beautiful to behold and even better to eat.

Also enticing were the buffalo sliders ($9), flecked with green pepper and topped with sharp cheddar. The spongy whole-wheat buns were a bit too much for the thin sliders and seemed mass-produced (a no-no for any place with “bakehouse” in the name), but were not enough to keep me from cleaning the plate.

So-so bread is an underlying theme that pops up again at brunch — one that does not spoil the meal, but should be fixed.

The orange-infused French toast ($7) is a terrific dish: Thick rounds of sourdough sopped in egg, dusted with a little cinnamon and brown sugar and fried, slit like trout and stuffed with sweetened, whipped cream cheese, then finally covered with a generous mound of garnet-red berry compote. The berries are tart, the cream cheese is rich. The syrup on the side is piping hot (a wonderful touch!). You can’t wait to devour it.

But what is this? The sourdough is tough and rubbery. It demands serious knife work. Time to look for new bread. There is a good bakery just down the street.

Incidentals are both fantastic and flat. The coffee here is some of the best you will find, but order a side of sausage and the result could have come off a McMuffin.

Still, when the kitchen is on, it is on. The crab cake eggs Benedict ($12) offers two perfectly poached eggs tottering on top of two enormous, almost baseball-size crab cakes. The breading on the cakes is a tad heavy — it reminds me of fish sticks — but the crab inside tastes fresh and sweet. Good fruit and a small blackberry muffin on the side make for a lovely brunch.

Service here isn’t swift enough — a trick the caterers still need to learn. But the setting is pleasant and the food rewarding enough that enforced leisure can be taken in stride. Make sure to leave room for dessert, especially the supremely indulgent hot miners cookies served with a cool glass of milk ($5). These little nuggets are rich with three kinds of chocolate, toffee chunks and candied walnuts — they are more chip than cookie. And if that isn’t rich enough, they are scattered with edible gold.

Crab Cakes Benedict at Farie Tales Tuesday, August 30, 2011. Photo by MARK REIS, THE GAZETTE