Corporate restaurants like Cool Hand Luke's Steakhouse and Saloon do a lot of demographic research. They tailor themselves to the precise population they hope to pull in. It's a science. But all that science is useless if a patron - say me for instance - isn't drawn to their bright demographic flame so much as nudged toward it by an editor wanting a review.

So let me say up front: I'm pretty sure I'm not the kind of customer that Cool Hand Luke's corporate executives have worked so hard to target. I mean: Fake cactus at the front door? A wait staff wearing sheriff's badges? A full-sized cowboy mannequin looming over our table like some Halloween left-behind? Really?

OK, the Cool Hand Luke's branch in Eagle is housed in an impressive new building with a large bar, lots of booths, an expansive outdoor patio, and a small army of wait staff. And the "campfire" beans that come as a complimentary starter were tender and spicy. It's just that I grew up in an Idaho full of genuine Western stuff, so a few minutes and a martini were required to get me comfortable with Luke's B-movie saddlebag-and-barn-wood interior.

The menu sticks more loosely to that cowpoke script - with an occasional Tex-Mex, seared ahi and coconut shrimp aside. The sizzling mushroom skillet appetizer ($6), with garlicky sauteed mushrooms and French bread was old-school good, the prawn cocktail ($8) a bit rubbery and the New England clam chowder (soup or salad comes with dinner) satisfying in a Campbell's kind of way.

The steaks - a New York ($17) and rib eye ($19) - both cooked to medium rare, were tender and tasty (if a bit more reminiscent of butter and salt than aged meat). The garlic chicken and mushrooms ($13), a chicken breast topped with mushrooms and roasted garlic was quite good - Luke isn't shy with the garlic - and the Campfire Salmon ($14) was flaky but fairly flavorless.

Although our foursome gave the meal mixed reviews, the service we did not. Silverware came dirty, orders were confused, some dishes arrived with food jostled from one side of a plate to the other and, finally, our cheery server charged our credit card with someone else's meal. (The badges the wait staff wear apparently aren't for merit.)

Clearly, the Cool Hand Luke's Eagle branch is not my cup of cowboy kitsch, but it does have plenty of fans judging from the size of the crowd on a Saturday night.

Far fewer customers occupied the Downtown Boise branch on a recent weekday afternoon. Maybe that's why the service was so much better. The food, though, tasted like it came off the same corporate chuck wagon: the chicken enchilada soup ($1.50), the fish taco special ($9), and andouille sausage panini ($9) ranged from just fine to forgettable.

Still, it wasn't the food I had a tough time swallowing. It was the concept. Especially at the Downtown location. Especially in the historic Adelmann building (a 1904 landmark that has housed more than its fair share of "themed" restaurants and bars). The bright afternoon light made that interior look even more egregiously inauthentic than its suburban cousin.

Why, I asked myself, would Idaho, one of the most authentically "Western" states in the nation, need a California-based franchise with a theme yanked off a sound stage to serve up a reheated version of its own history?

Short answer: It really doesn't. We've already got a home-grown passel of Western steak houses - and most are more interesting than Luke's.

Guy Hand's "Edible Idaho" show can be heard on NPR News 91.5. Email him at guyhand@mac.com.