Tere's Mexican Grill

Cater-corned from the garish Brothers Collateral Cash Loans pawn shop and a long block from Los Angeles’ best restaurant, Tere’s Mexican Grill is a charming, textbook example of a great neighborhood eatery. Tere’s has an extensive menu of Mexican specialties with a few standouts and standbys -- as well as a few items to be avoided. (This is to say, it’s not a taqueria.) It has a loyal clientele of locals, families, laborers working in the area, and, thankfully, not too many hipsters. Mexican folk art adorns its walls and ceiling, accompanied by the de rigueur American flag and portrait of Zapata. And fortunately for waiting patrons and breaking employees, the television always seems to be tuned to Primera División soccer.

The owner and his lieutenants are friendly and efficient. The constant flow of business and a lingering language barrier tend to prevent much banter, at least with the gringos. But the staff is always quick to offer a salsa bag if they detect any take-out patron struggling at the salsa bar with too many containers, a regularity considering how tasty the three salsas and pickled carrots are.

The real standout is the pork con chile verde, which provokes a feral response. The pork, which comes in three or four chunks to the order, has a tender consistency and occasional crispiness on its exterior. The kitchen simmers the pork in a sophisticated, deliciously piquant chile verde sauce, which has ample, but not immoderate, fire and a welcome lemony undercurrent. The manager confessed that he will put the chile verde on basically anything, but the pork is really the only appropriate vehicle for such a magisterial sauce.

I also like Tere’s mole which is unlike the thick, lumbering sauces I normally see. Ground chiles are its chief ingredient, chocolate is excluded (for the record), and it accordingly has a reddish orange color. But its appealing, spicy taste is unmistakably, if unconventionally, mole. Served over a platter of stewed chicken or a pair of chicken enchiladas, the mole tastes best when I wash it down with a cup of horchata.

Befitting its proximity to Providence, Tere’s showcases a commitment to fresh produce and quality preparations. It makes its own tortillas which are always served hot and perfect for sopping up chile verde, mole, or any of the homemade salsas from the bar. Its modest mixta salad—an assortment of chopped lettuce, red cabbage, cilantro, onions and a few wedges of avocado lightly dressed in lemon juice and salt—is always a success . Guacamole and chips are a consistently good starter, though the guacamole could use more fire and exclude the diced tomatoes.

Tere's Mexican Grill
5870 Melrose Ave.
Los Angeles
(323) 468-9345

Osteria Mozza

Recently, we returned to Osteria Mozza for the first time since Marisa somehow snagged a reservation on its opening weekend, when we had an enjoyable dinner (though one with justifiably mixed results). After frequenting the pizzeria regularly after its opening weekend, we ended up ignoring the Mozza twins for the last several months because reservations were impossible to come by and fighting the crowds for bar seating was as pleasant as a morning at the DMV. Then, we received a tip that the frenzy had moved west down Melrose to Comme Ça, where it is possible to reserve a table, but not secure a good meal, or even a table.

Since moving to Los Angeles in 2004, I have managed to suppress my urges for pasta because Italian food here is an object of my personal frustration and resulting derision. As much as I love Italian food--and I truly do--the whole Bill Buford cult of regional Italian cuisine and authenticity is as annoying as pretentious Silverlake espresso shops. (I'm talking to you, LA Mill.) Not only is French food infinitely better, homier, and more interesting, but Joël Robuchon’s Atelier in Paris may be making the best spaghetti carbonara these days. A week ago, though, I wanted some pasta. And going to JR's place in Paris is a hell of a commute.

We took a seat at the mozzarella bar, in direct view of the diffident celebrity chef. Silverton is a marvel to watch. She constantly examines, sniffs, and tastes, and is a model of efficiency and intensity in her preparation of mozzarella bar dishes. She devotes precious time to instructing the younger chefs, stopping often to issue seemingly inaudible diktats to her assistants who miraculously absorb every word. Unlike her extrovert of a partner, she is not interested in superficial banter with her customers, though she seemed happy to discuss the nuances of Italian and Californian burrata. Overall, she, like Quinn Hatfield, and, for that matter, Suthiporn Sungkamee (whose moo nua mae chan Silverton reportedly favors), is a throwback to the pre-Food Network days when chefs focused only on food while big personas with middling talent and creepy laughs did not win made-for-television competitions.

We began with a simple preparation of four deliciously tender pieces of grilled octopus accompanied by a salad of celery and potatoes dressed in lemon. This is a dish I absolutely love. It was great on opening weekend and was just as good on this particular night. It is also superior to Craft’s roasted octopus and Greek yogurt appetizer which does not have the same tenderness or flavor.

From the unwieldly large mozzarella bar menu, we had a less successful take on Campanile’s brilliant pressed autostrada sandwich. Silverton’s adaptation substituted scamorza (a mozzarella cousin, for all intents and purposes) for Peel’s aged provolone, Armandino Batali’s mole salami for Peel's assorted cured meats, and pickled cherry peppers. Silverton’s scarmorza sandwich, like Campanile's, used the device of embedding slices of salami on the exterior of the sandwich (which for all I know Silverton may have actually originated). However, the Silverton/Batali offering was a model of disproportion. Marisa felt that the mole salami, which has a distinctive, spicy taste and is a star in any platter of charcuterie, overwhelmed the sandwich. I arrived at this conclusion from the opposite direction: I thought the cheese smothered the salami and peppers. It’s worth noting that Peel charges $16 for an entrée-sized sandwich that comes with an always excellent salad of greens and frites for the table, while Silverton/Batali charge $14 for a much smaller sandwich accompanied by a tasty, well-dressed arugula salad but sans frites.

The two pasta dishes we shared were solid and faultlessly prepared. At their finest, the Batali pastas are both refined and exquisitely guttural, but Osteria Mozza’s lack this latter element. Marisa had the mezzalune, half-moons filled with butternut squash, topped with crumbled amaretti, and served in a brown butter sage sauce. I had the tasty francobolli di brasato, pasta filled with braised beef and served in a gray butter sauce with thyme. Francobolli are literally translated as “postage stamps,” though the spatial dimensions of the diminutive first class U.S. stamp bore no resemblance to the slightly larger filled pasta. There is no doubt that this pasta was the best I have eaten in Los Angeles though I cannot say that it triggered the desire to eat pasta here with great frequency. What we had was too luxurious and lacked rusticity. On our next visit, I’ll try the amatriciana again (which I struggled to enjoy on the admittedly challenging opening weekend) with the goal of proving myself wrong.

For an entrée, we shared the crispy duck which I devoured. It was the unquestioned highlight of the evening. The kitchen confited and then grilled a breast, thigh, and drumstick under a brick, which allowed the skin to crisp. It was like being back at the old Phil the Fire on Shaker Square, a chicken & waffles joint. The breast was as tender as a confit should be, i.e., not preciously tender, and with the advertised crispy skin. The drumstick may have even been better on account of its greater fat and the ease of eating the meat and skin together. A side of pear mostardo delivered some complex sweetness punctuated not only with a rich pear flavor, but also a little spicy kick moments later. A ramekin of leafy, vinegary brussel sprouts negated the theory that there can never be too much garlic. I would never have expected this theory to be tested in almost an afterthought of a side -- especially considering that the sprouts were cooked in the duck and then in sherry, two dominant flavors. This stuff was acrid.

The espresso was barely potable and had no crema. An expensive 250 ml carafe of a Soave was uninteresting and bland. On the plus side beverage-wise, I discovered the joys of Averna, a Sicilian digestif so fruity, herby, and delightful that I rushed home to order some from K & L (who refers to it as a "bitters"). As long as the Batali chain retains its silly policy of all-Italian wine lists, I’ll gladly pay the corkage fee.

Osteria Mozza
641 N. Highland Ave.
Los Angeles
(323) 297-0101
http://www.mozza-la.com/

San Francisco & Gary Danko

To celebrate my birthday, I planned a day of culinary hedonism, namely flaneuring around some of San Francisco’s most celebrated eateries and hoping for the best. We began with coffee at Ritual. While Marisa, a non-caffeine addict, found its cappuccino epiphanic, Ritual’s espresso was completely lacking in restraint. The barista appeared to employ a lot of technique, but the intensity was completely overwhelming, the caffeic equivalent of the dreaded California fruit bomb. We then strolled to Tartine for pastries and the requisite second morning espresso, all of which were outstanding.

We moved on to the venerable Zuni Cafe for a leisurely lunch. With rare San Francisco sunshine radiating through the restaurant, our table on the second floor overlooking Market Street provided privacy and views. We split a deliciously simple plate of black spaghetti with clams, garlic, olive oil and red pepper flakes and the justifiably famous roasted chicken with bread salad. As the fat from the chicken drained onto the warm bread salad, I became excited and erroneously pronounced Zuni’s chicken better than the smoky classic at Pollo a la Brasa in Koreatown.

Later than afternoon, we went down to the Ferry Building to check out the scene. After scoffing at the Slanted Door and its dumbed down “pan-Asian” selections, we saddled up to the bar at Hog Island Oyster Company. (New York has also succumbed to the same anglicized pan-Asian blandness in the form of Momofuku with its false shrine to pork. Once one eats at Chung King, Jitlada and the like, there is no going back.) There, we split a dozen sweetwater oysters and kumamotos from HIOC’s renown farm in nearby Tomales Bay. We then tried, and I ignored, an overcooked cheeseburger from the southern outpost of St. Helena’s Taylor’s Refresher. I’m glad the burger was bad, because I doubt I could have eaten it.

The coup de grace to this entire day of arterial destruction was a 9:00 pm reservation at Gary Danko, a titan of San Francisco dining. Gary Danko, after earning a sterling reputation at as a chef in Bay Area restaurants, opened his eponymous restaurant in 1999 and it became an instant classic. The San Francisco Chronicle has ranked the restaurant in its “Top 100” ever since it opened, and the painfully democratic Zagat Survey named the restaurant the most popular in San Francisco and as having the best food and service. Yet the controversial Michelin Guide awarded Gary Danko only one star, an outstanding accomplishment, but inconsistent with its local popularity and status. In comparison, Michelin gave two stars to competitors Michael Mina and Aqua.

We loved a dinner there two years ago, and I wanted to return again with Marisa. What we discovered on our return was a dated, one-dimensional restaurant with uncomfortably solicitous service.

Danko’s vision is a hollow triangulation of a cuisine that is neither progressive nor timeless. The middlebrow menu of vaguely French-inspired dishes with scattered elements of seasonality and Asian spices constitutes a reconfiguration of the old continental formula that was swept out 25 years ago by Puck, Waters, etc. I’ll list a few items:

Beef Tenderloin with King Trumpet Mushrooms, Potato Gratin, Cassis Glazed Shallots and Stilton Butter
Seared Ahi Tuna with Avocado, Nori, Enoki Mushrooms and Lemon Soy Dressing

Beef tenderloin, or filet mignon, is the hallmark of 1970’s continental food, which is not surprising since it is famously expensive and bland. With the side of potatoes, a substitution of mushrooms for corn and a cheaper cut of beef, the dish could be sold as a Swanson Original TV dinner. Seared ahi tuna,--a locution that is either misleading or vague and redundant depending on whether yellowfin, bigeye or some other tuna is being served-- has long been a favorite of whites in flight and hit the Ohio exurbs in the mid-Nineties. (I still shudder from those lengthy drives with the family through Republican precincts to the old Market Square Bistro in Bainbridge where I first developed my hatred of the dish.) The avocado accompaniment is even more embarrassing, as the fruit must be served with 80% of tuna hand rolls in California sushi bars. The only constants here are the luxury ingredients, which are perfect for Danko’s hugely marked up wine list and conservative clientele, and the kitchen’s anachronistic inclinations.

As for the actual experience, we sat on the perimeter in the restaurant’s smaller dining room, leaving us in earshot of the room’s center table and any reverberations. When one member of the party at the center table turned out to be the loud personification of what Eric Cartman detests about San Francisco, I knew we were in a bit of trouble.

Considering it was my birthday dinner, I went with the seared foie gras appetizer with caramelized red onion and apples that was served in an undisclosed lake of sweet red wine sauce. The dish was tasty, but a harbinger of mediocre things to come. Whatever amount of street cred I had is now being relinquished: the foie gras’s texture was slightly languid for my taste. Marisa tried the lobster salad with persimmon, chestnut mousse, and pomegranate seeds, and it was as bland as Mitt Romney.

After the richness of the foie, I wanted a change of pace and ordered the “Moroccan-spiced” squab with chermoula and orange-cumin carrots. I have an affection for practically all things Moroccan, and frankly couldn’t resist. Marisa, enticed by the side of chestnut spaetzle, tried the venison with braised red cabbage. Both dishes were, for all intents and purposes, submerged in the same sweet red wine sauce as the foie gras. I wanted to try Marisa’s venison, but my palate lay in ruins and I was unable to differentiate Marisa’s venison from Manischewitz. While I am amenable to criticism that I ordered foolishly, the menu’s description of these dishes did not mention sweet red wine sauce.

Danko is known for its traditional cheese course. For this food geek, it is immensely exciting when the old-fashioned wooden cart of esoteric cheeses is wheeled up to the table. On this evening, however, the assortment of cheeses underwhelmed. It could have been the absence of epoisses--Marisa’s favorite dairy-based substance--the overrepresentation of the quotidian cheddar, or the fact that Bristol Farms and La Brea Bakery carried most of the selections. Worse yet, none of the cheeses stood out, another disappointment.

We did end on a high note, because the baked chocolate soufflé, our shared dessert, was great. The soufflé had the requisite fluffiness and the chocolate had a welcome sharpness that I very much enjoyed. Two sauces accompanied it, but they weren’t needed.

Gary Danko
800 North Point Street
San Francisco
(415) 749-2060
http://www.garydanko.com/

Solar de Cahuenga

For the minority uninterested in paying $10.00 for a cup of coffee in a coffee “boutique” frequented by 40-year old white men wearing “God is Dead” shirts and Doc-Martens--whether ironically or not--and located in a neighborhood best known for its admixture of Upper East Side levels of pretension and Los Angeles levels of stupidity, I suggest giving Solar de Cahuenga a chance. Maverick barista Donny Morrison has recently taken over the reins of its espresso machine, and good things are bound to happen.

Solar de Cahuenga
1847 Cahuenga Bl.
Hollywood
(323) 467-7510
www.sdchollywood.com

Tartine Bakery, San Francisco

I am going out on a limb and pronouncing Tartine Bakery the finest bakery in the Western world. I freely admit that I base this opinion on only a few sampled items and on two visits that were separated by one year. I understand that Tartine only opened in 2002, lacks charm and comfortable seating and has long lines of insufferable San Franciscans. But I am also basing this opinion on visits to such celebrated establishments as Maison Kayser and the ever precious Gérard Mulot, as well as the inferior quality of bakeries in Los Angeles and New York. (When Bread Bar, the local branch of Maison Kayser, is properly managed--and it is a rare occurrence--it is the best bakery in L.A.)

I became hooked on Tartine in 2006 when its lusty croque monsieur ended a painful hangover. Not surprisingly, Tartine served its croque as a tartine, i.e., open faced. The bread was thick and crusty, the ham smoked, and the béchamel and gruyere in perfect, if slightly indulgent, proportions with thyme and pepper. Tartine’s accomplishment was that it made a sandwich that clearly benefited from its originators’ technique, experience and access to impeccable ingredients, but would not be out of place at a Philly cheesesteak tasting or on a taco tour of central Los Angeles. The sandwich is ultimately about pork and cheese and should cure a hangover, which it did.

In our recent trip to San Francisco, we had an hour to kill between having coffee at Ritual in the Mission and going to lunch at Zuni for my birthday, and so we wandered over to Tartine. As the line was not yet Soviet in scale though still out the door, we thought we'd try a few items, which restraint quickly dissipated under the pretext of birthday exuberance. We loved the ham and cheese croissant, which Tartine served warm, and also bridged (and negated) the false gap between food’s supposedly high and low bandwidths. The gougere with gruyere and fresh herbs was a revelation because of its ineffably addictive texture and peppery kick. On the sweet side of things, a thin and crunchy hazelnut biscotto with anise was a perfect complement to Tartine’s near perfect, restrained espresso that was not hyper-concentrated or over extracted, like at Intelligentsia. We could not resist the fresh “morning bun,” practically the Platonic form of a cinnamon roll. It was both light and substantial and had a thin layer of orange sugar to provide sweetness and balance.

We ended with the finest chocolate chip cookie this side of my mother’s. The thin and tasty cookie and had an undertone of saltiness and masterfully worked the classic salty/sweet combination. The cookie was like a cohesive, well-practiced quartet: the chocolate had the freedom to solo, but used its discretion to collaborate smartly with the dough’s tight rhythm section.

The upshot of eating before Zuni is that we were forced to order their venerable roasted chicken and bread salad and wait the hour, a period for which I otherwise would not had patience.

Tartine Bakery
600 Guerrero Street
San Francisco
(415) 487-2600
http://tartinebakery.com/

Spago, Beverly Hills

As much as I try to believe my adopted hometown is burgeoning with sophistication, Los Angeles sometimes just fails me. Or perhaps the whole process of burgeoning has failed to take root west of Doheny.

There is no other way to justify the continued existence and popularity of the self-caricature known as Spago. Wolfgang Puck was once lauded (along with Alice Waters) as a being a “seminal influence” in an “entire cuisine . . . a still-evolving culinary style that can sampled from one of [California] to the other.” (I’m skeptical that an entire cuisine can be founded on a menu whose principle innovations include smoked salmon on baked, flattened dough and the intermixture of Shun Lee-style “Chinese” food and French technique, but I’ll indulge the fantasy for a few minutes. Of course, the logical conclusion of such madness is CPK, the smooth jazz of cuisine.)

Despite Puck's contributions and skill, he is now content to meander around the large dining room and prattle on with patrons for hours on end. Accordingly, the Puck evolution has come to a halt. With its staid and virtually unchanging menu, Spago has morphed into a Cheesecake Factory in a suburb that is inexorably morphing into an ersatz Caruso lifestyle center. Bizarrely, it is the original Cheesecake Factory, established in 1978, that appears to be the anachronistic holdout in the Beverly Hills retail corridor. To exacerbate matters, Puck’s sole recent contribution to the culinary world, or perhaps it was Barbara Lazaroff’s investors’, is the $160 steak.

Teeming on a recent Monday night with businessmen , tourists and cougars, Spago is much more of a banquet hall than a quality restaurant. For a wedding or, better yet, a rehearsal dinner, the food would have been solid. Other than that, I saw an expensive menu littered with “fusion” items and a few Austrian standards, e.g., wiener schnitzel, that while tasty and fun, were of middling quality and would not be served by a Kurt Gutenbrunner kitchen.

My veal sweetbreads had that off-putting texture of soft chewiness that originally soured me on this offal. (I have been craving sweetbreads ever since savoring the rustic brilliance of Ali El-Sayed's version at his Kabab Café in Astoria.) The pan-roasted duck breast, served in slices, simply lacked flavor. I can’t point to anything that was objectively wrong with it, but I also can’t cite any quality that distinguished it, aside from forgettableness.

A dessert of unwieldy fried dough and out-of-season strawberries lacked sweetness and would not have passed muster at the Geauga County Fair.

A few comments from the wife:

First of all, I had to change the stupid title of this entry, which was in no way reflective of my otherwise adorable husband's brilliance and wit. When Steve writes about Beverly Hills, he immediately gets his panties in a bunch -- which is absolutely hilarious because we'll probably end up living there someday. (Ha, ha! Suck it, Steve! You know it's true!) Anyway. Steve's perspective on things is skewed by an existing bias against anything west of Doheny, which makes him a total fraud because he's fancier than H-bomb in Marc Jacobs at Blue Hill. While I am happy with a big salad or a burger or a spicy tuna handroll at the local sushi bar, Steve actually has to fly to San Francisco to eat at Gary Danko on his birthday or he whines like a little girl. Clearly, his vitriol is completely misplaced. Don't we seem to despise most in others what we unconsciously recognize in ourselves?

But I digress. Enough about Steve's hypocrisy and back to Spago, which is, admittedly, as The Trusted Arbiter of Style once decreed, over. The decor is straight out of Cleveland, the menu never changes, and the crowd is just a shade younger and hipper than the pre-dead patrons of the Hillcrest Country Club Grill Room. But I will give Spago this: It is consistent. You can count on a number of things at Spago: It will take hours. A nip-tucked Wolfgang Puck will work the room like a pro, shaking hands, kissing babies, acting like he knows who you are, and pretending that he cares. And the food will be good. It won't change your life or even challenge your assumptions about cuisine (that was 25 years ago), but it will be totally serviceable and often terrific.

For my appetizer, I ordered lemon-herb blini topped with creme fraiche, red onion, and, alternately, smoked sturgeon with black caviar or smoked salmon with red caviar. The pillowy blini were light and delicious, while the smoked fish and caviar combo delighted me to no end. Was it innovative? Not a lick. But it was exactly what I wanted, and the dish was absolutely delicious. For my main course, I ordered the striped bass with lobster and roasted root vegetables. It was great; just really well-cooked with balanced flavors. Moreover, in deference to my irrational and paralyzing fear of fish skin/scales, the kitchen removed any trace of the dreaded stuff -- how awesome is that?

I will concede that the desserts were uncharacteristically lame on our recent visit. My mother, whose birthday we were celebrating, was psyched to throw dietary caution to the wind and get down on her birthday -- especially since she'd just run into Sherry Yard at the Beverly Hills Sunday Farmers' Market stocking up for the week. The fact that Ms. Yard was purchasing grapes should have been a serious red flag as none of the selections really floated the birthday girl's boat. So we opted for two desserts to share as a table: a mediocre strudel and the doughy thing to which Steve referred. The doughy thing -- not fried, more of a pancake-souffle hybrid -- was actually somewhat addictive, reminding me a bit of a poor man's Bistro Jeanty clafoutis. Sprinkled with powdered sugar and studded with sweet strawberries and grapes, it was kind of awesome in an inelegant, dude-have-you-got-the-munchies-too? sort of way.

Overall, we did have fun at the dreaded Spago, which seemed to please everyone at the table --except for the grumpy, implacable Wolverines, who groused after dinner that they needed to go to In-n-Out, even though they both cleaned their plates.

Spago
176 North Canon Dr.
Beverly Hills
(310) 385-0880

Brunch at Jar

After an evening of fancified sushi, I needed a Sunday morning of serious fressing. So we went to Jar, which has a reputation as a foodie’s steakhouse despite this description’s oxymoronic implications. As a rule, I avoid steakhouses because I’d rather go to Soot Bull Jeep or Fatburger than drop a bill on an overcooked steak in a stuffy room filled with the usual assortment of country clubbers, white-collar criminals, yachtsmen, syndicators, and corporate drones. But Jar’s executive chef, Suzanne Tracht, comes from that royal Waters-begets-Silverton/Peel/Goin lineage, and with the lovable and genetically hungry Artie in town, I had a good opportunity to return to another quality restaurant in the neighborhood.

Jar began the brunch with a large wedge of coffee cake for the table. The cake was denser than I expected, topped with nuts and very good. Artie thought it needed more cinnamon, perhaps because the familiar swirl didn’t traverse the wedge, or maybe it just needed more cinnamon. Regardless, I liked the cake’s moist consistency.

We had a tacit agreement with the affable waiter: he would recommend the better dishes, and we would tolerate his confusing us for Georgianne Walken. So Artie and I split the corn pancakes, chilaquiles, and pot roast hash, while Marisa got the lobster benedict.

I have asked my wife to share her thoughts on her brunch:

In an effort to balance the scales of kashrut and make up for other nice neighborhood Jewish girls who, unlike me, don’t have the presence of mind or fortitude of spirit to enjoy a little traif, I ordered the lobster benedict, sans the lobster béarnaise. (I maintain that béarnaise is an utterly repulsive concept, though excellent fodder for Mel Brooks jokes). The lobster benedict came in its usual form atop an English muffin with a poached egg. But where most restaurants use Canadian bacon (or what I call “ham”), Jar uses Cantonese-inspired Char Sui pork as well as some “pea tendrils,” or soggy greens. Sweet and smoky, the Char Sui has a flavor preferable to the favored meat of Saskatoon; but unfortunately, it dominated the dish’s other, milder flavors. I ended up taking the dish apart, forsaking the desiccated English muffin and grazing on the eggs, Char Sui, lobster, and pea tendrils. I could barely muster more than a few bites. Despite the glorious self-righteousness that comes along with a low-carb breakfast, I felt somewhat cheated by the whole experience. Thankfully, Stevie and Artie were happy to share their bounty, leading me off the path of virtue and down the road of excess, right to the palace of wisdom where there are platters of absolutely delicious corn pancakes waiting for the hung-over glutton in all of us. I do loves me some Jar. You know you love me. XOXO, Gossip Girl – ahem, I mean, Marisa

The pancakes were not only the first serving of such that I’ve found edible in years; they were actually very good. Owing to their excellent batter, the pancakes were light and had a fresh baker’s quality. The kernels of corn were inside the pancakes and added an element of sweetness which obviated the need for maple syrup. These pancakes bore no gustatory resemblance to the thin starchy bricks served in homes and diners that had previously soured me on the Sunday staple.

The chilaquiles, essentially Latino matzoh brie, were infinitely better than the Jewish version. Serving a dressed up version of the classic dish, Jar fried and then layered strips of tortillas with eggs, salsa, shredded roasted pork, and crème fraiche. Why Jews have excluded roasted pork from the Passover standard (and then served it only once a year) is an enduring mystery. Suffice it to say, once roasted pork and salsa are added to the recipe and matzah is replaced with tortillas, the outcome is bound to be good. And it was.

The star of the brunch was the pot roast hash, a jumble of brisket, eggs, potatoes, onions, mushrooms and served with superfluous coffee gravy in a gravy boat. Jar annoyingly anointed its pot roast a “signature” dish, a conceit that I would expect only from eateries listed on the NYSE like Morton’s. Hash is leftover meat sautéed with vegetables, potatoes--whatever is around really--and in the hands of Suzanne Tracht, it was delicious. The brisket was most flavorful, much more so than the pork in the chilaquiles, and there was no sense that it was sautéed. It was soft and tender as opposed to the traditional crispy, and thus retained its essence as a pot roast. The eggs were intermixed into the center of the large portion, and it all blended together messily, which is to say seamlessly. The dish was a hash after all, not an omelet, and it impelled our enjoyable visit to Jar the next week for dinner to try the actual pot roast.

Jar has an impeccably designed dining room and bar which captures its modern steak house raison d’être. (Even when I was a just barely more pretentious undergrad studying philosophy with a bad habit of mining the depths of the thesaurus, I was self-conscious about using such an obviously heinous term like “raison d’être” in a paper. Not anymore, especially since I am Heinous. Just try to confute my views on Jar.) Jar’s designer, Brett Witke, raided one of those retro-modern furniture galleries along Beverly and imposed a great clean look on the place. The room’s walls consist of polished brown wood paneling which give the room a sense of tradition. They link Jar to proud, if mediocre anachronisms such as Taylor’s Steakhouse, and forewarn that creamed spinach will be served. But the wood paneling’s lighter tone and variations, the modern decorative artwork affixed thereto and the dark and wide hanging convex lamps splayed throughout the ceiling signify an updating of the whole steakhouse concept. While the muted light and lack of windows can induce mild claustrophobia during the dinner hours, the natural light at brunch was quite pleasant.

Jar
8225 Beverly Boulevard
Los Angeles
(323) 655-6566
www.thejar.com