COUNTER CULTURE

Eating alone? Feel like a little company? Counters have come back, and these recently reviewed restaurants all offer you the opportunity to pull up a stool.

THE ACME GRILL (130 S. Beverly Drive, Los Angeles, (213) 274-5844). The newest restaurant in Beverly Hills is an upscale fast-food place serving cheeseburgers and French fries and the like. The fat burgers have a faint tang of charcoal. Malts are made with real milk, and lemonade is neither too sweet nor too yellow. It’s all served in a colorfully kicky atmosphere that is one part nostalgia, one part high-tech and two parts high good humor. Open for breakfast, lunch and dinner daily. No credit cards. Beer and wine. Lot and street parking. Dinner for two, $9-$15.

DIPPY’S ISLAND CAFE (203 Marine Drive, Balboa Island, (714) 675-DIPS). Once the site of the original Jolly Roger, Dippy’s oozes with history. Everything here is mild and cozy in the ‘50s manner, from the rounded lunch counter to the tables topped with pink plastic. The star of the menu here is the French Dip sandwich, and Dippy’s dips are pretty good: They serve a full five (including a great lamb model), all served on grilled French rolls with the added option of cheese or grilled onions. The chili is terrific, the BLT generous and if you want to try everything at once, there’s a mammoth Super Club sandwich containing roast beef, pastrami, turkey, ham, Swiss cheese and bacon. Open for lunch and dinner daily. MC, V. Beer, wine and champagne. Street parking. Dinner for two, $10-$20.

GALAXY CAFE (2920 Lincoln Blvd., Santa Monica, (213) 392-9436). Like Ship’s and the ghost of Googie’s, the Galaxy Cafe is a reminder of modernist coffee shops past, from the streamlined facade to the black sunburst sconce. The menu is enormous (breakfast is served all day) and, wherever you sit, service is attentive, casual and quick. Their best main course is the simplest: a plate of vermicelli laden with garlic, basil and tomatoes. Potato pancakes laden with sour cream and lumpfish caviar are more than credible, as are the snappy spinach pancakes. Hamburgers are lean and juicy. Open for breakfast, lunch and dinner daily. V, MC. Beer and wine. Lot and street parking. Dinner for two, $15-$35.

HOLLYWOOD DINER (945 N. Fairfax Ave., West Hollywood, (213) 655-7051). A deco diner with valet parking, a French chef and caviar on the menu: That’s the style of Patrick Terrail’s latest creation. Breakfast is about what you’d expect--and respectable. There’s a lot of diner food here--sandwiches and hot dogs and the like. But while the hamburgers are hefty and cooked to perfection, the best things on the menu tend to be the dishes like oysters and the generously served steamed mussels. Open for breakfast, lunch and dinner Tue.-Sun. All major credit cards. Beer and wine. Valet parking. Dinner for two, $15-$60.

MILLIE’S (3524 Sunset Blvd., Los Angeles, (213) 662-5720). Millie’s looks like a Jim Jarmusch movie as restaurant--downbeat, offbeat, a scene. Greasy-spoon squalor may not be for everyone, but the food is good. In the morning there is fresh-squeezed orange juice and something called a Devil’s Mess--scrambled eggs and spicy sausage, onion, peppers, cheese, spiked with curry and cayenne, buried under a layer of avocados. Dinner is also good, strong and cheap: You can’t go wrong with the daily specials, the chicken or the bowls of linguine heaped with seafood and garlic. Open for breakfast and lunch Tue.-Sun., open for dinner Mon.-Fri. No credit cards. No alcohol. Street parking. Dinner for two, $20-$25.

THE ROSE CITY DINER (45 S. Fair Oaks, Pasadena, (818) 793-8282). The look here is practically perfect: If the place weren’t so bright and clean and shiny, you could easily believe that it had been here since the ‘50s, cheerfully serving malts and hamburgers and pie a la mode. Actually, this little piece of the past has been here only since February. The service is very friendly but fairly slow, and there’s almost always a long line. Open for breakfast, lunch and dinner daily. No credit cards. No alcohol. Lot parking. Dinner for two, $10-$22.

YUM CHA DIM SUM CAFE AND MARKET (3435 Ocean Park Blvd., Santa Monica, (213) 450-7000). Yum Cha is cleverly designed, with hip black metal chairs, a small market and lots of red accessories. This is chic Chinese fast food. No MSG and no artificial colors are used. There are lots of fresh vegetables and a convenient red carrying case filled with six sauces. Moist pot stickers are giddy with fresh ginger, shu mai dumplings burst with shiitake mushrooms and fresh chives. The Hunan chicken, roasted on the spit with cilantro, garlic and ginger, is juicy and wonderful. Open for lunch and dinner daily. Take out and delivery available. Beer and wine. Lot parking. MC, V. Dinner for two, $10-$35.