Gardens: Orchids to . . . Guess What

Coming into this quietly conservative restaurant and opening the menu is something of a shock. You walk in via a massive entrance way lined with orchids, past antique furniture, through a hushed bar plumply filled with sofas and into the restaurant itself. The walls are tastefully lined with soft fabric and adorned with old paintings, the banquettes are padded with huge cushions and waiters in neat gray uniforms see to your every need. Would you like water, a drink, anything at all? It is all exceedingly proper.

Then they bring you the menu at Gardens, in the just-opened Four Seasons Hotel, 300 S. Doheny Drive, Los Angeles, (213) 273-2222. It is a fairly radical document, filled with fancy prices (entrees are in the $20-$30 range) and extraordinary-sounding food. Young goat pastry with dandelion greens and skordalia. A garlic bread pudding served with lamb sausage. Smoked lobster and shark with braised eggplant and crispy vermicelli. And these are just starters. Main courses include lemon duck, chicken in black mustard seeds with fermented rice pancakes, veal on a bed of garlicky greens. This is the most innovative new menu in town.

Most of the food I tasted was very good, but I do offer one warning. It would be wise to ask for descriptions of the dishes before you order. That goat pastry was absolutely delicious-- but it was not the vision I’d had.