Upscale Delivery From Manhattan Gourmet

“We’re not going for your recliner-and-pizza-box-in-front-of-the-TV type,” the manager said. Noted, as the New Yorker would say. The Manhattan Gourmet is going for your Kumamoto-on-the-Corbu-couch crowd, your-poached-salmon-and- panzoti -on-the-Eileen-Grey-repro-rug set.

It is easy to shell out the clams with Manhattan Gourmet, the delivery arm of Brentwood’s Central Park Cafe, particularly if you start with a platter of oysters ($1.50 each) and move on to the $7.50 Caesar salad and $16 salmon. But even if you are, as my grandma used to say, “all champagne taste and beer budget,” you can have a nifty little meal. And not all that little, actually.

That Caesar salad is abundant and abundantly good. It’s even smartly packed: Lettuce comes in one envelope, masses of crunchy perfect croutons in another and just-grated Parmesan, anchovies, and dressing base arrive in separate vials like a junior science kit. Mix it all up in your laboratory kitchen; you’ll find one salad will easily serve three.

The salmon--either poached and accompanied by a refreshing cucumber-mint salsa or grilled and topped with a tomato-caper beurre blanc --is well worth the price. It’s a gorgeous fresh piece of fish that could adequately feed two, particularly when supplemented with the large, sprightly salad of mixed seasonal greens that comes for an extra $2 with any of the entrees.

But I’m getting ahead of myself. There are a couple of starters that you shouldn’t miss. A graceful New England clam chowder, no gluey duplicitous bowlful, comes loaded with sweet clams. Garlic-happy, tender pink calamari ringlets ($6) are wonderful, the melted garlic butter perfect for soaking up with the small round loaf ($2.50) of sourdough bread.

I had my doubts about ordering oysters on the half shell to go since I’m of the shuck ‘em and slurp ‘em school, but these guys--all silk, velvet and radiance, served on top of a bed of rock salt--stayed cool and fresh as they were bused through Brentwood. (Selection changes daily and deliveries take about half an hour, as promised.)

Pasta dinners ($11.50-$14) may be ordered as appetizers for slightly more than half the price of the entrees. Tomato mafalda , the curvy Gina Lollobrigida of pastas, is rich with roasted peppers, fresh tomatoes and spicy sausage. Panzoti , large ravioli stuffed with a light, finely textured walnut and ricotta paste, comes wrapped in a delicate sun-dried tomato cream.

A shellfish salad crammed with large shrimp, mussels and clams in the shell and clever large shell-shaped pasta looked good but turned out to be an assemblage of salty mussels, unpleasant clams, deadpan pasta and blase shrimp. Mediterranean chicken salad does all the right things--real feta, good olives, ripe tomatoes, spunky cucumbers, brisk oregano vinaigrette--but the chicken has no taste.

Greek chicken breast, on the other hand, is something I’d like to come home to. It’s a whole breast ($13.50) smothered with slow-cooked tomatoes, onions, capers and Kalamata olives, served, as all the entrees are, with fresh steamed whole carrots and a hill of nicely prepared rice.

Stuffed rainbow trout ($13.50) is another homey treat. A whole boned fish, literally stuffed to the gills with julienned carrots, celery and fresh sage, is tenderly braised in white wine. The ubiquitous Mom’s Meatloaf, ($9.50) moist with onions and topped with too-sweet tomato paste, is accompanied by silky real mashed potatoes that have just the right number of lumps.

In the extras department, skin-on home fries ($2) are chunky and crisp. Chunky guacamole laced with chile ($3.50) has soul but was missing the promised salsa and tortilla chips. Oaxacan black beans with chipotle peppers ($2) could be more dashing.

Desserts ($4-$4.75) include a tangy New York cheesecake with a succulent brown sugar graham cracker crust, a not-too-sweet cranberry and pear cobbler and a grown-up Queen Mum flourless chocolate cake with a translucent raspberry puree.

The Manhattan Gourmet at Central Park Cafe, 11604 San Vicente Blvd., Brentwood. (213) 826-6687. Dinner delivered nightly 6-10. Minimum order $15. All major credit cards and personal checks accepted.