RESTAURANT REVIEW : An Out-of-the-Way Place With Right-On Fare

You bet it’s a New Age. At Lozano, not only the waitperson introduces himself by name, so does the busperson. And when this personally introduced busperson drops off a plate of food and the dineperson politely says, “Thank you,” he breezily replies, “No problem!”

Fortunately, one of the conventions of this talky New Age is that we dinepeople can immediately forget all these servepersons’ names and address them as waiter or busboy. Even more fortunately, though, Lozano is a surprisingly good restaurant, with the emphasis on surprisingly.

It’s a stylish little place at the north end of Sierra Madre’s minuscule downtown; a room where earth tones abound, where the walls are roughly plastered and the exposed air ducts are a muted shade of plum. And yet it serves burritos as thick as a stevedore’s forearm and a hamburger approved by the American Heart Assn. Of all things, Lozano is an avant-garde Mexican-Southwestern restaurant where 90% of the dishes get the AHA shield.

There are good soups to start with, particularly the black bean, a smooth puree with a pure, intense bean flavor. Black beans may also figure in the chili of the day, which is frankly presented as a soup rather than a thick stew, and always has a solid flavor of fresh ground peppers. Even the chicken soup has chunks of chicken with some flavor to them.

The Wild Mountain Salad (recipe available at the door) has big chunks of jicama as well as corn and bits of tomato mixed with the lettuce. It tends to fly off the plate as you eat it, but no matter, since even a small plate is a generous portion. The other star salad is the cacophonous Smoked Chicken Salad, which includes walnuts, apple, red pickled onions and a dressing made with the most assertively berry-flavored of all raspberry vinegars.

The stuffed pepper is gorgeously presented in a sea of red chile sauce with patterns of sour cream painted on it, looking eerily like a Westside dessert in a sea of raspberry sauce and creme anglaise. The pepper itself, which is perfunctorily stuffed with smoked chicken and cheese, is hotter than you might expect. The other appetizers are a little less impressive: coconut fried shrimp--call them shrimp macaroons--with an “island salsa” that seems to be made of diced beets; Aunt Jemima-like jalapeno corn cakes with a jam-like mango chutney.

Of course, there are combination plates of tacos and enchiladas. The burritos are not available on the combo plates, and there are two things to note about them, apart from their huge size: the rice in the filling is brown, and you can choose either a simple red enchilada sauce or a peculiar “California style” sauce that is a paste of fried whole-wheat flour, like gravy without the meat stock.

A number of things don’t pretend to be Mexican or Southwestern. The jerk chicken, heavy on the allspice, is arrestingly spicy and comes with particularly good red cabbage coleslaw. The AHA burger comes on a whole-wheat bun, of course, with not only jack and cheddar but blue cheese. The patty is small but fresh-tasting, pretty good for this sort of health-burger. However, the French fries are some of the strangest in California. They’re extremely brown, but limp, and for all their dark color they taste less done than just about any fries I’ve ever had.

The desserts are nothing but cheesecakes and a surprisingly good home-made red yam flan that tastes like a remarkably smooth-textured pumpkin pie.

It’s rare to find a restaurant so far off the beaten track that’s so far out of the ordinary, and extremely rare to find heart-healthy food that’s so easy to like. With all its weirdness, I like Lozano. Personally.

Restaurant Lozano, 44 N. Baldwin Ave., Sierra Madre. (818) 355-5945. Open for lunch and dinner seven days; Sunday brunch. Beer and wine. Street parking. American Express, Diners Club, MasterCard and Visa accepted. Dinner for two, food only, $30-$40.