RESTAURANT REVIEW : 17th Street Cafe--It’s Around the Corner

So 17th Street Cafe isn’t on 17th Street. What do you want? The owners couldn’t call it Cafe Montana--the original Cafe Montana, which used to be at this precise Montana Avenue address, only moved half a block away and would probably notice if they did.

Anyway, 17th Street Cafe is still basically the same long, pink, clunkily proportioned room (a little murky in the back in the daytime) that it was as Cafe Montana. The main changes seem to be that the new people have pink-washed the bricks and put up some dramatic photos that seem to show people wrestling with searchlights, and of course they offer their own 17th Street menu full of pleasant fancies.

The specials are always worth noticing, though the descriptions may not be the best clue as to what they’re like. Seafood potstickers, for instance, turned out to be giant puffy fried won tons, about 7.07 inches along the hypotenuse by my calculations, with a delicious, slightly sweet filling of crab and shrimp. Fresh peppers stuffed with smoked chicken, corn and cheese on a bed of tart tomatillo sauce are getting to be common these days, but 17th Street sometimes makes a memorable version with peppers that are not only fairly hot but dead ripe, dark red and distinctly sweet.

Some things are present-day standards, such as a tortilla soup that tastes like enchilada sauce with some tortilla strips in it; in effect, an enchilada uncluttered by enchilada. The regular entrees include orange curry chicken, which does not have much orange flavor but is a pretty fair imitation of tandoori chicken, and a pork tenderloin with a sweet sauce that tastes like Cantonese plum sauce.

There are a couple of pizzas, including a barbecue chicken pizza with a moderately authoritative barbecue sauce, but the best one I’ve had was a special topped not only with familiar things like ham, salami and mild pepperoni but also leeks. The tomato sauce had a pleasantly surprising dose of red pepper in it, and the half-baked, half-roasted leeks gave a wonderful aroma. I predict that leeks have a future in pizza.

The rest of the entrees are largely seafood, pasta or pasta with seafood. The regulars, such as angel hair with shrimp and fish in a garlicky white wine sauce and salmon in pesto with fettuccine, are not bad. The fettuccine is very good, but there’s not much pesto flavor on the salmon; it smells like movie-theater popcorn.

Still, the specials tend to be more interesting. For instance: pasta with smoky salmon, shrimp, peas and tomatoes, or ono on a bed of tomato sauce made of both fresh and bittersweet dried tomatoes.

There are also dense-textured burgers served on a French roll split in half, available either “plain” or “not so plain,” in which case there’s a list of toppings. You can ask for as many of them as you wish for one price, but the more you ask for the harder it is to eat. Ask the man who asked for bacon, Cheddar cheese and tomato stewed with garlic on top of the usual lettuce and sliced tomato.

The desserts are all 17th Street Cafe’s own, and very trustworthy. For starters, the English sherry trifle, made with fresh fruit, is the least mawkish version in town of this pleasant dessert. Apart from the trifle, loud flavors are in favor, the lemon cheesecake having a very sharp sweet-sour lime sauce, and the Amaretto bread pudding (with yellow raisins) a powerful dose of Amaretto.

Call it 17th Street, call it the Pink Shoebox, call it anything. It’s nice to have it around. Around the corner from 17th Street.

17th Street Cafe, 1610 Montana Ave., Santa Monica. (213) 453-2771. Open for breakfast and lunch Monday through Friday, dinner seven nights, brunch Saturday and Sunday. Beer and wine. Parking lot in rear. MasterCard and Visa accepted. Dinner for two, food only, $30 - $60.