RESTAURANT REVIEW : Berty’s in Brentwood Makes a Virtue Out of Being Retro

Alas, poor Berty’s. The foodies will not go there because it’s so quiet. The noise level never gets above a dull roar--you can actually make out conversation at your own table.

Worse, it follows the long-discredited custom of dim, romantic lighting. Mirrors and coral-colored walls and etched glass dividers between banquettes are all very well, and the huge painting that seems to depict the death of the universe by drowning is cute. But when a room isn’t blazing with light so you can make a head count of all the tables, how are you supposed to tell you’re in a happening place?

Shocking. However, I will boldly say that you can still have a very good time at Berty’s. Considering all these retro-’80s features, that is, and the fact that it’s already been open for a couple of years, and maybe even that it’s in Brentwood.

The menu is pleasantly eclectic, though incorrigibly level-headed. The Caesar salad comes with a couple of whole anchovies, but the principal flavoring is little chunks of delicious roasted pancetta--meaty unsmoked bacon bits, more or less. There’s a very nice salad of baby lettuces with some very smoky trout and a mild horseradish cream sauce.

Spicy lamb sausages are about as exotic as the appetizer list gets: little Moroccan-style sausages the size of breakfast links, filled with lamb dosed with red pepper and cumin. They come with a tomato sauce a little like a pureed Mexican salsa cruda .

More typical is the crab cake. That’s crab cake , not crab cakes: one very thick one, built like a giant marshmallow, served on a mixed green salad with what the menu calls “lime butter.” The sauce says a lot about Berty’s, because it harks back to the early ‘80s--it’s essentially a sort of lime-flavored beurre blanc .

Consider the stuffed chicken leg. Even the idea of a stuffed chicken leg has been unfashionable for an unfashionable length of time--it’s not even old enough to revive yet. To be sure, this is a very tasty one, which comes to the table already sliced into rounds, the veal filling spiked with porcini mushrooms, with a simple, tasty sauce of reduced chicken juices.

The most expensive item is a very tender, very garlicky rack of lamb. And if you ask for the separated chops to be served medium rare, they are likely to come rather rare indeed. Calf’s liver is one of the best things Berty’s serves, in its meaty liver-flavored sauce sharpened with aged vinegar--not balsamic vinegar, apparently (unless Berty’s is too behind the times to advertise each and every time it uses a dash of balsamic vinegar), but a pretty rich-flavored vinegar anyway.

Another of Berty’s best dishes is veal medallions with reduced meat juices and shiitake mushrooms. This is one of the dishes that comes with appetizing lemon angel hair pasta (also available on its own as an entree with broccoli). Here is one pasta with a flavoring in the dough that you can actually taste.

Swordfish comes on a bed of perfectionistic ratatouille (the peppers, eggplant and squash all diced to the same size), surrounded by a pool of sauce with a strong basil flavor. One night there was a special entree of grilled tuna served on lettuces with a slightly sharp vinaigrette dressing; the ‘80s mania for hot meats served on salad lives on.

The desserts are likely to include three tiny pots of creme brulee , each differently flavored: espresso (great), lime (interesting) and raspberry (vague). In apricot season there has been a fresh apricot tart emphasizing a contrast between the rather tart fruit and some sweet raspberry puree on the side. That and the raspberry tart seem to be the best choices (the chocolate hazelnut terrine tastes like a chocolatey bread pudding, unfortunately).

If you liked this sort of food when it came around the first time, you’ll still like it at Berty’s. And if you don’t, you can think to yourself: At last, a place where there’s no danger of running into foodies, not until the beurre blanc revival begins. And even then, you won’t have to see or hear them.

Berty’s, 11712 San Vicente Blvd . , Brentwood, (213) 207-6169. Lunch 11:30 a.m.-2:30 p.m. Monday-Friday; dinner 6-10 p.m. Monday-Saturday. Wine only. Street parking. All major credit cards. Dinner for two, food only, $37-$72.