RESTAURANT REVIEW : Flora Kitchen Serves Up Stylish, Wholesome Fare

Flora Kitchen on South La Brea is a stylish take-out/eat-in restaurant that serves the needs of a busy, stylish clientele.

It is a very appealing place. The restaurant tables spill over into the florist’s next door, and there are fresh flowers everywhere. The color scheme is novel and attention-getting: aubergine and willow green. Counterpersons tend to be handsome young men with long pony tails. Customers tend to be young, good-looking, well-dressed; many seemed to have stepped directly from the pages of the Tweeds catalogue (a mail-order source for hip, often aubergine- and willow-green-colored casualwear).

Even Flora Kitchen’s food seems stylish and wholesome; conceivably eating it often could transform one into an attractive regular. There are pasta salads, grilled vegetable salads, couscous, lentils, tabbouleh. There are baked goods both humble (muffins, cookies, brownies) and extravagant (tarts, tortes and layer cakes). It’s trendy catering fare: cuisine du picnic .

I am both sad and glad that I don’t live near enough to Flora Kitchen to be a regular customer.

It makes me sad because some of the food is quite delicious and eating there is just so easy. Most of the dishes are already prepared, so if you want to stop by for a quick bite to eat--say, a fresh mixed field green salad, a slice of cheesy and savory spinach pie, a couple of crab cakes--there’s no waiting, no intense restaurant ritual. You just order at the counter, perch yourself on a high comfortable stool, and in a few minutes, someone brings you a pretty plate of food.

Or, if you’d like to dine at home without turning on the stove, you can pick up a Cornish hen baked in herbs. Some farfalle with feta and sun-dried tomatoes, a good mixed green salad, a fresh-baked dessert, and voila ! A complete, classy diner. Certainly for those home entertainers who don’t cook or haven’t the time to cook, Flora Kitchen is a great find.

I am glad, however, that I don’t live too near to Flora Kitchen. I think I would become overly habituated to the incredible ease of eating well without much more effort than pulling out a charge card. I could easily rationalize paying $5.26 for a scoop of potato salad, $2.50 for a date bar, and up to $9.95 for a sandwich. In short, I might well find myself eating at home at restaurant prices.

I loved the seared ahi tuna sandwich: a good piece of barely cooked fish with a mild sun-dried tomato-mayonnaise on La Brea Bakery rosemary bread. The hefty grilled Mediterranean sandwich with feta cheese, onion and tahini was terrific, too. Served on a large length of baguette, it was easily food enough for two.

The salads and side dishes varied in interest level and taste. My favorites were farfalle with sun-dried tomatoes, chunks of chicken with asparagus, and the couscous with grilled vegetables. I didn’t like the oven-roasted potatoes, the very average potato salad with chicken, and the Thai noodles with chicken in peanut sauce, which didn’t lend itself to life in the deli case. A cream of spinach soup was tasty, but it came to the table barely warm.

There are dozens more dishes--salads, casseroles, and savory pies--available.

For dessert, I had good luck with things chocolate. The brownies were amazing. The chocolate raspberry cake, terrific. The date bars were sumptuous to look at, big and gooey and promising a lot of crunch, but the filling was way way way too sweet, as if the already sweet dates had been cooked with a cloying jam. One server talked me into a hunk of the big, dome-topped pale-crusted apple pie and just as I feared, its paleness signifyed a deficit of cooking. The apples, although tart and juicy, were gooey from undercooked dough and thickener.

If I lived in the neighborhood, I’d probably become a true expert on all of Flora Kitchen’s food--what’s always great, what’s not so hot. The busy, harried, convenience-loving part of me would probably patronize Flora’s shamelessly. My budget-minded, dedicated home-cook alter ego, however, is quite pleased that we reside beyond temptation’s range.

* Flora Kitchen, 460 S. La Brea Ave., Los Angeles (213) 931-9900. Open seven days 8 a.m. to midnight; Friday and Saturday until 1 a.m. No alcohol. Takeout. American Express, MasterCard and Visa. Dinner for two, food only, $12 to $40.