RESTAURANT REVIEW : Savoring Flavor of Scotland

“Everybody thinks this place is Irish,” laments the host at Tam O’Shanter Inn. “St. Patrick’s Day is probably our busiest day of the year.”

For shame. What would poor Robert Burns think if he heard that--or Tam O’Shanter himself, the hero in Burns’ poem of the same name? Tam O’Shanter (the restaurant) is Scottish and proud of it, even if the place looks like an English roadhouse.

It’s 70 years old now, just about the only L.A. “theme” restaurant that has survived the decades (though there was an unfortunate period when it renamed itself the Great Scot). It has aged well, too. Having been built to look antique, it now actually is antique. Today it’s part of the Lawry’s chain, and I hope it stays around forever.

It’s located where Los Angeles meets Glendale on a quiet, tree-lined stretch of Los Feliz Boulevard that seems to have come down intact from an earlier age. The place certainly is venerable-looking, with a striking half-timbered Tudor facade.

Inside, it has the appearance of a dark, Fielding-esque cottage. A series of low-slung rooms is enriched by fireplaces, brass fixtures, tapestry chairs and wooden tables laden with shiny copper service plates. The crowd here is venerable, too: staid old-money types, many of whom wouldn’t dream of entering these doors without proper dinner dress. Come in less-elegant attire, as we did, and you risk icy stares.

There aren’t many great surprises when it comes to this cooking, unless you are surprised by how well it holds up. Everything here tastes just as good as ever, before the avalanche of sun-dried tomatoes, air-fried potatoes and free-ranging chicken parts hit.

If you’ve come just to peek, there is a tempting selection of carved sandwiches at the restaurant’s ale and sandwich bar, which is open all day, even in the late-afternoon slot between lunch and dinner. (Of course, it also has a variety of rare single-malt Scotches and imported beers to wash them down.) The brisket is terrifically moist, cut into thin slices and ladled with a rich, brown beef gravy. I’m a big fan of the turkey sandwich, too, roasted fresh daily and piled halfway to the ceiling.

This is, incidentally, one of the city’s last bastions of cocktail music. On my last visit, the pianist and bass player just adjacent to the sandwich bar did a mean rendition of “Memories of You.” My mother would have broken into tears if she had been listening.

The only time, in fact, that the present seems nigh is when the food server comes to take your order. The illusion of immemorial age vanishes when the server whips out a hand-held computer (which looks like the tricorder from “Star Trek”) and begins punching up buttons that send flashes to a board in the kitchen.

Don’t marvel too much. The promise of technology, as many futurists will tell you, has not been fulfilled. The entrees can take a good half-hour on busy evenings.

Ah, but what delicious entrees they are. Lawry’s excellent prime rib, served in such cuts as English (three small slices), California (a smaller single cut) or Prince Charlie (the monster cut), is still the ne plus ultra of the genre, the stuff of Beefeaters’ dreams. Sides of Lawry’s famous creamed spinach and the puffy, popover-like Yorkshire pudding mix with the beefy runoff beautifully.

Then there are the beefless entrees, such as the terrific crisp-skinned rotisserie chicken, the credible spit-roasted duck with lingonberry jam, apples and wild rice and even more adventurous ways to eat meat. “Toad in the hole” is a huge flan of Yorkshire pudding with chunks of roast beef, onions, peppers and mushrooms in the middle. Various steaks come with fresh mushroom caps and meaty baked potatoes, ready to be anointed with sour cream, chives, bacon bits and butter.

Good beginnings for these complete dinners include a fine spinach salad premixed with a lightly sweet poppy-seed dressing, a solid, non-controversial Caesar and a treat called Scotch rarebit--grainy melted cheese and spices bubbling away in a crouton-filled copper dish.

Desserts run to such things as a fudgy double-chocolate mousse cake, a misnamed peach cobbler (more like a single-crusted pie) served in a ceramic dish and the occasional cake-style souffle--chocolate Kamora, for example--which are memorable mostly for the liqueur-laced bowl of whipped cream brought along for indulgent pleasure. I don’t know where the Scots got the reputation for being thrifty, but these luxuries do nothing for the image.

Suggested dishes: rotisserie chicken, $12.95, toad in the hole, $15.95; prime rib, $16.95 to $22.95, chocolate mousse cake, $3.50.

Tam O’Shanter Inn, 2980 Los Feliz Blvd., Los Angeles, (213) 664-0228. Lunch 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. Monday through Friday; dinner 5 to 10 p.m. Sunday through Thursday, 5 to 11 p.m. Friday through Saturday. Sunday brunch 10:30 a.m. to 2:30 p.m. Valet parking. Full bar. All major credit cards. Dinner for two, $30 to $50.