Piccola Cucina Zooms to Flavorful Peak

Orange County’s culinary fortunes have been on the upswing for quite some time now, and we have come, perhaps unreasonably, to expect the moon and the stars from some of our new restaurants. The shock of Piccola Cucina, a stylish, moderately priced Italian restaurant next to a Barney’s New York in South Coast Plaza, is that the moon--if not the stars--actually seems within reach.

Owner Pino Luongo wouldn’t have it any other way. Luongo is a Tuscan-born restaurateur who has been busy making waves with his highly praised Le Madri (The Mothers) in Manhattan. Thanks there go to the quartet of woman chefs from four Italian regions that the restaurant’s concept revolves around.

Piccola Cucina is Luongo’s first venture in California, and one has to wonder why he has bypassed more obvious markets--specifically, L.A.’s West Side. If it’s that he doesn’t relish competition, he has to be pleased with the first few months. Piccola Cucina has already ascended to the top of the local Italian restaurant pack, and it is barely out of the starting gate.

This is a handsome, and above all self-consciously chic, place to dine. One of the dining spaces, which houses an open kitchen, is enclosed, sporting a smartly polished wooden floor, an elegant, narrow-beamed ceiling and a series of iridescent Deco lanterns shaped like unopened umbrellas. The more romantic shopping crowd has the option of heading for the flower-filled patio with its rustic terracotta floor, where cream-colored marble tables are arranged tastefully around a pint-sized Italian fountain.

But wherever one sits, the senses are immediately drawn to the kitchen, where masses of wood and copper are set off by white tile. Here chef de cuisine Christine Whitmer and her staff prepare a spate of unrepentedly authentic Italian dishes: cracker-thin pizzas merely brushed with tomato, hand-rolled pastas topped with perfect meat ragus, wild game straight from the restaurant’s hardwood oven and desserts of shaved ice, as bracing as a windstorm in the Italian Alps.

If there is a problem with any of this, it is only that Luongo is not here permanently to keep an eye on things. (And who can blame him? He already has Piccola Cucinas in Dallas and Houston, as well as several other restaurants in New York and the West Indies.)

My best meals here were eaten the week the restaurant first opened, when the maestro himself was in residence. Things haven’t been quite as perfect since. For example, the croissant-shaped noodles called garganelli aren’t rolled up as well as they were that first week, and the antipasto isn’t composed of as many goodies. I recently asked a waiter just how long Signore Luongo stayed around during the opening. The gingerly reply was “five days, four hours and 10 minutes.”

Everyone’s first course here is a plateful of breads baked on the premises: slightly salty hand-rubbed focaccia, a twisty egg bread and whatever else the kitchen has on hand that day. Extra-virgin olive oil and a good grade of balsamic vinegar are then poured from goose-necked flasks into tiny side plates, so the bread can be dipped liberally in the resulting puddles.

At lunch, I prefer to start with panzanella, a Tuscan bread salad. The recipe is simple: cubes of good bread, olive oil, some chopped tomato, sliced onions and a generous sprinkling of basil. The trick, it would seem, lies in the quality of the ingredients, and here they are superb. Few dishes can be more satisfying.

Vegetali alla griglia makes a more ephemeral first course, ideal for a light supper. These are simple grilled vegetables like eggplant, fennel, radicchio and cabbage, again rubbed with olive oil and blackened on the grill. What’s amazing about this dish is how thin the vegetables are sliced. This process allows the magic flavors of grilling to shine through.

A couple of pastas are new to this area. I’ve already described the garganelli. Another novelty is panzotti, triangular ravioli filled with spinach and ricotta, lightly tossed with pinenuts. Lasagna is nothing new, but this version, baked in the wood oven, is rich and wonderful. Fusilli con pomodoro marinato, pancetta e cipolla, where corkscrew pasta are sauteed with Italian bacon, white onion and piquantly marinated tomatoes, makes a tempting alternative.

The meats are sensational here, especially the poultry. Poletto is half of a free-ranging chicken served with an imaginative salad of semolina, frizzled garbanzos, and a handful of well dressed greens. It’s cooked in the wood oven with rosemary, and a regular on both the lunch and dinner menu.

I wish I could say the same for anitra dal girarrosto, without a doubt the best roast duck I’ve ever eaten. Magically moist and at the same time crisp, but without the slightest amount of extra fat under the skin, it is served with fine roasted potatoes and simmered spinach. Unfortunately, it has been removed from the lunch menu and now appears only occasionally as a special. Console yourself with the fine Florentine beefsteak, a grilled T-bone doused with olive oil and garlic, or with one of the fish of the day, wrapped in lemon leaves, steamed and served with delicate French green beans.

And do save room for the desserts, elegant and wonderfully light. Granita di espresso isn’t made every day, and it’s a good thing for me. Coffee lovers will swoon over this tall parfait glass filled with layers of shaved ice, sweetened espresso and rich whipped cream. Another day might bring granita di limone, an ethereal lemon slush. Life is tough.

Piccola Cucina’s flourless chocolate torte, served warm, is pure, unadulterated fudge. There is a fine tiramisu and sometimes even panna cotta, a Piedmontese baked cream custard that will make you forget flan in a hurry.

Don’t think Piccola Cucina is perfect. Salads can be quite tasteless, the wine list--geared for shoppers who order wine as a passing fancy--is uncommonly boring and the tables could be a little larger. But we’ll forgive these little oversights, and come back any day now.

Piccola Cucina is moderate to expensive. Antipasti and salads are $4 to $7. Paste are $10.50 to $12. Secondi are $13.50 to $19.50.

*PICCOLA CUCINA

* 3333 Bristol St., 3001, Costa Mesa.

* (714) 556-5844.

* Lunch 11:30 a.m. to 4 p.m. Monday though Saturday; dinner 5 to 10 p.m. Monday through Saturday; brunch Sunday 11:30 a.m. to 6 p.m.

* American Express, MasterCard and Visa accepted.