Menu Offers a Tour of Tasty Greek Delights

The Greek American Restaurant is a relatively innocuous-looking place in a generic strip center on El Camino Real in Encinitas. The menu, fortunately, takes a much less generic tone.

There are the requisite white walls framed with blue accents and photographs of village scenes; more specific to the eatery are the pairs of Greek and American flags that hang from the wall sconces. As small as the place is, it has been divided into several separate seating areas that increase comfort and give a greater sense of privacy to some tables.

Many typical dishes appear, including such traditional big deals as moussaka, roast lamb and chicken, dolmadakia (stuffed grape leaves) and the tasty appetizer dips called satziki and taramosalata . But the extensive lists also offer such less familiar items as bakaliaros tiganitos , or fried dried cod with garlicky skordalia (a thick, sticky sauce of emulsified potatoes and oil), and the psari skaras , or charbroiled white perch, deftly seasoned and served whole, so that the guest may fillet it himself under the uncomplaining gaze of a fishy eye. By and large, the cooking seems quite good.

The appetizer list can lead to flights of extravagance, not only because much of it is attractive but because the prices, on occasion, are relatively high. Given the portion, the price for the loukaniko seems too high--although this wondrously spiced, homemade sausage, served hot and fragrant from the broiler, also is delicious to the last bite. Loukaniko itself seems rather a generic name, with the flavoring left to the individual maker (some use grated orange); at Greek American, the crumbly sausage has an almost curried taste derived from cumin and allspice.

There is fried octopus, for those who want it, as well as tiger shrimp finished with tomato sauce and feta cheese, and the rather flashy melted cheese dish called saganaki that flames the cheese in ouzo and seems the Greek version of queso fundido . The dips are reliable, less expensive and sided with wedges of hot, fluffy pita bread; both the cucumber-yogurt satziki and the potato-red caviar taramosalata get the meal off to a good start.

One of the tastier items in the Greek repertoire, avgolemono , takes on an all-purpose role here and seems rather overused. Both the soup and the sauce that go by this name call for broth or vegetable stock to be thickened with egg yolks and decisively flavored with lemon juice; the effect in both cases is something like a hollandaise made with liquid instead of butter. At Greek American, the soup, definitely made with a real chicken and typically garnished with rice, is excellent, while the sauce tends to be over-thickened and not quite right on the tongue. (As an alternative to the soup, included in the price of the entree, the kitchen offers a salad in a strongly herbed dressing.)

The entree list begins and ends with lamb, the favorite red meat of Greece. The choices are good, notably the arnaki me aginares , or braised lamb with artichoke hearts, a sprinkling of dill and scallions and a coverlet of avgolemono . At the other end of the scale, the paidakia skaras treats lamb chops to a zesty flavoring of oregano and other seasonings.

The grape leaves, stuffed with ground beef, rice, herbs and a bit of tomato sauce, are good enough--and served in great quantity--but you begin to long for some other item on the plate to serve as an occasional distraction. Crisp, carefully cooked green beans perform this role with the moussaka, a relatively delicate version of the famous casserole that seems to contain mostly meat (very well flavored), and very little of the potatoes and eggplant advertised as having been layered into it. No two restaurants top this dish quite the same way, and while Greek American specifies a bechamel (white) sauce, it has been baked into a firm, toothsome crust.

The menu also includes a vegetarian section that, somewhat surprisingly, mentions okra (cooked in tomato sauce with onions and garlic) as well as meatless stuffed grape leaves, a casserole of zucchini and potatoes and yemista yelanzi , or tomatoes and green peppers baked with a seasoned rice stuffing.

Greek American Restaurant

392 N. El Camino Real (in Little Oaks Plaza), Encinitas Calls: 753-8425

Hours: Lunch and dinner Monday through Saturday, closed Sundays

Cost: Entrees $7.95 to $14.95, dinner for two, including a modest bottle of wine, tax and tip, about $40 to $70.