RESTAURANT REVIEW : Tribeca: Still a Happening, Hip Place

Opened in 1988, Tribeca in Beverly Hills was immediately famous for its long, sumptuous bar, and a little less so for the upscale restaurant upstairs in the back. Over the years, the bar has become a beacon for Westside singles, and on busy nights, it’s a challenge to make it to the stairs, let alone up them. At lunchtime, and on slower evenings, the dining room is still sedate enough for a power meal, the bar still a good public place to watch the ballgame.

When we heard Tribeca’s kitchen had a new chef, we decided to pay a few visits. We found the bar still long and gleaming. It was early on a relatively slow night and still, our entrance did not go unnoticed. Virtually everyone sitting at the bar turned and sized us up. A few people said hello. “I know where I’m going to come the next time I want a date,” said my friend Ed. We dragged him upstairs, to the dining room, where we had a drink at a smaller semi-circular bar while waiting for our table. Upstairs, especially on such a slow weekday night, the singles atmosphere was diluted, if not vanquished. Along with some of the younger, stylish couples, there were a few dignified older couples, a family of adults, some business types.

Tribeca’s dining room is full of those things that once defined a hip, happening restaurant--overhead truss, swank booths, olive oil on the table, innovative lighting fixtures. Each table holds a living herb plant--rosemary, sage, oregano. All these flourishes made me nostalgic for the late ‘80s when nouvelle bar ‘n’ grill food came in to temper the extravagant excesses of California cuisine, and certain upscale restaurants--Tribeca, DC3, the Brentwood Bar ‘n’ Grill, Engine Company 28--looked like postmodern variations on the men’s club.

The service during that first visit to Tribeca can best be described as abrupt. Our waitress was rushed, we couldn’t get a question in edgewise and the courses arrived on top of each other--salads before we’d finished our appetizers, entrees before we’d finished our salads. On another night, we had a waiter who was congenial and good-natured, if not downright flirty--when he bothered to show up. After one long spell during which we were waiting to order, he reappeared and cheerfully said, “Do you miss me yet?” Luckily, the back-up runners and table-busers are quite attentive.

The new chef, David D’Amore, takes a clean, healthful approach to what we now recognize as old standbys in the California kitchen. Ahi tuna tartare is counterpointed with crisp fried potato strings and an eye-opening sauce of rice vinegar and cayenne. I also liked the earthy ragout of grilled wild mushrooms on polenta. We tried a half dozen oysters from the raw bar, and were not particularly impressed. On the other hand, Maryland crab cakes were quite good: crisp on the outside, fresh and crabby within. I only wished for a bit more of the good “Cajun” remoulade--the elegant, smallish pool of the stuff did not quite stretch over two crab cakes.

Mixed baby lettuce in and of itself impressed us more in the ‘80s, before we could buy our own bags of the stuff at the supermarket. But our jaded palates were pleased to find the salad augmented by more of those fried potatoes, Roquefort cheese and a good vinaigrette. The Caesar is less triumphant; it’s mustardy, clumpy, curiously sweet.

Roast pork, on special, was a little dry and the stuffing it was served with was a little bland, but it did satisfy a certain craving for a rich square meal. I much preferred a special entree of lightly grilled scallops and shrimp--both shellfish sweetly fresh, and deftly cooked, not too jiggly raw, yet not too firm, either. Penne arrabbiata was a rowdy mix of tomatoes, black olives, peppers, basil, capers.

Of the regular entrees, I really loved the blackened meat loaf with cilantro gravy. The fried leeks on top of the grilled salmon were deep-fried and heaped atop the plate like a big messy hairdo, but they turned out to be quite delicious, especially with a bite of salmon--that is if you could subdue the long curly stuff enough to get it into your mouth. It came with bland couscous, however, which made no particular taste or texture sense with the fish.

After dinner, as we descended the stairs, my friend Ed gazed hopefully at the bar. “Shall we leave you here?” we asked him. “Certainly, someone will drive you home. . . .”

Tribeca, 242 N. Beverly Drive, Beverly Hills, (213) 874-2322. Lunch Monday through Friday, dinner seven nights. Full bar. Valet parking. Major credit cards. Dinner for two, food only, $38-$80.