RESTAURANT REVIEW : A Taste of Italian Potluck

We first arrive at Pizza & Contorni around sundown on a weeknight to find the restaurant and patio virtually empty. The staff is standing outside the front door. “Are you open? May we eat?” we ask.

“Hello! Yes! We were just waiting for you.”

I’d misheard the name of the restaurant as Pizza & Cantore, so I expected singing--opera perhaps. It is, of course, Contorni, which our waiter explains, has to do with the antipasti bar inside: a round counter of hand-painted tile and scalloped copper that displays about 25 separate dishes ranging from steamed wax beans with basil to lasagne to baby octopus cooked in a terra cotta pot. Here, an order of contorni consists of your choice of five items for $8. Possibly because the sparsely populated restaurant is in a mood of promotional good will, the contorni server throws on a sixth item. One plateful of contorni provides a sufficient antipasti for two people.

I like the idea of contorni . The counter looks like a sampling of home-cooked items at a lavish Italian potluck: casseroles, vegetables, hors d’oeuvres-style meats, fussy stuffed things, salads. The overall quality is OK. Not great.

But I’m delighted with a casserole of mashed potatoes, prosciutto, mozzarella and Parmesan cheeses. In fact, all the potato items are good, including a flavorful fritter, and positively silky gnocchi. The roasted marinated, mint-spiked zucchini was my favorite non-potato vegetable, though the rapini was compellingly bitter, the roast eggplant full bodied.

Still, over several visits, I find a general dullness of flavor, some of which has to do with the food sitting in a cold case for periods of time (fresh-cooked spinach, for example, doesn’t improve much with age). Mostly, it seems that the potential hasn’t been coaxed out of the ingredients in the cooking.

Those who can’t face the decision-making process of the contorni bar will be perfectly happy with a nicely dressed insalata mista , a now-standard assortment of fresh, mixed baby greens.

As the name indicates, Pizza & Contorni, which originated in Naples, also specializes in pizza and its variations. So far, the pizzas outclass the contorni, even if I’m not mad for the Sei Gusti pizza, with its separate wedges of mozzarella, prosciutto, salame , artichokes and mushrooms around a center of ricotta cheese. Too busy. And soggy in the middle. And too difficult to share if everyone at the table wants a taste of each topping.

The pizza variations are more interesting. A crescent-shaped calzone is a pleasure consisting of good chewy dough and a well-balanced filling of mushrooms, ricotta, prosciutto and mozzarella.

P&C;’s Sorrentino Saltimbocca is an excellent, rustic panini , hand-shaped, and filled with good prosciutto, mozzarella and grilled peppers.

My favorite, however, is the sfilatino (an oblong, thick-crusted, open-faced pizza) called Delicato; the bubbly dough is topped with a thick custard of ricotta and mascarpone cheese, fired in the wood oven, and served topped with fresh arugula leaves. Subtle and smoky, this is one item I’ll have to eat again.

The pastas, although quite generous in size, are unremarkable. Spaghetti alla puttanesca is utterly dominated by its strong purple olives. Penne alla boscaiola , with mushrooms, prosciutto and green beans in a very light cream sauce is rather more pleasant, but nothing spectacular. Spaghetti with fresh tuna and chopped tomatoes is also so ordinary as to be disappointing.

Still, there are trendy new Italian restaurants around town that are packed nightly while serving far worse food and exhibiting far less imagination and charm than Pizza & Contorni. And I’ve had a good time on every visit. The patio is so pleasant, with its cheerful orange bistro chairs, handsome marble-topped tables, its view of palm trees silhouetted against the fading orange sky. P&C;’s service staff is thoughtful, funny and amiable. The pizza is unusual and good. And, though there’s no singing, we did get some drama one night when a handsome, sizable frog in a man-made pond adjacent to the restaurant’s patio escaped his watery home. The hostess, a poised, attractive young woman, managed to capture him and return him to his pond. She didn’t kiss him.

Pizza & Contorni, 1333 2nd St., Santa Monica, (310) 917-2604. Lunch seven days, dinner Tuesday through Sunday. Beer and wine. Major credit cards. Parking nearby. Dinner for two, food only, $31 to $45.