RESTAURANT : A BISTRO REVERIE : Wherein an Apparition Appears With Some Exceedingly French Opinions

Just look at that woman stuffing her face,” Marielle would whisper as she handed me the Cognac. “Do you think she will appreciate that you are about to make for her a masterpiece? Of course she won’t. Now pour, doucement, doucement-- you don’t want to burn down the restaurant.” Then she’d light the match, and as she watched the flames creep across the crepes suzette, a hint of a smile would appear on her face. Marielle was a very good waitress, and she knew it.

She could bone a sole in seconds, carve a Chateaubriand with her eyes closed and tell you to the penny how much a customer would tip. But above all, Marielle had standards. Did she change because she happened to find herself in America? She did not. She expected no less from the establishment in which she worked. In the two years that we waited tables together in Michigan, she taught me more about restaurants than I’ll ever need to know.

The restaurant we worked in lived up to Marielle’s impossible standards; that is undoubtedly why it folded. She went to another, and for a short while it was a better place. “But what I do not understand,” she’d say time and again, “is why you Americans insist on haute cuisine. Un bon bistro would make you so much happier. Steak-frites-- what is it but le hamburger without chopping?”

I hadn’t thought of Marielle in years, and then I walked into Pinot--Joachim Splichal’s new restaurant on the site of the old La Serre on Ventura Boulevard--and she materialized out of thin air. Here in the bistro of Marielle’s dreams, a little piece of Paris plunked down in America, I realized that this woman who taught me about food so many years ago is always with me. Marielle’s standards are stricter than mine, and when I find myself becoming indulgent, there she is, shaking her head and frowning at me. Here at Pinot her presence was so palpable I actually thought she was whispering in my ear. And for once she was happy. “ Un bon bistro, “ she was saying, “Did I not tell you les Americains would like it?”

I imagined her taking in the long curve of a bar, the warm wood, the mirrors covered with writing. I could see her sniffing the air and smelling that indefinable bistro scent of spilled wine and roasted meat and garlic. Marielle radiated happiness.

But what is this? Our table isn’t ready? Marielle frowned. And frowned and frowned as the wait stretched on, 20 minutes, half an hour. “Do they offer me a glass of wine?” I heard her muttering. “No, they do not.” In fact, they did not offer a seat--the bar was too densely packed with people waiting for tables. The bartender kept popping up to say, “I’ll get to you as soon as I can”-- which turned out to be never.

Marielle was somewhat mollified to discover, once we were finally seated, that the wine list was wonderful. And she liked the menu, too. She repeated the names of the dishes, reverently, to herself. “Pate, soupe a l’oignon, escargots, cote de boeuf, bouillabaisse, steak-frites . . . “

The menu is in English, but I heard Marielle say the words in French, and for the rest of the meal, I imagined her sitting across from me, grading the food with Gallic bluntness. She was indulgent with the waiter--until he started to reel off the names of his favorite dishes. “Did I ask for his opinion?” she harrumphed. “No, I did not. In my day we knew better than to impose ourselves.” She, of course, needed no advice; she knew exactly what she wanted: escargots, bouillabaisse and a baba au rhum.

The escargots came, and she was downcast when the snail shells turned out to be ceramic. Then she was horrified to discover that the snails tasted more of lemon than garlic. “No, no, no,” she said. “These are wrong. The lemon makes them seem greasy.” I found myself poking dispiritedly at the hard nuggets beneath their layer of butter. It was deeply disappointing.

The bouillabaisse did not find much more favor. “This,” she said, “this is not . . . “ she searched for the word . . . “generous. A bouillabaisse must be, above all, generous.” I looked down at a stingy bowl with a few minuscule pieces of toast next to it, some grated cheese in an egg cup, and a timid pot of rouille. “This tastes nice enough,” Marielle mused, “but it has no heart. And a bouillabaisse without heart is not a bouillabaisse. “

But Marielle liked the baba . It was, she said, “comme il faut. “ And she liked the espresso. The situation, she thought, was hopeful. “Pinot is very new, no?” she said. “Perhaps it will improve. We will come again, yes?”

Yes indeed. Pinot is the restaurant of the moment. La Serre had been everything Marielle hated about American French restaurants--pretentious, expensive, a little bit hokey. She had spent her life in America searching for what she calls an honest French restaurant. She would like it to be Pinot.

But it is hard to forgive the fact that the restaurant is continually overbooked. “So rude,” Marielle said, appearing again on my second visit just as I was commiserating with a woman who had been waiting an hour for a table. And everybody agrees that the chairs are not as comfortable as they might be (“ask for a banquette,” Marielle was constantly urging).

Then there’s the question of the food. One night we had a perfect dinner: a plateau of oysters, impeccably fresh and silky, followed by the most extraordinary ravioli. Marielle would approve of these; they were true French ravioli--rich beef-filled pillows topped with tomatoes, toasted bread crumbs and little bits of basil. She’d think highly of the oven-roasted red snapper, too: It was the essence of fine French bistro food. “So simple,” I could hear her saying, “a fresh fish and hup-- into the oven. And these spinach and potatoes. Who can ask for more?”

Marielle would lament the lack of a cheese tray; no real French bistro would be without one, but I think she’d settle very happily for chocolate creme brulee that is a cross between melted truffles and Mom’s pudding. The desserts, in fact, are all terrific.

But there are nights when the food is less impressive. I found myself choking on an acrid garlic terrine while my French critic pointed out that the lentils in the accompanying salad were undercooked. I thought scallops, served in a shell, covered with a puree of eggplant and hard white beans was brave and interesting and delicious. Marielle, I think, would dismiss it with a single word: “ridiculous.”

She’d be critical of the fact that the lamb chops came with green beans mixed with potatoes--and a huge bowl of French fries. “Potatoes and potatoes?” I could hear her crying. “What imbecile thought of this?”

And so it went. On good nights, we had bowls of richly satisfying onion soup, a cote de boeuf (prepared for two) served with a bowl of bearnaise sauce, deliciously buttery spinach and a potato gratin. On bad nights, we had salty beef tongue and grilled tuna in a pepper sauce that Marielle would consider “California nonsense.”

On the whole, Pinot would be a better restaurant if it stuck to its roots. It is best when grounded in the hearty simplicity of bistro food, on shakier ground when it edges into California territory.

And yet Pinot has the right spirit, which must be why I find Marielle every time I enter the restaurant. “It’s not perfect,” she explains, “but it’s the best bistro I’ve been to in America.” She gives the room a loving look and adds, “This is a great leap forward. Les Americains have come a long way from crepes suzette.”

Pinot Bistro, 12969 Ventura Blvd., Studio City; (818) 990-0500. Open for lunch Monday through Friday, nightly for dinner. Full bar. Valet parking. All major credit cards. Dinner for two, food only, $50-$75 .