RESTAURANT REVIEW : Farewell, Rosebud; Welcome, Cafe Pierrot

Rosebud, infamous home of blueberry fettuccine, perhaps the single most ghastly plate of food I have ever found, is now a memory.

Rosebud’s old location in Larchmont Village is now the modest Cafe Pierrot. There’s a new owner, a new menu, a new chef . . . believe me, I made certain of this before I set foot in the door.

There’s nothing too fancy in this tidy, narrow room, including the prices. Cafe Pierrot seeks to fill the neighborhood’s need for a small, reasonable French restaurant. A four-course dinner with coffee runs right around $25 per person before tip.

On a Saturday night, Cafe Pierrot is dimly lit, and not a bit boisterous. Our young waiter seems inexperienced--we have to remind him to replenish the cutlery, refill our waters. Otherwise, the staff seems competent.

The chef, Keiji Mizukami, clearly has the capability of turning out a good plate of interesting food and sometimes does exactly that. The seafood ravioli, for instance, shrimp-and-salmon mousse in a spinach noodle, has a delicate just-right saffron sauce. And I especially like the seasoned calamari--crisp, fried strips of it on a bed of good greens dressed with a light sesame-ginger dressing.

Other times, the dishes fall short. A spring roll of tiger shrimp and vegetables is topped with ordinary cocktail sauce. Beef carpaccio, which is always frozen to facilitate thin slicing, came to the table one night still crunchy with ice granules.

Entrees come with soup or a mixed green salad with the house mustard vinaigrette. A briny, creamy seafood chowder drew murmurs of approval, but a thin white cream of cauliflower puree was too bland. French onion soup, available for $1.50 extra, was a less-salty-than-usual version.

Our table of five one night unanimously voted the rack of lamb as best entree: four juicy little chops in a thin rosemary-infused wine-vinegar sauce, fanned out from a cluster of chopped sauteed fresh vegetables and delicious au gratin potatoes. Another good dish was the generous, nicely sauteed Norwegian salmon in pesto sauce.

Unfortunately, there was a notable discrepancy between those two dishes and the other three entrees we tried that night. Any virtues of the pork tenderloin were disguised by an overwhelming infusion of tarragon. Pan-roasted duck swam under a sea of dark, heavy raspberry sauce. And before it came to be steamed and wrapped in spinach, the whitefish’s journey from the Great Lakes to the pans of Cafe Pierrot had clearly been a long one, with much of the fish’s delicacy lost along the way.

The darkness and relative intimacy of this small restaurant makes it a good place for conversation--and lingering over desserts. The creme brulee was a little too runny, the creme caramel was a little too firm. The tiramisu , however, was nicely fluffy. The apple tarte tartin looked bad--a big wedge of pale apples, totally uncaramelized--but was marvelously tart and tasty, so good I had to have another piece when I returned to Cafe Pierrot for lunch.

In the daytime, Cafe Pierrot runs a brisk business. The lunch menu has many of the same ingredients found on the dinner menu only in different combinations. At night, the farm chicken dresses up in shiitake mushrooms and rosemary. At lunch, the juicy pan-roasted half-chicken wears garlic and herbs--too many herbs, in my opinion, especially thyme. The Caesar salad, which is not available at night, is ample and good. Tiger shrimps make their lunch-time appearance deep-fried, stuffed with crab-and-mushroom mousse, and set adrift in a good tomato coulis.

My memories of Rosebud are fading. . . .

* Cafe Pierrot, 125 N. Larchmont Blvd., Los Angeles, (213) 463-2814. Lunch Monday through Friday, brunch Saturday and Sunday, dinner seven nights. Beer and wine. Major credit cards. Dinner for two, food only, $26 to $52.