RESTAURANT REVIEW : Menu That’s Rich in Healthy Choices : LoCAL NoCHOL offers appealing soups and sandwiches and such nutritious dishes as turkey meatloaf and un-fried chicken.

Not so many years ago, I had to be forced to eat in health food restaurants. They were usually depressing places where people with a decidedly unhealthy pallor served strange mounds of food covered in sprouts. The cuisine was often crunchy, full of fiber and generally tasteless, leading me to believe it was similar to the fodder placed in feed bags.

Fortunately for those of us today who are concerned about cutting back on fat, salt and sugar, we can choose a cheerful spot where the food is flavorful and healthy. LoCAL NoCHOL is a tiny, informal restaurant located in a Westlake Village strip mall. It has blond wood walls, accents of blue and yellow and about 20 tables.

There’s a counter adjoining an open, sparkling-clean kitchen where customers order and pay for meals. Then you grab a table and wait to be served. Although it can get a little congested at the counter at peak times, I like the energy of this place, which attracts a wide spectrum of people.

The felicitous restaurant is the brainchild of Lauren Bell and Bob Bell, who were married and now work together as partners. High cholesterol caused Bob to have a massive heart attack at age 37, motivating Lauren to invent hundreds of heart-healthy recipes that helped him to recover.

If you’re like me--a person who’s never enjoyed food based on Nathan Pritikin’s dietary precepts--you’ll be surprised at how tasty this cuisine-that’s-good-for-you can be. A reminder: The menu is not necessarily geared to weight loss. But if you’re feeling guilty about that Thanksgiving weekend pig-out, you can request a supplementary list that gives the exact calories, fat, sodium, etc., of each menu item.

For starters, I like Ma Bell’s rich chicken noodle soup ($1.75/$3.50) filled with minced chicken and vegetables, and a special soup du jour ($1.75/$3.50) of smooth pureed squash. A delightful turkey chili ($1.95/$3.75) is made with adzuki beans, ground turkey and fresh herbs, served over brown rice.

Salads are made from 17 varieties of delicious greens. Top choices are the Mediterranean ($5.50), flavored with grilled squash, eggplant and couscous, and the Caesar ($5.25), with a biting dressing and crunchy home-fried potato slices instead of croutons. The hot and cold chili salad ($6.50)is a fine meal, with the spicy warm chili, lentils and brown rice contrasting nicely with the cool greens and salsa. Unfortunately, the Chinese salad ($5.50), with its addition of rice noodles, almonds and mandarin oranges, suffers from the blahs.

Light eaters can make a meal around stuffed baked potatoes. One of my major gripes is that so many restaurants serve stale, rewarmed baked potatoes, assuming the customer can’t taste the difference. Here, the spuds are baked fresh every hour, and my favorites include one filled with turkey chili ($3.25), another stuffed with grilled vegetables and topped with tangy carrot-yogurt ($3.25), and a mouth-zinger with chili sauce, salsa, fire-roasted red peppers and a whole roasted jalapeno that seared my taste buds for hours ($3.50).

Among the flavorful sandwiches offered on oat-bran buns, I prefer a grilled salmon burger ($4.50) with a tingling horseradish topping, a moist vegeburger ($3.75), and a nice chicken breast topped with garlicky ranch dressing ($3.95). The turkey burger ($3.95) is well-seasoned but too dry for my taste. Two other winners, which are rolled up in paper-thin chapati bread, are the Mideast feast ($4.50), dense with couscous, lentils, diced grilled peppers, red onions and a lemony tahini-hummus dressing, and a veggie roll ($3.95) filled with grilled zucchini and eggplant, brown rice, adzuki beans and piquant salsa.

After 5 p.m., I try the moist grilled turkey meatloaf studded with golden raisins and onions ($8.25) and topped with chili sauce. Pasta primavera ($7.95) with grilled vegetables is not exciting, but the un-fried chicken ($8.25) is sensational.

Lauren Bell bakes the skinless chicken breast with a crackling crust that tastes even better than the fat-filled super crunchy variety hailing from Kentucky. And it’s served with fabulous roasted garlic potatoes ($2.50)--mashed up, skins and all.

Although I like the creamy rice pudding ($2.50), I’m not impressed with the other desserts, which look tantalizing in the glass case at the counter. I’d rather finish my meal with another side of those dreamy garlic mashed potatoes.

Details

* WHAT: LoCAL NoCHOL.

* WHERE: 30869 Thousand Oaks Blvd., Westlake Village.

* WHEN: Breakfast, lunch and dinner, 6:30 a.m. until 9 p.m. every day.

* COST: Meal for two, food only $10-$25.

* FYI: All major credit cards; no alcohol.

* CALL: (818) 706-7706.