RESTAURANT REVIEW : When It Comes to Bad Taste, Birds Doesn’t Chicken Out

A postcard came recently from Birds, a cafe with an all-chicken menu on the Franklin Avenue “Strip.” The postcard, made expressly for this cafe, shows two little girls, one around 4, one maybe 7. While the 4-year-old is furiously and aggressively giving the viewer “the bird,” the older girl looks on in mock astonishment. This public relations statement made me wonder: Did the owners think such an image would draw people into their restaurant?

On the other hand, the postcard did make me curious: With such poor taste in P.R., what could the food be like?

Birds is half restaurant, half bar. Dark, it rocks and rolls at a moderate volume. There’s sports on the bar TV and plump chickens on the kitchen rotisserie. Roomy booths in black vinyl are a bit sprung. The crowd is largely young men with big appetites, some with girlfriends or dates.

The menu offers chicken. Marinated rotisserie chicken is served with one to three side dishes and a choice of four dipping sauces. There’s chicken pot pie. Chicken chili. Chicken “roll ups”--lavash bread sandwiches in a variety of ethnic flavors.

Much, then, depends on the quality of those twirling birds. And frankly, they’re not much to chirp about: They may look plump and promising up there on the spit, they may be reasonably priced (half a chicken with one side dish is $6.75), but on the plate, the birds are small and flavorless, unless you count a faint, watery taste. Overcooked and dry, the white meat in particular is mealy--no wonder the waitress urges us to select a dipping sauce.

Everything made of this meat, then, is not as good as it could be, no matter how enormous some of the portions are. Side dishes are also large and unremarkable: baked beans that taste as if they came from a can, dry rosemary potatoes, mashed potatoes made inedible with too much mashed garlic. You could feed a family of four with the Chinese chicken salad--if you could find four people who’d like a deluge of thick, too-sweet dressing and knuckly meat. Corn chowder is thick and tasteless; the accompanying corn bread is sweet as pound cake.

The best chicken item is the pot pie, which has a terrific flaky crust, although the filling is dry and mostly potatoes. The best item of all, however, is the Italian “roll up” made with roasted vegetables, feta cheese, tomato, pepperoncini, lettuce--and no chicken.

* Birds Rotisserie Chicken Cafe, 5925 Franklin Ave., Hollywood, (213) 465-0175. Open 7 days for lunch and dinner. Full bar. Dinner for two, food only, $22-$36.

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Flavorful Fare: More low-priced chicken can be found at the newest branch of Rosti, now inhabiting the former Mario’s Cooking for Friends space on Beverly. There, the irresistible half chicken, pollo al mattone , grilled with fresh rosemary and garlic and served with roasted potatoes, sells for $6.95. For the same price, chicken breast that’s been pounded, breaded and fried to a thin crisp golden disc (fabulous with a squeeze of lemon) is served atop more roasted potatoes with a chopped tomato-and-basil relish.

If you can make yourself order something other than the chicken here--and a lot of my friends could do so with only the greatest reluctance--there’s much on the familiar Rosti menu worth choosing. Antipasti are varied and interesting: fresh artichokes fried and stuffed, tuna and beans, caponata, roasted eggplant stuffed with ricotta and pine nuts. Rigatoni with pancetta and onions is simple and lively, and pasta fagioli , with soft pureed beans and sturdy bits of pasta, makes a satisfying $4 meal.

This third Rosti’s food can be terrific, but the service can be unbelievably dim. At times, nobody greets you at the door, there are long lapses between courses, and neither wait staff nor management seems to know what’s in the food. Vegetarian lasagne turns out to be lasagne with meat sauce--the manager apparently thought those small brown flecks were a kind of pureed vegetable. A friend with a serious nut allergy asks if the pear tart has almond paste. It does not, we’re assured, and yet it’s full of the stuff. . . .

Still, I’ll be back.

* Rosti, 7475 Beverly Blvd., Los Angeles, (213) 938-8335. Open 7 days for breakfast, lunch and dinner. No alcohol served. Dinner for two, food only, $17-$42.