HANGOUTS : For Steaks and Gossip, It’s a Cut Above

In a metropolis where cold impersonality is chic and vegetarian dishes are haute cuisine , Joe Petrelli Steakhouse in Culver City is anything but trendy. This is the place for thick steaks, hand-cut by owner George Petrelli, and service from waitresses who put efficiency before panache.

And, of course, the latest gossip.

The steakhouse has received its share of celebrity trade--the actors from “L.A. Law,” for instance, used to go there. But its bread and butter is the locals.

Nearly every night of the week, its Burgundy booths are filled. Customers clog the aisles as they stop at one another’s tables to chat.

“Every time my wife and I and the kids go there, we always bump into people we know,” said Mike Balkman, a Culver City councilman. “It’s just the kind of place where the locals congregate.”

The restaurant, on Sepulveda Boulevard between Jefferson Boulevard and Slauson Avenue, is scheduled to move into a building across the street later this month to make way for a Circuit City, an Office Depot and a Ford dealership. Ironically, the new site is the location of the original restaurant where George Petrelli’s uncle, Joseph Petrelli, first started serving steak dinners in 1931.

The updated version of the steakhouse will carry George Petrelli’s name on the sign outside, its walls and trim decorated in pink and mauve. An elevator will lead to an upstairs room for private parties of up to 150, and a smaller meeting room for about 20 people.

Petrelli will continue to cut all the meat himself, though he’ll do so in a kitchen upstairs. At the current restaurant, he works in a cottage behind the restaurant, hacking the steaks (he buys 1,500 pounds of meat every day) on a cutting table worn in the middle from use.

George Petrelli emigrated from Italy in 1956 and still speaks with a thick accent. He arrives at the restaurant at 6:30 a.m. and does not leave until about midnight, spending much of that time in the parking lot greeting customers and catching up with friends.

“This is my love,” said Petrelli, cigarette in hand, gesturing toward the restaurant. “It’s my American dream.”

The Petrelli dream actually started with George’s uncle. In 1931, Joseph Petrelli opened the Airport Cafe, named for the nearby Culver City Airport. Twenty-five years later, George joined his uncle.

“I did everything, swept floors, everything, but Uncle Joe really wanted me to learn how to cut the meat,” George said. “He said that cutting the meat is what I really needed to know about the business.”

In the mid-1940s, Joseph Petrelli moved the restaurant to its current location. In 1958, he died, leaving George and 17 other family members to run the business.

But in 1988, the Culver City redevelopment agency bought the restaurant and several other pieces of property adjacent to the location to accommodate new development. Until the redevelopment agency finalized its plans, it allowed the Petrellis to lease the site.

Two years later, the Petrelli family decided to close the restaurant--a move George vehemently opposed. After a bitter dispute, George Petrelli says, he estranged himself from his family and ran the restaurant alone.

He approached the City Council in 1991 for permission to continue operating the restaurant on a month-to-month lease.

“The (council chamber) was packed with people,” Petrelli remembered. “The City Council said, ‘Yes,’ and everybody cheered. I cried. I really did.”

But in 1993, the redevelopment agency completed its plans for the 6.8-acre site and notified Petrelli that he would have to move.

Obligated by law to find a new location for property owners who are ousted for redevelopment, the agency loaned $1.5 million to Petrelli to buy the property across the street and build a restaurant.

“This ensures that a cultural institution is preserved,” said Miriam Mack, redevelopment administrator for Culver City. “We heard from a lot of community leaders who wanted to keep Petrelli’s in business, and we took those messages to heart.”