British to a Tea at Bits & Bobs in Canoga Park

British Bits & Bobs is a bastion of brews and belly bombs. Sorry. I just had to get that out of my system.

The sign on the front window of this oversized cottage, “Good English Food,” would be considered an oxymoron in some circles. But even if you don’t fancy Scotch eggs, shepherd’s pie or trifle, you are likely to be charmed by this Canoga Park establishment, located where Village Pizza used to be.

The rear of the place is a nicely arranged shop where you can buy British specialties such as pasties, Gloucestershire cheese, Devon cream, Branston pickle and candies designed for the famous English sweet tooth. There are a few tables back there for customers who come for high tea in the middle of the afternoon.

In the front, a team of right English waitresses (often right sassy ones) serve British grub from full breakfasts to dinner entrees with side dishes such as mushy peas (a name that leaves little to the imagination). The decor is largely photos of aircraft from the Battle of Britain era.

In the open kitchen, a lone, harried chef does a brave but rather erratic job. The only difference, for instance, between the cream tea and the larger full tea is four sad little sandwiches--cucumber, tomato, salmon and egg salad--served on dried-out triangles of commercial bread. (At least the tea is superb: Yorkshire Gold, kept piping hot by the quilted pot cover known as a tea cozy.)

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And so it goes. The Cornish pasty, stuffed with minced beef instead of the more familiar mixture of beef, potato and onions, is microwaved into soggy lumps for serving. Welsh rarebit, usually a piquant cheese sauce on toast points, comes up as mildly spiced cheese partially melted onto toast.

Even the menu’s pride, Sunday roast beef (available from 1 to 9:30 p.m., Sundays only), doesn’t do it for me. It comes with serviceably puffy Yorkshire pudding and decent roasted potatoes, but the overcooked beef itself reminds me of a certain brand of TV dinner.

It’s not all Dickensian here, though. The best meal--and value--is undoubtedly Big Roger’s, a breakfast so enormous the waitress dared me to finish it. Picture a small hill of home fries, four slabs of Irish back bacon (like thinly sliced Canadian bacon) and three slices of black pudding (better known as blood sausage), along with three grilled tomato slices, two pieces of fried bread (each topped with a fried egg) and some baked beans. Now add three banger sausages, each rather larger than a hot dog, and you have the picture.

The banger--a peppery pork and bread-crumb sausage--also shows up in bangers and mash (mash being mashed potatoes), where it’s garnished with grilled onions, garden peas (or mushy peas, if you prefer) and a little pot of brown gravy. These particular bangers are better than you may have had elsewhere: fine, firm sausages, meatier than most, properly blackened on the outside, lean and reasonably well spiced.

Another respectable dish is fish and chips, a cudgel-sized piece of Icelandic cod deep fried in a thick, crunchy beer batter, accompanied by a large portion of fries. The idea is to cut the grease with liberal splashes of malt vinegar, the pale brown fluid in that cruet on your table.

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I have mixed feelings about the shepherd’s pie. The bottom of the casserole dish is lined with what I’m guessing is the same minced beef used in the Cornish pasty, but here the meat is topped with bubbling mashed potatoes. This is the sort of British baby food I can enjoy when the mood is right, but there’s no denying it’s extremely bland. Try adding in a bit of Norfolk Manor Brown Sauce, a bottled condiment something like A-1.

Real crumpets (although not made on the premises) are available all day. These round, pock-marked breads soak up butter like nothing else I know.

For dessert, there is an oddball version of English trifle topped with rainbow-colored sugar sprinkles. You can also get various English tea cakes. Eccles cakes look like small scones, but the top crust is sugared and the center is filled with currants. Bakewell tart is richly spiced butter cake on top of short crust.

If you don’t fancy English cakes, indulge yourself with a Cadbury’s Walnut Whip from the back shop. It’s an English Mallo Cup, and it proves conclusively that America hasn’t cornered the market on junk food just yet.

DETAILS

* WHAT: British Bits & Bobs.

* WHERE: 8215 De Soto Ave., Canoga Park.

* WHEN: 10 a.m.-9:30 p.m. Monday-Friday, 9 a.m.-9:30 p.m. Saturday and Sunday.

* HOW MUCH: Dinner for two, $14-$23. Suggested dishes: Big Roger’s, $9.95; bangers and mash, $5.75; fish and chips, $7.50; English Yorkshire Gold tea, $1.50. Beer and wine only.

* FYI: Parking lot. American Express, MasterCard and Visa.

* CALL: (818) 886-5479.