A Serious Beef

ANAHEIM HILLS — While the sumptuously spiced cuisine of India has grown increasingly familiar, the meat-rich cooking of Pakistan has remained in its shadow, an enigma.

There are more than two dozen Indian restaurants in Orange County. Count Shahnawaz in Anaheim Hills among the multitudes. But Shahnawaz is special: It also is Pakistani, and its Pakistani dishes are what make it a mysteriously compelling destination.

Pakistanis cook many dishes with beef; Indians do not. Another difference is more subtle: The north Indian style of cooking--synonymous with Indian food in the West--is more heavily dependent on masala, a generic term that refers to mixtures of ground spice.

This is a somber, spacious restaurant with pale green walls, tables covered in white linen, and water glasses holding cloth napkins. Across the ceiling are streamers of pink and blue balloons that remind you of a small child’s birthday party. Music, mostly mournful Indian ragas, reverberates in the background while you dine.

Before plunging into Pakistan, try a couple of appetizers common to the whole of the region once known as Hindustan (today encompassing both Pakistan and India). Onion bhaji is evocative of onion rings, the twist being that the onions are bound together by gram (garbanzo bean) flour and seasoned with fresh cilantro, chiles and coriander. Keema samosa are steaming flour pastry triangles stuffed with minced lamb, best eaten with the cool house mint chutney.

The fastest way to heat things up is to order mirch ka salan, a pepper dish you’ll never forget. What you get are eight or nine whole jalapenos, mustard yellow in color and looking benign in a rich sauce of oil and masala. But the heat explodes onto your palate, and you’d better cut the intensity by mixing them up with the buttery house fried basmati rice.

Next there is beef, serious beef. Perhaps the most distinctive beef dish is khata kat, crisply sauteed bits of liver and kidney coated in a dry herb and spice crust, very close to something you’d run across in a Pakistani street stall. Tala gosht, a dish bound to score big with steak lovers, looks like a Chinese stir fry: diced steak pan-fried with green onion, green chile cilantro and mint.

Order nehari, tender shank of boneless beef in a fiery brown sauce, with both eyes open. This is one dish that Pakistanis insist on serving hot and spicy. The mildest beef dish is probably haleem, a traditional Muslim dish made from mashed lentil, wheat and beef, with a texture as soft as baby food. A dish of fried onion, fresh ginger, minced green chili and wedges of lemon is brought alongside to add piquancy.

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Beef also is prepared in the restaurant’s clay oven, or tandoori. Behari kabob is marinated slices of beef, and you’d better like your beef dry if you order this one. Chapli kabob is a sort of Pakistani hamburger: These are crunchy patties, really, and one more variation on the beef, wheat and lentil theme. But unlike the haleem, which is mostly lentils, the chapli kabob is overwhelmingly composed of meat.

You don’t have to order meat to be happy here. Besides the peppers, Shahnawaz offers many fine vegetable dishes in classic north Indian fashion. Bhindi is cut okra cooked in a light tomato sauce laced with cumin; aloo palak is fresh spinach and potato lightly steamed with mint and cilantro. The kitchen’s rich channa masala is made by stewing garbanzo beans with ginger until the beans cook down to a thick gravy. Vegetable biryani, available weekends only, is a basmati rice pilaf of peas, onions and carrots.

Back at the clay oven, there are options beyond beef. Charga, which requires a one-day advance order, is a whole uncut chicken, bright red from a tandoori spice rub, sitting majestically on a bed of onions and green bell pepper.

Tandoori lamb chops are meltingly tender, coated with a delicate crust of spices. There also are tandoori shrimp, tandoori fish (actually mahi-mahi) and the ever present seekh kabob, cylinders of ground lamb mixed with (too much) garlic, ginger and cumin.

Most of Shahnawaz’s side dishes--namely the chutneys, pickles and hot breads--are impeccable. The sweet-sour mango chutney is delicious with the lighter meat dishes, and parathas (think of them as whole wheat tortillas) are terrific for wrapping up spoonfuls of the vegetarian items.

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The restaurant makes its own desserts. Kulfi, ice cream in Hindustan, comes in two flavors, mango and pistachio, and both are thick, creamy and exotic, subtly scented with cardamom. Ask for gajar-ka-halwa when they have it, a warm carrot pudding made with condensed milk, almonds and raisins. And don’t forget gulab jamun, golden cheese balls with soft centers served swimming in a sweet syrup.

The lunch buffet, only $5.95, is a bargain, but it is primarily Indian and not Pakistani.

Call for reservations if you plan to eat here on a weekend; the restaurant frequently is booked for private functions. (It will be closed to the public Saturday.)

Shahnawaz is moderately priced. Appetizers are $2 to $4.95. Entrees are $5.95 to $11.95. Desserts are $2.

BE THERE

Shahnawaz, Imperial Highway at La Palma Avenue in Anaheim Village, Anaheim Hills. (714) 693-7193. 11 a.m.-2 p.m. and 5-9:30 p.m. Mon. and Wed.-Fri., 11 a.m.-10 p.m. Sat. and Sun. (closed Tuesdays). Amex, MasterCard, Visa.