Service With Style

Little ethnic restaurants usually look as if they were opened on a shoestring. If Piyaleh was, it doesn’t show it. This charming Iranian place positively drips with good taste.

It does have the usual ethnic hole-in-the-wall sort of location, in a nondescript Sherman Oaks strip mall, but owner Pirouz Tehrani has made the most of it. With its burlap curtains, stone floor and wicker chairs, the dining room could almost pass for Tuscan. At dinner the room is lit by overhead lamps shaded with curved pieces of galvanized steel.

Everything is served on colorful stoneware. Even the obligatory condiment of tart sumac berries (somagh) is tastefully presented in a cerulean blue stoneware vessel.

And the food is unfailingly good. Hot dolma are bite-sized grape leaves deliciously stuffed with rice and yellow split peas. I like to contrast this gently spiced appetizer with mast-o-khiar, a sort of dip of thick yogurt mixed with minced cucumbers.

Tah dig may look like an order of hash browns well done, but it’s really a layer of rice cooked crisp and golden brown in an iron pot. Most Persian restaurants serve it topped with ghormeh sabzi, a bitterish lamb and bean stew made with an abundance of herbs. You can have that topping here, but you also have a choice of two others. One is gheimeh, a terrific stew of lamb and yellow split peas perfumed with dried limes. The other is khoresht-e bademjan, hearty braised lamb and eggplant.

Pickled vegetables (torshi) are listed among the appetizers, but they’d really go better as a condiment for a kebab or pilaf. A waitress told me this torshi has more than 30 ingredients, among them eggplant, cauliflower, garlic, assorted herbs and spices and plenty of vinegar. It’s a finely minced version with a quicksand-like texture and, of course, a penetrating bite.

All Iranian restaurants serve pretty much the same menu of kebabs and pilafs, and Piyaleh’s versions are mostly well prepared and satisfying. The kebabs--chicken or beef in large pieces tender enough to cut with a fork--are marinated in onion juice and saffron and served (against custom) removed from their skewers.

I was impressed by the plump, juicy chicken kebab called joojeh, and also the chelo kebab barg, made from juicy filet mignon. Chelo kebab koobideh looks like a foot-long cylinder of hamburger; mine was too dry. All kebabs are flame-broiled and served with a mound of rice (that’s the chelo part) sprinkled with saffron-tinted rice grains.

If you aren’t in kebab mode, the restaurant offers three pilafs. The best is the tasty loubia polo, mixed with ground lamb, green beans and stewed tomatoes. (This is a little different from the usual version of this dish, which uses lamb shank instead of ground meat.)

Baghali polo and zereshk polo are presented with a couple of extremely buttery broiled chicken thighs. Baghali polo is traditionally accompanied by a boiled lamb shank too, but never mind--the chicken is excellent. Piyaleh’s baghali is rather dry, flecked with dill and mixed with lima beans. I prefer the zereshk polo, mixed with tart barberries, a pinch of saffron and enough butter to raise a Frenchman’s eyebrow. By the way, all the pilafs are immense servings.

Piyaleh serves steamy Persian tea in glass cups and, for dessert, either tiny squares of rose water-perfumed baklava or Persian ice cream, in rose water or pistachio flavors from the local Persian ice cream company Akbar Mashti.

BE THERE

Piyaleh. 15030 Ventura Blvd., Sherman Oaks. Open noon-2:30 p.m. and 5-10 p.m. Tuesday-Friday; noon-11 p.m. Saturday; noon-9 p.m. Sunday. Closed Monday. Dinner for two, $17-$26. Suggested dishes: torshi, $1.95; hot dolma, $3.25; tah dig, $2.95; chelo kebab barg, $7.50; loubia polo, $6.50. Beer and wine only. Parking lot. MasterCard and Visa. (818) 783-9119.