Goal-Oriented

Running a restaurant means reinventing yourself at least four times a year as the seasons change, and sometimes weekly or even daily with your list of specials.

And when you do, of course, you seek two goals--to keep your regular customers happy and to bring new people to the door.

Which is what Sebastian Fazio seems to have accomplished since he bought Portofino a year ago. The Studio City place has been around 12 years; old-timers remember the ice cream parlor that used to occupy the space.

Fazio wanted to make something new, something reminiscent of the great neighborhood Italian places in New York.

“I am a Sicilian immigrant, but I grew up in this country, and I try to present the foods of Italy with an American touch,” Fazio says.

“I have run about 30 restaurants in my life, but I used to take places in trouble and turn them around and then give them back to the owner. This is the first time I’ve run my own place.

“We serve Italian food, seafood, steaks and chops, and we give people sourdough bread like they do in New York restaurants. When I seat people, they get a little slice of pizza, and after dinner we serve everybody a plate of sliced apples to clean the palate.”

To reinvent Portofino, Fazio overhauled the menu and trained his line chefs, Lupe Flores and Pedro Salazar, in his own methods and recipes. He hasn’t tinkered with the menu much since then, but he sometimes changes his specials daily.

Recently these included breaded veal with a sauce of lemon, butter and capers, for $23.95; frutti di mari with linguine, scampi, mussels, swordfish, salmon, whitefish and clams in a red or white clam sauce, for $16.95; and filet and scampi in a lemon butter sauce, for $19.95.

Fazio also offers a dozen pasta dishes, salmon with a dill sauce, grilled swordfish, broiled whitefish, broiled roughy, and 13 dishes featuring chicken, beef, veal or lamb.

A big veal chop goes for $21.95, osso buco for $18.95, a rack of lamb for $19.95. Everything else goes for $17.95 or less.

Portofino seats 140 and serves dinner seven nights a week. It is at 13251 Ventura Blvd., Studio City, (818) 986-3190.

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Ventura Boulevard got another new place last week--Denari restaurant in Encino, serving Italian food with a distinctive twist and moderate prices.

Chef Stefano Mazzi is from the Piedmont in northwest Italy, tucked under the Alps and known for its vineyards, among other attractions.

Mazzi’s most recent stint was as executive chef at Tuscany II Ristorante in Westlake, and he brings a light touch to the creams and cheeses that distinguish the cooking of northern Italy.

His signature dishes, however, sound as Sicilian as they do Piedmontese. They include:

* Rollatini of Colorado Angus beef with roasted peppers, smoked pancetta and garlic;

* A free-range chicken breast caramelized on a hot stone and served with rosemary and garlic;

* Grilled Tasmanian salmon with a sauce of mascarpone, wine, lemon, basil and capers;

* Cioppino with Santa Barbara mussels and ribbed clams in a spicy broth of garlic and tomatoes;

* A charbroiled chicken breast topped with arugula and tomatoes concasse (chopped).

Prices max out at $13.95.

Denari seats 100; general manager Gary Blanco hopes to open a patio seating another 30 within a week or two. It is at 17239 Ventura Blvd., Encino, (818) 907-8107.

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Cal Calbassi and his chef, the inventive Matt Evans, have overhauled the menu at Tabu Bistro, Calbassi’s popular Tarzana place, to reflect the advent of autumn--distinguishable in Southern California not by falling leaves but by the heat of day.

Among the new items: a chicken quesadilla, chicken ravioli in a sauce of roasted tomatoes, salmon pasta with a lemon garlic sauce, pecan-crusted chicken and garlic mashed potatoes, herb-crusted halibut with a tropical lemon sauce, grilled tri tip in a merlot sauce, a rack of lamb with a cabernet bordelaise sauce, and sauteed veal scallops with sun-dried tomatoes and Marsala.

Prices top out at $15.95 for the rack of lamb. Tabu Bistro is open for lunch five days a week and dinner every night. It is at 18607 Ventura Blvd., Tarzana, (818) 758-9368. Benito Prezia celebrates the fourth anniversary of his Buon Gusto Ristorante in Mission Hills with two specials through the end of September:

* 20% off the price of any bottle on his wine list on Fridays and Saturdays, and

* A $12.95 four-course dinner Sundays through Wednesdays featuring an appetizer of mozzarella marinara, soup or salad, chicken parmigiana or red snapper with pasta or vegetables, and a dessert of flan.

Buon Gusto Ristorante is at 15535 Devonshire, just west of Sepulveda, (818) 893-9985.

* Juan Hovey writes about the restaurant scene in the San Fernando Valley and outlying points. He may be reached at (805) 492-7909 or fax (805) 492-5139 or via e-mail at jhovey@gte.net.