Fused Personality : Owner melds what he learned at two successful eateries to create a Euro-Asian charmer.

Chic, spare Asiatique is one of the Valley’s best new restaurants, and it has Cafe Bizou and Outtake Cafe to thank.

Romanian-born owner David Berachet, who has worked at both of the latter, has brought along some of the restaurants’ better attributes. Like Cafe Bizou, Asiatique has $1 soups and salads with entrees and a minimal corkage fee. Like Outtake Cafe, it has an eclectic menu, in this case, Euro-Asian fusion.

Asiatique has a personality of its own, though. The minimalist dining room was designed by Jennifer Dolan, a name to remember.

Trellises are ingeniously mounted on the off-white walls; tropical ferns dot the room and the tables are set with bamboo place mats and hand-painted Chinese service plates.

Asiatique presents its food with equal parts verve and imagination. Vegetarian Thai spring rolls come with a nicely complex sweet and sour sauce and an interesting salad of shredded carrots laced with sesame oil. The name “shrimp and salmon mousse toast tempura” is a mouthful, but eating them is no problem. These flavorful fried shrimp and salmon cakes are first cousins of the Thai fish cake tod mun.

Asiatique salad combines julienned carrots, daikon sprouts, cucumbers, pine nuts and romaine with a refreshing raspberry sake dressing. Even better is the red grapefruit fennel salad, made with baby spinach and red onion. It’s one of the few successful attempts I know about that uses fruit in a leafy salad.

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The entrees are more Western. There’s a crispy whitefish much in the Bizou style, but here it comes with basmati rice and baby carrots with a caper remoulade. Sliced, roasted pork loin dances around a tart plum sauce and a pile of roasted potatoes brushed with olive butter.

The grilled halibut, served with snow peas and an oddball tangerine champagne sauce, is a bit mushy, and the seared rack of lamb (which is served with tasty pureed butternut squash and sauteed spinach) is rather spoiled by the sake kumquat sauce underneath the chops--it’s sugary, and clashes with the meat’s flavor.

For a mildly offbeat dessert, try the chocolate papaya mousse for a taste you may not have experienced, or the caramelized pineapple creme bru^lee, with a crackling sugar crust that is a natural for fresh pineapple.

This little charmer makes a statement, and one hopes the other restaurants on the street are listening.

BE THERE

Asiatique, 12321 Ventura Blvd., Studio City. Lunch 11:30 a.m.-2:30 p.m. Tuesday-Friday; dinner 5:30-10 p.m. Tuesday-Thursday and Sunday, and 5:30-10:30 p.m. Friday-Saturday. Closed Monday. Valet parking. Beer and wine only. All major cards. Dinner for two, $34-$57. Suggested dishes: Thai spring rolls, $4.50; red grapefruit fennel salad, $4.95; crispy whitefish, $11.95; pork loin, $12.95. Call (818) 761-7505.