It’s a Sweet Place for Ribs

So this barbecue joint in Hollywood has valet parking.

OK, it doesn’t exactly have its own valet. The Pig is located on a hip block of La Brea Avenue, between Louis XIV Restaurant and the Showcase Theatre, and the Louis XIV valet will oblige Pig customers.

This is still some fancy barbecue. Inside, the place is a sleek re-creation of a ‘50-style lunch counter--complete with a jukebox and red and gold vinyl booths. You order and pay at a counter, though somebody will bring the food. Chef Daly Thompson, who comes from Memphis and has won a number of barbecue prizes, has also worked in L.A. at Checkers Hotel, a shrine of California cuisine, so this is the sort of barbecue joint that has appetizers.

One of them sounds like an Elvis Presley special: fried dill pickle chips. They turn out to be very lightly breaded, making something like a strange, vinegary tempura. The name of another appetizer, Smoky Mountain gumbo, signals that this is an inland gumbo, not one from the bayous. The effect is savory but not funky, like chicken and rice in brown gravy.

Daly really knows barbecue, and what comes out of his state-of-the-art barbecue pit is remarkably tender and smoky. Probably the most tender is the rib tip appetizer; the meat, an essence of pork flavor, practically falls off the tiny bones. It’s a bit sweet. Generally speaking, the Pig works at the sweet end of the barbecue spectrum.

The five barbecue sauces on the table (all bottled for the restaurant) are fairly mild--nothing you couldn’t eat right after surgery, as Homer Simpson would put it. If you want to make your food hotter, you add some Louisiana pepper sauce, and if you feel the need to cut the sweetness of, say, those rib tips, one of the barbecue sauces is moderately vinegary. (The mustard sauce is quite sweet, like certain German and Scandinavian mustards.)

As for the entrees, the meat on the hickory-smoked baby back ribs has been cooked down to a suave, velvety crust cloaking the bones. It tastes a little like the lean part of some exotic hickory-smoked bacon, only more tender. You can see how Thompson has won a barbecue world championship for these elegant ribs. They come with a sweetish coleslaw, a mustardy potato salad and boiled beans with a dash of vinegar and cumin.

The St. Louis-style spare ribs are a more familiar sort of barbecue, meatier and juicier. I would rate them among the best pork ribs in the city. The remaining pig meat choice on the Pig’s menu, a generous plate of pulled pork shoulder, is less flavorful and a bit dry.

There’s plenty here that isn’t pork. You can get apple-wood-smoked beef brisket, quite tender and moist for barbecued brisket. It comes with garlic mashed potatoes, mixed vegetables and sweet mustard sauce. The barbecued chicken is respectable but not outstanding. I’m more impressed with the “chicken-fried chicken”--chicken breast flattened into steaks, breaded and fried quite brown--especially for the old-fashioned bit of country gravy on it.

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You have a couple of sandwiches to choose from, including a catfish po’-boy with a mild, tangy mustard sauce. The fish is fresh and sweet too. Sandwiches come with Cajun slaw, a lightly dressed salad of red cabbage, carrot shreds and whole mustard seeds.

There’s even an outstanding hamburger. It’s thick, juicy and smoky, and you can get it with real Cheddar. The “home fries” that come with the burger are quartered potatoes fried dark brown.

The Pig makes its own desserts, and like everything else here, they’re in a bold, hearty American style. There’s a Karo syrup pecan pie, quite sweet but not so sweet that it sets your teeth on edge, which can happen with pecan pie. The Key lime pie is a rich cheesecake without much Key lime flavor.

The most impressive dessert is a disheveled sort of apple pie called apple rumble crumble, which comes dribbled with fresh caramel sauce. It has a wonderful thick, old-fashioned lard crust, like big pastry boulders amid the apple slices. After a plate of this, you’ll be glad to have a valet fetch your car for you.

BE THERE

The Pig, 612 N. La Brea Ave., Los Angeles. (323) 935-1116. Open 11 a.m.-11 p.m. Tuesday-Thursday, 11-1 a.m. Friday and Saturday, noon-9 p.m. Sunday, closed Monday. No alcohol. Street and valet parking. Major credit cards. Sandwiches $5.95 to $6.50, entrees $7.50 to $8.95, desserts $4.25 to $4.95.

What to Get: rib tips, fried pickle chips, hamburger, catfish po’-boy, baby back ribs, spare ribs, brisket, pecan pie, apple rumble crumble.