Who’s minding this kitchen?

WHAT’S in a name?

Everything.

A little more than a year ago, Tim and Liza Goodell closed their Balboa Peninsula restaurant Aubergine, ostensibly to remodel. As the couple concentrated on new ventures, including Meson G, Dakota and 25 Degrees in Hollywood, Aubergine, once one of the most exciting restaurants in all of Southern California, was left shuttered and Tim Goodell relinquished the stoves for a more entrepreneurial role.

Then a few months ago I heard that Aubergine had stealthily reopened at the beginning of the year. It seems the Goodells sold the restaurant -- and the name -- to Dennis Overstreet, proprietor of the well-known Beverly Hills shop the Wine Merchant.

Aubergine the Second (hereafter to be referred to as A2) has a new chef, a new decor and an entirely different menu. And yet if you were to check out its website, you’d think it was the same restaurant because the new owners have the chutzpah to claim the praise lavished on the original and quite unique Aubergine.

It’s not. Anyone who reserves a table at Aubergine expecting to find Tim Goodell’s extraordinary cooking will be sorely disappointed. The revised Aubergine has very little to do with the original, other than the address and the physical structure -- and the fact that the new chef, David J. Man, worked under Goodell as chef de cuisine at Troquet, the Goodells’ Costa Mesa bistro.

Changing faces

THE Aubergine that won all the praise was elegant and quite formal, but A2 is casual and not at all elegant. The entrance to the modest Newport Beach cottage has been changed with the idea, I think, of creating more room for tables.

Now you enter through a small, cluttered room with a counter and an array of very pricey wine bottles with legendary names such as La Tache or Romanee-Conti, prominently displayed in a glass-fronted cabinet. On top, six chef’s toques, three on each side, form a chorus line with a short-sleeved chef’s jacket beribboned with some kind of award and a jeweled brooch in the shape of a bottle. Is this tacky or what? A computer stands at the ready, too, along with a clutch of coat hangers. Oh, and in case you’d like to get a case of that old Burgundy or Bordeaux you just paid an arm and a leg for, there’s a stack of Wine Merchant catalogs on a stool by the door.

The dining room is so jammed with furniture, it’s awkward negotiating your way past the pudgy upholstered slipper chairs to your table. Bistro-style mirrors above the banquettes reflect the room and its well-heeled, beach-bronzed occupants. A good many are locals who stop by for dinner or squeeze in for a drink at the small bar. Glass sconces swirled with confetti colors dot the walls, but what is the point of those flat-screen monitors, mounted hospital-style, in the dining room? All three are tuned, not to the baseball game, but to the goings-on in the long galley kitchen.

In terms of entertainment, it’s not exactly Iron Chef back there, but the kitchen views do come in handy the night my guests and I decide to splurge on the one holdover from the original Aubergine’s menu, terrine of foie gras. I remember how none of us could ever stop eating it in the old days, even though we knew first courses and entrees were yet to come. I don’t expect it to be inexpensive, but I’m not happy when the waiter who touted it as a special avoids mentioning the price -- $50 -- until I ask.

Although terrine de foie gras is something that’s already prepared, ours takes so long to arrive I begin to wonder if we’re the first to ever order it on this team’s watch. After 15 minutes, I glance up at one of the video monitors. That’s why it’s taking so long: There’s nobody in the kitchen.

When our terrine arrives, it’s ceremoniously presented: the rosy foie gras in a canning jar, as at the original Aubergine, along with an innovation, three tiny crocks of jam. Why? None of us has any interest in eating jam with our foie gras, and we’re even more baffled when the “toast points” turn out to be toasted raisin bread, too sweet not to interfere with the taste of the foie gras.

It’s a moot point, because the terrine is a huge disappointment. The liver doesn’t have much flavor. It’s too cold, and grainy besides. Could it have been frozen? We don’t know what to think. The silken texture and the way foie gras melts on your tongue is a huge part of the pleasure of eating it. For $50, this foie gras is a big fat zero.

Meanwhile, our waiter is back, asking us if the terrine is delicious. Maybe the fact that we barely dented it would have been a clue if she were really interested. More annoying, the waiters here tend to be overly solicitous, as if they’re talking to idiots, continually coming by to ask, “Is everything delicious?” It’s enough to drive a person crazy.

Shouldn’t somebody -- the chef, the manager, the waiter -- already know that the tall, soggy potato cakes beneath the smoked salmon look and taste as if they were made days before? Perfectly awful. Hearts of romaine salad with grilled asparagus passes muster, but it’s certainly not extraordinary.

I quite possibly would have enjoyed the steak ‘n’ eggs -- steak tartare topped with a quail egg -- if it hadn’t been so doused with truffle oil that it was like eating raw beef marinated in after-shave. Fish and chips in the guise of halibut sashimi with some sad-looking root vegetable chips is just silly. The best thing about it is the shishito pepper salad that comes with it.

Venture deeper into this menu and the execution becomes even more wobbly as the kitchen struggles to perform above its level. Black cod in parchment paper is completely overcooked, and that’s hard to do with such an oily fish. The duck confit that’s in there with it is more like a thin, chewy slice of ham. A couple of bites and that’s it, I’m done. Same thing with the “crispy skin” duck breast. It would be difficult to find a more tasteless piece of duck than the one served here with sticky forbidden (Chinese black) rice and a ginger gastrique (sweet-sour reduction).

The idea of continuing to call this restaurant Aubergine seems extraordinarily stupid or extraordinarily cynical, I can’t decide which. No one would even be comparing the old and the new restaurants otherwise. And believe me, there is no comparison, not in the quality of ingredients, the imaginativeness of the menu, the execution of the dishes, nor in the service.

Yet somehow, the waiters all seem convinced that this is a temple of fine cuisine, cheerily recommending the $95 or $110 or whatever-price tasting menu, which is just a collection of dishes straight off the a la carte menu, and uninspired at that.

The crowd is a mix of regulars and tourists dressed up for special-occasion dining as if they’re eating in the best place in town. The two couples next to us one night chat desultorily like old friends, discussing a house remodel and troubles with a daughter-in-law. They seem to know people at other tables too, and one woman comes over to say hello, curious about what everyone had. “Oh,” replied the remodeler, “the usual -- what I always have.”

She’s like many people, a diner who fixes on one or two dishes at a favorite restaurant and orders them again and again. Without ever venturing into the larger menu, she’s convinced this place is terrific based on her two dishes. If somebody, like the Zagat guide, asks her to rate the restaurant, she’s likely to give it high marks. She’s happy here; isn’t everybody?

Something to try

TO be fair, there are a few dishes that don’t offend. Among the appetizers, the puree of summer pea soup is pleasant enough, served with a miniature bacon and egg sandwich on the side. And the Stilton blue cheese souffle is a perfectly decent straight-ahead souffle baked in a cappuccino cup. Only two main courses are at all worth ordering: the steak frites and the poussin pot-au-feu. The steak is a bone-in New York prime cut, a beautiful piece of beef, but $45. The fries are thin, crisp and absolutely freshly fried. Finally, something you really want to finish.

Poussin pot-au-feu is baby chicken in its juices with wild mushrooms, fingerling potatoes, fresh corn and other spring vegetables. But hold the truffle oil. In one meal, our group happened to get four dishes with truffle oil. That constitutes abuse.

The wine list is puzzling in a restaurant owned by someone in the wine business. Although it includes a number of older bottles, it doesn’t offer much that’s truly exciting or adventurous. If you want to spend upward of $200 for a California Chardonnay, you can drink some fabled Peter Michael or Marcassin. But something intriguing from the Rhone or the Loire Valley? Not a chance.

If you know wine and don’t have deep pockets, pickings are slim. Of the 65 domestic wines listed under Cabernet Sauvignon and Meritage, only four are priced under $75. And so it goes. It’s hard to find anything you’d like to drink that’s less than $60 -- and bringing your own is verboten on the weekends. Best picks include the Michel Colin Meursault for $65 and Ken Wright’s Oregon Pinot Noir for $75.

Desserts, I’m afraid, don’t save the evening. There’s the usual inescapable chocolate souffle cake and an apple turnover that tastes like one of Pepperidge Farm’s rejects. I loved the idea of strawberry shortcake with aceto balsamico until I tasted the pound cake that stood in for the shortcake, topped with strawberries that were far from sweet. However, help is on the way in the person of a new pastry chef.

Meanwhile, the kitchen is in dire need of an editor, somebody to say yea or nay. From the sparse crowd on a weekend night, it looks like the public is already doing so.

*

Aubergine

Rating: Unsatisfactory

Location: 508 29th St., Newport Beach, (949) 723-4150; www.aubergine-restaurant.com.

Ambience: Sweet cottage on Balboa Peninsula with a bar, a small back terrace and a cozy private dining room with a view of the kitchen. The rest of the largely O.C. crowd can look into the kitchen via three monitors mounted in the dining room.

Service: Awkward and intrusive.

Price: Appetizers, $9 to $50; main courses, $22 to $45; dessert, $8 to $11; tasting menu, $95 to $115.

Best dishes: Stilton souffle, poussin, steak frites.

Wine list: Strong on Bordeaux, Burgundy and Napa Valley, with rare and older vintages at high markups. Corkage, $20, except on weekends when bringing in wine from the outside is not allowed.

Best table: One in the front window, where you won’t be able to see the kitchen monitors.

Details: Open for dinner Tuesday through Thursday from 5:30 to 9:30 p.m.; Friday and Saturday until 10 p.m. Full bar. Street parking.

Rating is based on food, service and ambience, with price taken into account in relation to quality. ****: Outstanding on every level. ***: Excellent. **: Very good. *: Good. No star: Poor to satisfactory.