The high life on the cheap

WRITERS are striking. Wall Street is in Grinch mode. Gas prices are rising, and holiday shopping is sucking our bank accounts dry. It’s a rare Angeleno who isn’t hurting this year, but that doesn’t mean we can’t show ourselves a good time. Less money just requires more of an imagination -- and in our opinion, that equals more fun.

So don’t think of yourself as strapped for cash; think of yourself as free to explore. It doesn’t take much dough to sample our city’s smorgasbord of neighborhoods: Culver City, Long Beach and Highland Park are three good choices for art walks. Babe’s and Ricky’s Inn is only one well-priced music venue bopping around tuneful Leimert Park. The L.A. Urban Rangers have mapped out all the access ways to Malibu’s coastline, while the Los Angeles Conservancy offers a concrete suggestion: “Just look up,” says communications manager Cindy Olnick. The myth is that L.A. is one big mall; the reality is that areas like downtown host world-class architecture. Or take a refreshing turn through San Pedro’s Vinegar Hill or Mar Vista’s midcentury Moderns.

Not that we’re downplaying the joys of dining at swanky eateries like Jar. But have you considered the thrill of eating out of a jar?

That was a joke. Read on for a few real solutions to downsizing your life -- without feeling like you’re scrimping at all.

--

Eating out

Before: Steak at Cut ($34-$160)

After: Fourteen bucks lets you grill your own sirloin at the Venice Room (2428 S. Garfield Ave., [323] 722-3075). The H.M.S. Bounty (3357 Wilshire Blvd., [213] 385-7275) scores for two reasons: Succulent lamb chops and a stiff drink will run you about $20.

Before: Sushi at Katsuya ($40 and up)

After: Noshi Sushi (4430 Beverly Blvd., [323] 469-3458) offers fists full of fish for negligible prices.

Before: Gelson’s Deli

After: One $3.99 lunch special from India Sweets and Spices (eight SoCal locations; www .indiasweetsandspices.org) could stretch for two days.

Before: Gourmet sliders

After: Yuca’s (2056 Hillhurst Ave., [323] 662-1214) is a James Beard-award-winning burger and taco stand busting your gut for about $5.

Before: Dinner at Craft ($50 and up)

After: Lunch at Craft (10100 Constellation Blvd., [310] 279-4180). A prix fixed $38 buys you three courses.

Before: Whist’s $55 Sunday Brunch

After: Oh, happy new year! All January, Whist (1819 Ocean Ave., [310] 260-7500) has whittled its price down to $20.08.

Before: Lucques by day.

After: Lucques by night. Past 9:30 p.m., the restaurant (8474 Melrose Ave., [310] 655-6277) unveils its bar menu, including terrific steak frites for $16.

Before: Jerry’s Deli

After: The famous beef French dip sandwich at Philippe the Original (1001 N. Alameda St., [213] 628-3781) costs $5.15, a pancake breakfast can still be had for $2.75 and a cup of coffee runs you one thin dime. You can’t afford not to eat at Philippe.

Before: Dominick’s Monday through Saturday

After: Sup at Dominick’s (8715 Beverly Blvd., [310] 652-2335) on Sunday nights for their $15 three-course prix fixe menu.

-- Eating in

Before: Trendy supermarkets

After: Ethnic supermarkets. Shopping inexpensive 99 Ranch (several locations, www.99ranch.com) might require more intestinal fortitude, but only of the metaphorical kind -- meat lovers, we can vouch for freshness and quality. We’ve personally enjoyed many a chicken dinner obtained from these parts, even if we had to view a few unorthodox chicken parts to obtain it.

Before: The produce aisle

After: Your neighbor’s tree. According to Fallen Fruit, any citrus treat overhanging public property can be pocketed by your rights as a taxpayer. For tips (and maps of fruit-filled ‘hoods), visit www.fallen fruit.org.

Before: Purchasing food

After: Sampling food. Families can fill up with just the freebies at Costco ( www.costco.com). For organic noshing, frequent the stands at your neighborhood farmer’s market.

Before: Omakase

After: Su casa. Mitsuwa (333 S. Alameda St. [213] 687-6699, call for other locations) offers sushi-grade cuts of seafood, plus all the fixings (rice, seasoned vinegar, nori and S&B;’s gourmet wasabi -- zingier than any we’ve been offered in a restaurant), all packaged for assemble-your-own dinners.

--

Entertainment

Before: Full-price movie tickets

After: The ArcLight is great -- for as much as $14 a seat, it should be. Shave off bucks with a membership; just by signing up (www.arclight cinemas.com), regulars can earn discounted and free tickets. Laemmle’s Sneak Preview Club ( www.laemmle.com) offers monthly freebies right off the bat. For $25 a month, the (semi) Silent Movie Theatre ([323] 655-2510, www.silent movietheatre.com) allows unlimited admissions, as well as one bucket of popcorn on the house. Tuesdays and Wednesdays, first-run movies at the historic (if somewhat rundown) Highland Theatre (5604 N. Figueroa St., [323] 256-6383) will set you back $3. Same deal but seven days a week at Academy Cinemas (1003 E. Colorado Blvd. [626] 229-9400).

At the Paley Center for Media (465 N. Beverly Drive, [310] 786-1000), singletons are free (donations are suggested) to view any of their 140,000 different programs in private kiosks. But groups of 15 or more can reserve whole theaters for just $6 a head. Tuesdays, classic movie matinees run $2 at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art (5905 Wilshire Blvd., [323] 857-6000). (After 5 p.m., the rest of the museum is free.)

Before: Paying museum entrance fees

After: Frequenting free nights. The Getty (1200 Getty Center Drive, [310] 440-7300) has a free Friday night concert series. In Long Beach, Fridays are free at the Museum of Latin American Art (628 Alamitos Ave., [562] 437-1689). Every day’s free day at the Workman and Temple Family Homestead Museum (donations appreciated); it’s genteel six acres in the city of Industry (15415 East Don Julian Road, [626] 968-8492) features an 1870s country home, a 1920s Spanish Colonial Revival mansion and one of SoCal’s oldest private cemeteries. Life-sized Michelangelo replicas, authentic tiki heads and a stained glass “show” of Da Vinci’s Last Supper every half hour -- they’re just giving it away at the Forest Lawn Museums (seven locations, different artwork, www.forest lawn.com, [800] 204-3131). The Museum of Jurassic Technology (9341 Venice Blvd., www.mjt .org) isn’t exactly free -- it takes five whole bucks to score admission to these stupendous halls of quirkery, including refreshments in the Russian tea room.

Before: The Nokia Theater

After: Neighborhood haunts. The legendary Ben Caldwell still oversees L.A.’s long-running hip-hop jam Thursdays at KAOS Network (4343 Leimert Blvd. [323] 296-5717); $5 gets you in. Every Monday night at nearby Babe’s and Ricky’s Inn (4339 Leimert Blvd., [323] 295-9112), 87-year-old proprietress “Mama” Laura Mae Gross serves up a steamy musical jam with free soul-food dinner on the side, all for $8. And now that the music world has been myspaced within an inch of its life, there’s no reason to fear small clubs (e.g. the Echo and 14 Below) on school nights: parking’s easy, covers are low and the Biblical Proof of UFOs is in the house.

-- Beautification

Before: $130 sea tonic scrubs

After: You want soothing? Try the reflexology or full-body massages at Thai hideaway Pho Siam (1525 Pizarro St., L.A., www.phosiam.com) for $25 and $40 respectively. The no-frills Massage Place (seven locations, www.themassage places.com) offer a blissful $44 for 60 minutes.

Before: Department stores

After: Sell or trade your clothes at Buffalo Exchange (three locations, www.buffalo exchange.com) or Crossroads Trading (four locations, www.crossroadstrading.com). Bring in your 2005 Marc Jacobs, come out with something Tim Gunn-approved.

Before: Vera Wang

After: Vera Wang for Kohl’s (Simply Vera Wang). Other fashion designers are collaborating with Target (Erin Fetherston, Loeffler Randall), the Gap (Pierre Hardy), Payless (Patricia Field).

Before: Shopping Loehmann’s, Marshall’s, Ross and TJ Maxx at any old time.

After: Seek out branches with the best selections (e.g., we recommend Loehmann’s in Burbank, and both the Marshall’s in Pasadena and in Montrose) on weekdays, when the new shipments arrive. Don’t forget Nordstrom Rack; Costa Mesa’s sports an entire section dedicated to high-end designers like Balenciaga and Versace, the vast majority under $500.

Before: Haircuts at a price only John Edwards could love.

After: The Vidal Sassoon Academy (321 Santa Monica Blvd., [310] 255-0011) gives students with valid ID cuts as cheap as $10.50. On alternating Wednesdays, John Frieda (8440 Melrose Place, [323] 653-4040) offers $40 cuts or $50 color for unfussy guinea pigs.

-- The great outdoors

Before: CityWalk

After: Walking the city. The Los Angeles Conservancy’s Curating the City program offers a detailed self-guided tour of all 17 miles of Wilshire Boulevard ( www.curatingthecity.org), as well as podcast guides to downtown (www.la conservancy.org). Request LA Commons’ neighborhood guide “Trekking Los Angeles: Local Adventures in a Global City” through their website: www.lacommons.org. Or just pick a neighborhood like West Adams, which contains one of the city’s largest collections of historic homes, as well as the affordable nonprofit 24th Street Theatre(1117 W. 24th St., [213] 745-6516), coffeehouse The Ragazzi Room (2316 S. Union St., [213] 741-1723), old school hangout Pete’s Burgers (2400 S. Hoover St., [213] 748-3206), L.A.’s first multicultural graveyard, the Angelus-Rosedale Cemetery (1831 W. Washington Blvd.), and the one-of-a-kind Velaslavasay Panorama (1122 W. 24th St., [213] 746-2166). As part of its mission to champion pre-cinematic entertainment, this weekend the Panorama features puppets in existential crisis, retelling Frankenstein (see page 19 for details).

Only your first one’s free, but every Saturday morning, the Pasadena Roving Archers ( www.rovingarchers.com, [626] 577-7252) offer classes, equipment included.

--

The power of 99 cents

Thanks to 99 Cent Only Stores, you too can live a champagne lifestyle on a beer budget. So what if the champagne is Asti Spumanti.

Be flexible: Certain staples -- bread, tortillas, toilet paper -- are in constant supply but other items pop up, then disappear like a Whac-a-Mole. No bananas today? Go for apples instead.

Forget brand loyalty: These stores rely on other chains’ overstock so trends change constantly. One week there’s Heinz, the next there’s Hunt’s, the week after a brand you’ve never heard of. Big deal. Ketchup is ketchup, even if it’s spelled “catsup.”

Scrutinize your produce: By and large, the produce is good and fresh. “Fresh,” of course, is a relative term, so a little cautious investigation goes a long way. Transparent packaging is your friend.

Don’t be a size queen: With prices fixed, size is often the determining factor. The 16-ounce jar of pickles from Oxnard is still a great deal and will pack more flavor than the 23-ounce from China. It won’t have lead in it either.