Spaghetti Westwood

TAKE an old Rat Pack haunt with a semi-illustrious past and a dwindling clientele, add a dedicated, hard-working chef in search of a restaurant, and shake. What do you get? A 43-year-old Italian restaurant with the chance of a new lease on life.

Matteo’s Restaurant on Westwood Boulevard, the Italian joint where Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin, Gregory Peck, Sophia Loren and a host of other stars once felt right at home (or so the wall of vintage snapshots would seem to indicate) has made some changes. And not in the decor.

The present owners, the Heron family, who bought the place from founder Matty Jordan’s family in late 2005, realize the value of the Old Hollywood look -- red booths that seat four comfortably, soft lighting from table lamps and a chandelier with leopard skin patterned shades (to match the carpet). This isn’t just a vintage “look,” it’s the real thing. But something had to be done about the food. Mired in an old-fashioned red sauce menu that distilled what fine dining meant, Italian-style, circa 1963, it was terrible.

And so Don Dickman, formerly chef and co-owner of the shuttered Rocca in Santa Monica, rides in to the rescue of both the restaurant and his stalled career. The dedicated 51-year-old chef hadn’t found a place to call his own since Rocca closed more than a year ago. He gave Valentino a try, briefly, but that wasn’t a good fit. So why not Matteo’s?

Dickman isn’t Italian, true. But he’s completely smitten with Italian food and, in fact, a good choice to turn the kitchen around.

He’s traveled and tasted, followed his heart more than his head, and when the force is with him, he is capable of turning out gutsy and delicious Italian food.

Just taste his supple half-moon ravioli stuffed with finely chopped chicken livers or his gnocchi sauced in oxtail ragu. This is a chef who understands the Italian idiom.

Old-timers can still find the best of the old dishes listed on Dickman’s new menu under “Matteo’s Classics.” But in a section that changes daily so it reflects what’s on his mind or in his walk-in, Dickman offers rustic Italian cuisine as it’s practiced in countless trattorie, osterie and ristoranti in various regions of that country.

You can’t go wrong starting with a plate of affettati misti (mixed cured meats): prosciutto from Parma, speck (smoked raw-cured ham from the Alto Adige region) and a selection of handcrafted Fra’ Mani salumi from former Oliveto chef and cookbook author Paul Bertolli. Here, the meats are lined up on a handsome square platter in orderly rows, and it’s quite the feast, cured lean and fat pork astutely seasoned with garlic, black pepper and herbs.

On a recent visit, our table zeroes in on small black mussels presented in an oval cast iron skillet with lots of butter and garlic, sort of Dickman’s version of escargots. There’s plenty of sauce too for four of us to sop up with our bread.

Another time, I try Dickman’s Italian wedding soup and love the fluffy little meatballs and swatches of Swiss chard bobbing in a rich poultry stock with shreds of egg and grated Parmesan cheese. This is a soup that’s worth a detour. For something heartier, consider the sauteed mushrooms served over bright gold polenta.

Arugula salad, though, is sharp and vinegary, the featherweight greens weighed down with awkward bundles of prosciutto wrapped around cheese and fried. Asparagus Milanese -- asparagus topped with a breaded, fried egg -- would be terrific if the asparagus weren’t so skinny and wan. There’s also a decent version of the classic antipasti of roasted scarlet peppers with anchovies on top.

A way with pasta

PASTA can be ordered as a primi or as a larger main course, with prices to reflect the differences in size. If you want to eat light, get the primi. If you know that everyone at your table will be begging for a taste of your spaghetti or ravioli, then go with the larger portion because Dickman has a fine touch with pasta. His pasta dough is usually supple and tender, and he rarely over-sauces. He cooks it al dente, which is not necessarily the old-school Italian way.

Spaghettini with sweet Manila clams is a perfect example. Studded with plenty of clams and neither too salty nor too oily, he gets the balance just right. My favorite right now, though, is the chicken liver mezzalune I tried on my last visit. They’re flat half-moons of pasta dough with an earthy chicken liver stuffing. A regular on the menu is millionaire’s pasta (good name, eh?), which is wide ribbon noodles tossed with real bites of Maine lobster, richly flavored shiitake mushrooms and scallions. It does kind of make you feel rich.

Sometimes, he features a delightful lasagna of homemade pasta layered with ricotta and fresh artichokes. The top is nicely browned and bubbling, and the lasagne sits in a puddle of intense tomato sauce. For a winter pasta dish, you can’t beat his strozzapreti alla Norcina. The twisted pasta (“priest stranglers”) is sauced with coarsely ground sausage in a ragout flecked with carrots and celery. This really looks like handmade food, and it has character.

Though I enjoyed the sweet little burrata-stuffed raviolini in a long-simmered veal osso buco sauce, the butternut squash tortelloni don’t quite work for me. They’re a bit chunky and clumsily shaped, and the pronounced flavor of the butternut squash doesn’t marry well with the sweet elements in the filling. I wish too that the pasta wasn’t served in high-sided bowls. It’s awkward to eat, and the opposite of appetizing when your pasta course arrives in something that looks like a white porcelain dog bowl. Plating, in general, is not this kitchen’s strong suit.

Compared with the pasta and primi, the secondi, or main courses, aren’t that inspiring. But they hardly ever are in Italian restaurants. Chicken al mattone, cooked under a brick to press every bit of skin against the griddle or pan, is juicy and moist with a crisp brown skin. Still, the bird could have more flavor.

A gigantic double pork chop is nicely cooked too, pink at the center and browned on the outside. But the pork is very dense, and I can’t imagine anyone slogging their way through this much meat at one sitting. Consider it a dish to share.

Skirt steak is a reliably delicious choice, cooked on the rare side of medium rare. Watch out, though, when the waiter asks if you want aceto balsamico and olive oil. Say yes, and before you can intervene, he’ll proceed to douse the steak in vinegar with abandon. Fortunately, most of it falls off the meat, so it’s OK in the end. Scottaditta -- finger scorchers -- are lamb chops. In Italy, these are usually the tiniest baby lamb chops. Here, a trio of big bruisers are stacked on the plate to form a pyramid. They’re OK, but nothing special. What’s wonderful, though, is the tender, beautifully cooked Swiss chard underneath.

For a chef to come into a kitchen that’s set in its ways after more than four decades and try to change its culture is a tall order. Dickman has certainly got the cooks’ and the waiters’ attention and is moving things forward, but they haven’t got it down consistently yet. Waiters seem jazzed about the new dishes, but not all of them are expecting questions from diners, and don’t have answers at the ready. I’ve had servers I’d recommend for waiter of the year, and others that were so annoying with their “Is everything delicious?” that I considered asking to be moved to another table to escape the constant interruptions.

There’s work to be done on the wine list to reflect what’s going on right now in the world of Italian wines. It needs someone to take it in hand and put together a list of wines appropriate for the menu. As it is, the list is dated and is missing some of Italy’s best winemakers.

Desserts are fairly limited right now. If tiramisu is on offer, go for that: It tastes freshly made and is less sweet than most versions around town. There’s the usual torta della nonna filled with vanilla-scented pastry cream, and for ice cream lovers, an ice cream sundae called coppetta Toscana.

Old meets new

DESPITE the changes, Matteo’s is never going to be mistaken for a trendy Italian restaurant. It’s never going to be chic or stylish, really. But that’s much of the point. The people who find their way to this Westwood restaurant are going to be those who appreciate Dickman’s cooking, or who treasure the retro-kitsch of the old place and may get a kick out of dressing to match the leopard skin carpet. Or anybody who appreciates a restaurant where the tables aren’t squeezed too closely together, and where it’s quiet enough to have a conversation without shouting over the music or the loud, merrymaking guests.

Can the old and the new coexist in the same ristorante? I think so. I suspect that even now, some old-timers are trying out the millionaire’s pasta and some newcomers to Matteo’s are crossing over to the classics side of the menu for veal piccata or something equally familiar with their Sangiovese or Nebbiolo.

But not everything is rosy. I can’t imagine Matteo’s is ever going to have the following of Dan Tana’s, even though it has much better food. It’s not a scene of any sort. And on a weekday night, it can be pretty empty. One evening it’s so quiet, the bartender hasn’t switched on the toy train in the bar. And even though only a few tables are occupied, it’s hard getting the waiter’s attention. At 8:30, the chef had already gone home for the night. What does that say? It says he’s tired, and not enough tables are on the book to warrant him staying around.

That meal was pretty mediocre. It’s a good thing I came back, because on later visits, with Dickman cooking, the restaurant was beginning to have some momentum. Slowly but surely, he’s nudging this grand signora into the 21st century without forgetting the past and the clubby coziness of this tribute to Hoboken, N.J.-style Italian cooking that got Matteo’s this far in the first place.

It’s worth remembering the beautiful Italian saying: “A tavola non si invecchia mai” -- you never grow old at the table.

virbila@latimes.com

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Matteo’s Restaurant

Rating: * 1/2

Location: 2321 Westwood Blvd., Los Angeles; (310) 475-4521; www.matteosla.com.

Ambience: Old-style Italian -- once a Rat Pack haunt -- with leopard-patterned carpet and comfy leather booths. The crowd is mostly old Hollywood, with some younger.

Service: Varies from considerate and professional to annoyingly intrusive.

Price: Cured meats and salumi, $10 to $26; antipasti, $5 to $16; pasta, $13 to $29; main courses, $21 to $38; sides, $6; desserts, $7.

Best dishes: Affettati misti (mixed cured meats), Italian wedding soup, asparagus Milanese, mushrooms trifolati, pan-roasted Maine mussels, artichoke lasagna, chicken liver mezzalune, strozzapreti alla Norcina, millionaire’s pasta, stuffed veal chop, chicken al mattone, tiramisu.

Wine list: Dated and uninspired. Corkage fee, $15.

Best table: A corner booth.

Details: Open from 5 to 11 p.m. Tuesday through Sunday. Full bar. Valet parking, $4.50..

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.