HANG ONTO YOUR PLATE, HERE THEY GO AGAIN . . .

I had a nice little dinner at the Columbia Bar & Grill in Hollywood not long ago. Nothing special, but nice--and I liked the sort of brand-new Old Hollywood feeling of the place. One thing jarred just a trifle, though: Our busboy had the gimmes. What I mean is, he couldn’t keep his hands off our table--or rather off the plates and glasses on our table. He seemed to hover at every moment, ready to pounce, and the instant any dish had been emptied or apparently abandoned . . . Swoosh! It was gone! This wasn’t good service: This was positively predatory. But, as I said, a trifle. Our meal was hardly ruined by the business, and I thought no more about it.

But then, the other day, I got a letter from well-known L.A./San Francisco free-lancer Chris Barnett (a man who, among other things, knows bars about as well as Hemingway knew, well, bars). He had had a meal recently at the Columbia with a fellow writer, he said, “and chalked up a few firsts.” To begin with, “we split a so-so Caesar and one microsecond after a waiter delivered the plates, another swooped in to remove mine. He thought I was ‘finished’ with the salad. Apology. . . . My boneless breast of chicken arrived, I took two bites, was jawing with my friend when a hand was thrust over my right shoulder, finger and thumb wrapped around my plate. . . . I told the waiter to back off. . . . Apology. . . . We were rhapsodizing about the old days when suddenly he said, ‘My wine, my wine.’ Sure enough, a quarter-full glass of Acacia ’84 Chardonnay, Carneros no less, had been snatched from under our noses. The offending waiter brought us both fresh, filled glasses and apologized, but three times in a single night?” Barnett goes on to wonder why the owners of the Columbia can’t “spare a few bucks and a few hours to train the staff.” Or, he adds, “is the owner shooting for a world record in turning tables.”

Columbia Assistant Manager Paul Hanley was dismayed to hear of Barnett’s (and my) experience when I called him the other day. “It’s certainly not our policy to rush people,” he assured me. “It sounds like maybe it was a slow night, and the staff was just standing around waiting for something to do. But that shouldn’t have happened, of course, and I guess it’s ultimately my responsibility if it did.” No big deal, Paul. But do try to get your guys to lighten up a bit. Slow down. Feel the rhythm of the thing. Stop and smell the roses--or at least notice the Acacia Chardonnay.

WHAT’S NEW: Roland Gibert, one of our town’s finest unsung chefs, has left his longtime post at Bernard’s, downtown, and is considering other offers at the moment. . . . Il Cielo has opened on the site of the old En Brochette on Burton Way. . . . Madeo in West Hollywood is closed for remodeling and is scheduled to reopen by the 30th of this month. A whole new kitchen crew has reportedly been imported from Tuscany for the reopening, and pizza ovens--to be used to cook meat and fish as well as pizza itself--have already been installed. . . . And elsewhere on the pizza front, the second California Pizza Kitchen has opened in the Beverly Center. Watch for more, maybe many more. . . . Trovare has just opened in Woodland Hills, with chef Michele Rignanese, formerly of the DDL Foodshow, in charge. . . . Ciatto is the latest addition to the Los Feliz area dining scene. . . . Nancy Silverton, formerly pastry chef at our own Spago and then co-chef with husband Mark Peel at Maxwell’s Plum in New York, has taken a summer job--as pastry chef at Bud’s in Manhattan. . . . Emilio’s in West Hollywood is now open seven nights a week for dinner and has started serving lunch Monday-Friday. . . . Tommy and Sandi Tang, whose Tommy Tang’s is one of the most popular restaurants on Melrose, plan to open a New York branch of the place this fall, in TriBeCa. . . .

CORRECTION: You don’t believe everything you read here, do you? Good. On June 16, for instance, I noted that the highly praised new chef at the Los Olivos Grand Hotel, Guy Bergounhoux, had worked, among other places, at Michael’s Waterside Inn in Santa Barbara. Michael Hutchings, the Michael in question, notes that Bergounhoux has not , in fact, ever worked for him--though, he adds, “I am flattered by the thought.”