Rockenwagner: Remember the Name

Times may be tough in the restaurant business, but that isn’t stopping Hans and Mary Rockenwagner, proprietors of Rockenwagner in Venice and Fama in Santa Monica, from fulfilling their dream of moving to new, larger quarters. The couple has just signed a lease on the restaurant space in the Frank Gehry-designed Edgemar complex on Santa Monica’s Main Street--a space in which chef Peter De Lucca and his partners had planned to install a bar and grill last year, but which has in fact remained unoccupied since Edgemar opened in 1988.

“I see Edgemar as being like a modern town square,” Hans Rockenwagner says. The interior, being designed by David Kellen and Rockenwagner himself (the two also designed Fama) will elaborate on the town-square theme. “You’ll be sitting in a restaurant surrounded by the facades of buildings,” continues Rockenwagner. “One will actually be the kitchen, one will be the bar, one will be the deli, and so on.” The deli in question is a combination bakery and informal restaurant planned for one portion of Rockenwagner. Informal Continental-style breakfast and soups and sandwiches for lunch and dinner will be served there. The main restaurant will feature an expanded version of the present Rockenwagner’s menu, and will be open for lunch. “We might even have a hamburger and steak with fries,” Rockenwagner says.

The new Rockenwagner, which will seat a total of 75 (instead of 48 as the Venice location does), is scheduled to open in summer of 1991. Meanwhile, the fate of the original restaurant is undecided. “We have all kinds of ideas,” says Rockenwagner. “We might keep it and change the concept, or we might sell it. If we do close it, though, we’ll probably do it about a month before the new one opens.”

SABROSO DOS: Rockenwagner’s recently departed Venice neighbor, Sabroso, may not be gone for good after all. Restaurant owner Jeanine Coyle reports that one of her regular customers, distressed at her announced plans to temporarily retire (“I’m just going to take the dog and drive towards Guatemala,” she told this column recently), has found her a new location in Marina del Rey, where she plans to reopen early this coming year. “A lot of things have happened very fast,” she says. Watch this space for details.

ON THE FIRE: Jean-Francois Meteigner, former chef at L’Orangerie, has taken over the kitchen temporarily at Diaghilev, the newly renamed luxury dining room in West Hollywood’s Bel Age Hotel. . . . David Teck, former co-proprietor of Ingrid and David’s Gingerhouse International in Tarzana, has a new restaurant: the World Cafe in Santa Monica. . . . Fleetwood’s is new in West Hollywood, on the site of the old Palette. Namesake and co-owner (with Peter and Ernest Lepore) of the place is Mick Fleetwood, drummer for and co-founder of Fleetwood Mac. . . . Mori Teppan Grill and Hibachi Pasta is new in Glendale--the Hibachi Pasta part of the name refers to the restaurant’s specialty, quick-grilled Japanese noodles with shrimp, beef, chicken or assorted vegetables. . . . And, on Thursday nights through the end of February, Emilio’s Ristorante in Hollywood is serving that wonderful Italian “boiled dinner” called bollito misto --including beef, veal, veal tongue, capon, and cotechino sausage, with lentils, sauerkraut and assorted sauces--at $25 per person.

FRENCH NUMBERS: What are L.A.’s best restaurants--according to the French? The November 26th issue of FYI, a magazine published by Forbes, answers that question--or at least tell us how Andre Gayot of Gault/Millau rates local places. His listing of America’s top 40 restaurants includes five Southern California entries: Citrus (with a score of 18/20); Chinois on Main, Patina and Valentino (all with 17/20); and St. Estephe (16/20). The top-rated U.S. restaurants are Le Cirque in New York, at 19.5/20--the same score given by the French edition of the guide to such legendary establishments as Robuchon, Michel Guerard, Troisgros, Marc Meneau and Giradet; and then, at 19/20, Le Bernardin and Lafayette in New York (the latter of which has just lost its chef) and Jean-Louis in Washington.

COLETTE’S COOK: Famed French restaurateur, author and gastronomic godfather Raymond Oliver has died in Paris at the age of 81. Born in Langon, in the Bordeaux region, he learned his trade at his father’s hotel in the city of Bordeaux itself. In 1948, he and Louis Vaudable, proprietor of Maxim’s (which had been closed temporarily after the liberation of Paris), took over the venerable old Le Grand Vefour in the Galerie de Beaujolais near the Palais Royal. Almost certainly the oldest continually operated restaurant in Paris, Le Grand Vefour was opened in 1784 (as the Cafe Chartres), and had once played host to Diderot, Dumas and Victor Hugo. It’s even said that Napoleon courted Josephine there. By the 1940s, though, it had fallen into disrepair and disrepute. Oliver and Vaudable revived it, refurbishing its elaborate Directoire interior and winning back a latter-day celebrity clientele, including Colette (who lived a few doors away) and Jean Cocteau. In 1950, Vaudable went back to Maxim’s and Oliver became the sole proprietor--winning three stars in the Guide Michelin in 1954. Oliver’s kitchen became famous as a training ground for chefs--among its graduates is Claude Deligne, chef at Taillevent. He wrote at least 30 books on cooking and food history and broadcast several popular cooking shows on TV. In 1983, after he had lost his third star, and seen his dining room damaged by a terrorist bomb, he sold Le Grand Vefour to the Taittinger Champagne group--and a year later he retired from professional life. His son, Michel, has become a famous restaurateur in his own right, with the popular, casual Bistrot de Paris, among other establishments.

SCENES FROM THE CLASS STRUGGLE IN BEVERLY HILLS: Joss, the upscale contemporary Chinese restaurant on the Beverly Hills end of the Sunset Strip, offers what it dubs a “Maid’s Night Off” dinner every Sunday night--five courses at $18 per person. I wonder if potential customers have to provide proof that they employ domestic help?