Taking Citrus to Santa Barbara

“I’m trying to come up with an un-formal hotel restaurant,” says Michel Richard. L.A.’s favorite French chef is talking about the July 15 opening of Citronelle, the restaurant he is opening in the Santa Barbara Inn on the corner of Cabrillo Boulevard and Milpas Street; the phone number is (805) 963-0111. The 150-seat ocean-front restaurant occupies the site of the former Don the Beachcomber, but the food is reminiscent of Citrus. Richard will even be serving his crab coleslaw and scallops with Maui onion rings. “The food will basically be the same as Citrus, only a little cheaper--$35 to $40 per person at dinner; $12 to $15 for lunch,” says Richard, adding that “people in Santa Barbara won’t stand for $50 tabs.” And since the restaurant is in a hotel, it will be serving breakfast as well. Chef Tony Pels, who has cooked at Citrus for the last three years, will be in charge of the kitchen but, adds Richard: “I’ll be up every weekend.”

THE SMOKING WARS: When Barry Fogel was president of the Beverly Hills Restaurant Assn., he led “The Charge of the Lighter Brigade” against the 1987 no-smoking ban in Beverly Hills restaurants. Now the Jacopo’s Pizzeria chain owner has switched allegiance. Faced with having to split his dining rooms into smoking and non-smoking sections, Fogel decided to ban smoking at all his restaurants. “It was a very tough decision for me,” says Fogel, “but we now know too much about second-hand smoke to ignore the facts.”

OPENINGS: Piazza Rodeo, an indoor/outdoor trattoria located beneath the belltower on Two Rodeo Drive, is now open for breakfast, lunch and dinner. But the real news here is that the restaurant offers free valet parking for two hours.

CHANGES: In the first major change since it opened five years ago, the El Torito Grill has a new menu. Look for innovations such as Southwestern crab cake with tomatillo butter sauce, three new mesquite-grilled seafood entrees; and soft tacos made of sea bass and served on handmade flour tortillas. Virtually everything is now cooked to order, the restaurant says, rather than saved on a steam table . . . Those who wait for the green tamales at El Cholo every year will be pleased to know that they’re back on the menu until the end of September . . . Frere Jacques in the City of Industry is planning to introduce Basque dishes along with a new take-out dessert service. It’s hired two new chefs--pastry chef Philippe Yvermogeo (who worked at Bernard’s at the Biltmore and Seventh Street Bistro) and Carlos Montana, a 17-year veteran of the San Gabriel Valley’s Chalet Basque restaurant . . . The Salisbury Manor, formerly located in a vintage 1898 stone mansion on West Adams Boulevard, has taken up residence in a different historic mansion. Owners Kathleen Salisbury and Bill Washington are now serving fixed price meals ($22 at lunch and $30 at dinner) in their new Salisbury Manor at 1345 Alvarado Terrace. It’s called the Powers House because it was built by developer and L. A. City Council President Pomeroy Powers in 1904.