Dining Out

Mary Furr

Baci that most Italian of restaurants has succumbed to the currently

trendy buffet service. Just inside the door owner/chef Angelo Juliano has

set up a four-tray steam table, a big bowl of mixed salad, pizza squares

and a plate with crusty bread slices.

The buffet ($6.95, Monday through Friday), convenient and as fast as

you need to keep on schedule, sacrifices nothing to speed. The big bowl

holds romaine, red leaf, watercress, baby greens, cucumbers, purple onion

slices and mushrooms. There is a creamy Ceaser-like dressing to douse it

with -- great with the crusty homemade bruschetta rubbed with garlic,

topped with tomato and onion and drizzled with olive oil. It’s tempting

to overdo on the salad urged on by manager Oscar Anselmi who has been

friends with Juliano since their days in restaurants in Switzerland,

London and Bermuda.

The hot entrees change daily and include chicken, fish and beef. When

we were there recently it was tender-boned slices of lightly floured

chicken piccata sauteed in white wine sauce sprinkled with capers --

those tiny buds that add such zestiness to the excellent combination.

Another tray holds a hearty dish of sliced Italian sausage in a chunky

tomato and bell pepper sauce and squares of pizza are brought in hot from

the kitchen. There is enough variety here to challenge any appetite and

since it changes daily, you’ll find a favorite.

The next tray -- bow-tie pasta in a ground mean Bolognese sauce -- is

thickened with tomato and celery and seasoned with garlic, herbs and

olive oil. The quality of imported olive oil adds richness to the firm,

chewy pasta.

On another visit a sweet chicken Marsala flavored with the fortified

Italian wine, has mushroom halves, and just as tempting is a mean dish of

tender beef -- crusty at the edges and sauced with red and green

still-firm bell peppers. The pasta, a slender linguine, is a delicious

combination of intensely flavored sun-dried tomato and prosciutto,

Italian for “air-dried ham.” It’s the kind of pasta that looks mild but

carries a lot of flavor. The lunch buffet is just another testimony to

the great variety of the Italian cuisine.

Desserts are not included on the buffet lunch but are important enough

to chef Juliano to have a menu all their own. Tortufo al Cioccolato Nero

Flambe’s ($7) is the ultimate, a dark chocolate truffle shell over

vanilla ice cream, doused with a mix of Grand Marnier and Drambuie, which

is flamed by Oscar. Owner Juliano created the dish while working as a

chef in Switzerland and said he was tempted to call it “strip tease” as

the flaming sauce spooned over the truffle slowly revealed the vanilla

ice cream beneath.

Coupe Denmark ($5.50) one of several ice creams, fills a tall

soda-like glass (coupe) with hot chocolate sauce and whipped cream

reminiscent of a fountain soda you’d find in an old-fashioned drug store.

Banana Split ($4.50) is not what you have known but a dark chocolate

frosted Italian gelato strawberry with maraschino cherry pieces and

frozen chocolate layered with rum-dipped yellow cake -- another very

satisfying sweet.

You feel as if you’re entering an Italian village as you step into

Baci’s charming interior of arches and winding streets created by artists

Franco Masci, a friend Juliano brought from Rome to do interior. On one

wall is written “Se magna e se bene in allegria” (eat and drink in

happiness). Though the buffet may offer a quick lunch, the lovely

fanciful interior begs you to slow down -- stay awhile in the village,

make friends with genial host/manager Oscar.

* MARY FURR is the Independent restaurant critic. If you have comments

or suggestions, call (562) 493-5062 or e-mail o7 hbindy@latimes.com.f7

FYI

Baci Italian Restaurant

WHERE: 18748 Beach Blvd. (north of Garfield Avenue)

HOURS: 11:30 a.m. to 2 p.m. Monday through Friday; dinner, 5 to 10

p.m. daily; Easter Sunday, 12:30 p.m. to closing

PHONE: (714) 965-1194