Glitz Without the Shine : The Plow and Angel Pub Has Charm but Service, Food Are Erratic

The Plow and Angel Pub at Santa Barbara’s San Ysidro Ranch has plenty of charm--it’s the food and service that are sometimes in short supply.

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Nestled in the foothills above Montecito, the ranch has a couple of hundred years of Spanish and Mexican history, a guest register of illustrious names, and a contemporary reputation as a resort hideaway for the glitzy people.

The full dining room is upstairs; downstairs, surrounded by eucalyptus trees and flower gardens, is the venerable Plow and Angel. Remodeled in recent years, the charming pub has low, beamed ceilings and whitewashed rock walls. Its intimacy is accentuated by its modest seating capacity of about 35.

Outside on the patio, facing the ranch’s old adobe, one can drink and dine in the early evening while watching the sun set and the limousines discharge formally dressed passengers going upstairs to eat.

When a certain lack of consistency is not bedeviling the pub’s “American regional” cuisine, the kitchen--which also serves the restaurant upstairs and concocts several dishes common to both menus--can produce a couple of excellent pub items.

The SYR Backyard Burger ($8.95), with a slightly charred bun made on the premises, is large and succulent, the sort of thing you expect of pub grub. The lightly fried and seasoned tobacco onions and aged Cheddar cheese are perfect.

The barbecued duck and sweet corn calzone ($10.95) is another winner. The shell is fresh and crisp, but not too crisp and not too thick. Inside, the corn nuggets give the dish a nice crunch and the tomatillo sauce is slightly sweet. Duck, Jack cheese and sauce come together for a tasty, juicy meal.

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The penne pasta ($9.95), which comes with grilled chicken and sun-dried tomatoes in a goat-cheese cream, can be excellent. And there are no complaints about the crisp shrimp and deep-fried calamari ($6.00), with lemons and capers.

Other menu listings are not so consistently good. Neither are the drinks. In a pub, you naturally look for quality libations. But the drinks at the pub are inconsistent and sometimes even short. Perhaps because the young bartender spends some of his time introducing himself to new customers, reaching across the bar to shake hands, and not enough time doing his job.

One evening, when a couple asked that the jukebox--did I forget to mention the jukebox?--be turned down, the bartender mumbled the equivalent of “I’ll show them” and turned up the volume of the baseball game on the TV over the bar.

Maybe he’s a buddy of the smiling waiter who served us on the patio one evening. This guy starts out great with the drinks, but then proceeds to do a fine job of destroying the meal. He brings the food and, when someone asks for a fork, nods cheerily but walks over to another party, takes their order, has a brief discussion of wines and, finally, returns with the fork. This turns out to be typical.

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Another drawback: The intimacy inside can be blasted to smithereens in the evening by bands who apparently think they’re playing in a much larger space.

Is the atmosphere and the reputation of the ranch enough to tolerate the Plow and Angel’s food and service deficiencies? Well, there are some mitigating delicacies. Plates arrive at the table with a main item that may be mediocre but a side dish that can be quite good. The cornmeal-battered onion rings ($7.50) can be so wilted that you could slide them around your wrist without breaking the crust. Yet, the accompanying ancho chili ketchup is a great dip for the rings.

A chopped salad ($4.50), with fairly large chunks of fresh vegetables, is nondescript, but the cave-ripened blue cheese on top is yummy. The pan-fried salmon cakes ($11.95), although not chintzy on the salmon, either lack the requisite seasoned crust or are over-peppered. And, please, ignore the chilled artichoke soup with Florida rock shrimp ($6.75), which is absolutely devoid of flavor.

I’m a big garlic lover, so believe me when I say that the garlic in the stonehouse Caesar salad ($7.50) was just too strong to eat. Another time, that salad was fine.

I don’t know whether chef Gerard Thompson, who’s been at the ranch now for about two years, is always on the premises. I just hope he doesn’t think that charm, by itself, is enough.