Homey Polish Dishes Bask in California Light

Christopher Piotrowski has traveled a rather winding path. He was born in southern Poland and worked as a waiter in Chicago and Los Angeles. Later he spent four years cooking for nuclear inspectors in the Soviet Pacific.

A man with such an unconventional resume can be hard to predict. His latest effort is as chef-owner of a Huntington Beach restaurant, California Bistro. If the name doesn’t impress you, don’t worry. This restaurant is anything but nondescript.

The menu is largely California staples--salads, pastas and rotisserie meats--but it includes a few traditional Eastern Europe favorites as well. Imagine a restaurant where you can get stuffed cabbage and tofu with spinach and garlic in a soy vinaigrette.

The best dishes at this engaging, utterly romantic little stop may well be the Polish items, but don’t blame Piotrowski for downplaying the Polish connection. Southern California’s most notable Polish restaurant, Santa Monica’s Warszawa, is nearer a neighborhood with a high concentration of Eastern Europeans. Anyway, a good deal of what is served here could really be considered Californianized Polish. Piotrowski cooks in a light, healthful style, even when preparing the traditionally heavy foods of his native land.

Trellises twined with ivy, potted palms, candlelight and live music provide much of California Bistro’s romance. One wall is painted with a lush mural of ferns. By the door is a small stage, on many an evening home to a jazz singer and French-language songstress known as MaDee. A witty Polish woman waits the tables. She may not be as polished as some French waiters, but she is one of the most charming servers I’ve met in a long time.

The real stars, though, are the chef’s homey dishes.

*

Piotrowski studied at a Polish culinary academy, but I’d bet anything his California borscht was locally inspired. This ethereally light, ruby-colored soup is simply the best beet soup I’ve ever tasted. It’s made with julienned strips of fresh beet, butter beans, a little cabbage and a few beef bones, which produce a delicate, wonderfully perfumed broth. It would be a travesty to sully it with sour cream, Russian style, though I’m told many of Piotrowski’s customers do.

Pierogis are another Polish delight. These are chewy, pot sticker-sized dumplings, similar to their better-known Ukrainian cousins, vareniki. Piotrowski stuffs them either with a potato-cheese or a cabbage-mushroom filling and tops them with a homemade mushroom sauce. The potato pierogi, my recommendation, is unexpectedly light--light as a feather, in fact.

The chef is a stickler for freshness, so he often runs out of items on this small menu. He doesn’t buy tofu every day, for instance, and he won’t serve shrimp, a main ingredient in at least three of his featured dishes, unless they are up to his standard.

When it’s available, try the appetizer called shrimp Oriental: two black tiger shrimp coated in seasoned bread crumbs and doused with a delicate soy-based sauce. Another good starter is marinated herring, bathed in extra-virgin olive oil and wine vinegar.

Entrees come with soup or a beautiful mesclun-cucumber-tomato salad; choose either soy vinaigrette or a delightfully herbal creamy garlic dressing. On a wintry night, try Grandma’s plate--pierogis, stuffed cabbage, Polish sausage, sweet-and-sour cabbage and potato pancakes. If you like the idea but hesitate because the dish seems more than you can handle, rest easy. The stuffed cabbage does have a dense meat filling, but there is only a small chunk of that garlicky sausage, the sauces are delicate and the potato pancakes are crisp and airy.

*

The chef recently introduced bigos, a slowly simmered cabbage-and-potato casserole he loads up with pork, beef, sausage and garlic. Bigos is the national dish of Poland. I once ate a great one on a train in that country, but this version puts the Polish Amtrak to shame. When available, it’s the best thing Piotrowski makes.

The restaurant prepares linguine with clams that would put most of our local Italian kitchens to shame as well. The noodles are correctly al dente, the clams squeaky-fresh and bathed in a rich white wine fumet. Another good one is clams and black tiger shrimp tossed with penne and a thick marinara sauce. For vegetarians, there is a baked casserole of colorful bit-sized chunks of eggplant, peppers, purple onion, mushrooms and tomatoes, sprinkled with a snuffbox-sized dose of fresh herbs.

Just outside the kitchen stands a small rotisserie where a couple of juicy, appetizing apple-stuffed chickens turn slowly. Chateaubriand bistro style turns out to be magically tender slices of beef tenderloin resting on a dark, penetrating wild mushroom reduction. Rack of lamb, a bargain at $16.50, is a couple of chops in a sauce mildly redolent of mint. (They’re a little fatty--those who like their lamb well trimmed may want to pass.) Duck is oven-roasted with sweet spices and served with a tart, citrus-based sauce.

The dessert list is short, but items are long on presentation. You can get fresh berries with a splash of Grand Marnier, a fine warm chocolate sauce and a scoop of pistachio ice cream. And one evening I found a trio of tiny cake slices--lemon, chocolate and cheesecake--each with its own fruity sauce.

California Bistro is high-end moderate. Starters are $3.95 to $5.50. Entrees are $8.50 to $16.50.

* CALIFORNIA BISTRO

* 6078 Warner Ave., Huntington Beach.

* (714) 841-3619.

* Dinner 5-10 p.m. Tuesday-Thursday, 5-11 p.m. Friday-Sunday.

* American Express, MasterCard and Visa.