Music and laughter leak from behind a hedge as a friend points the nose of his car down into an underground Santa Monica parking structure. That's got to be it, surely: Hidden, but in plain sight.
Though the awning out front still reads "Schatzi's," the governator's former restaurant has been defunct for some time. In its place is a new spot named Hidden Restaurant. No more tough guys puffing Monte Cristo lookalikes. No more sorry veal schnitzel. Now the space has a pulsing, late-night lounge vibe. That's not unusual on a weekend, but this joint is rocking on a weeknight too.
On the night in question, the garden dotted with cherry red chairs is full up. That's OK because the music from the weaving and bouncing outdoor DJ verges on the earsplitting and we're thinking maybe we'd like to talk.
Inside, behind the bar, past the sushi bar section, is a long, spacious dining room with tables lined up against the banquettes and vaulted brick ceilings painted white. Nobody else is here and my group can't decide whether to wait for a table in the garden or sit all alone inside. The hostess assures us there are reservations for the room this evening, so we sit down.
Now comes the tough -- or the interesting -- part: ordering the food. Instead of going for northern Italian or contemporary California cuisine, say, the owners (who are the partners behind Via Veneto) propose four different cuisines for your delectation. There's that sushi bar , pizza from a pizzaiola fresh off the Milan express, tapas (is there anybody left who doesn't know that these are small Spanish tidbits?) and Vietnamese cuisine -- each with its own chef.
Think of it as a trendy, high-end food court where Santa Monica night owls can nibble on chicken oysters in a Marsala reduction, langoustine pizza with curry and Dom Perignon (label alert!) or jamón serrano and goat cheese from Sardinia, and Spanish mackerel tataki.
Put all that in a blender and you get this dizzy newcomer.
We skip the sushi, as we are sushi-ed out, and head straight to the long list of thin-crusted pizzas with some intriguing variations. Wood-burning ovens are tricky, and the pizza chefs are still working out the kinks. The dough is a little tough, but that can be fixed. However, our escarole, anchovy and olive pizza arrives without the escarole and no explanation. That doesn't bother me so much. What does is the quality of the ingredients: cheap, extremely salty anchovies will never a great pizza make.
