Alain Giraud

The Santa Monica farmers market is more exotic. The Hollywood market is bigger and the new Altadena market more devoted to tiny organic farms. But the most charming place to buy vegetables in Los Angeles may be the Sunday morning market in the Pacific Palisades, a village street lined with flower merchants and fruit growers and bakers of dense sourdough breads. It's just a bit politer, a bit spiffier than the markets tend to be in town - even the strawberries seem to be arranged into neat rows.

Hungry Cat Hollywood's birthday bash: The Hungry Cat in Hollywood is throwing itself a birthday party on Friday in celebration of the restaurant's eighth anniversary. The bash will pay tribute to chef and owner David Lentz's hometown of Baltimore by featuring an outdoor barbecue, pit beef sandwiches, grilled oysters, a raw bar and $8 cocktails on the dinner menu. Call for reservations. 1535 N. Vine St., Hollywood, (323) 462-2155, www.thehungrycat.com . Alain Giraud at the Strand House: Champagne and caviar are what's on the menu for the next dinner in the Strand House's Culinary Masters series.

Franklin CANYON PARK, a sprawling wilderness in the Santa Monica Mountains high over Beverly Hills, is one of L.A.'s best-kept secrets -- a place to hike, to read in the shade, to relax -- a place, perchance, to picnic. A Mercedes SUV pulls up at road's end next to an open field framed by lazy sycamores and California live oaks. Out jumps Alain Giraud, L.A.'s leading French chef (and until recently the chef at Bastide), followed by his wife, Catherine.

Booze in America: On Saturday, the Culinary Historians of Southern California present a lecture on “American Drinking History” at the Los Angeles Public Library. Culinary historian Andrew Smith from the New School in New York will explore what Americans drink and why, considering influences such as traditional British beverages like ale and hard cider, beverages made popular by the arrival of immigrants and marketed concoctions from the beverage industry such as Coca-Cola and Snapple.

Who makes the best croissant in Los Angeles? Apparently, that has been a subject of hot debate on the news side of the Los Angeles Times staff. To settle the argument, they came to the experts - the Food team. They brought in their favorite 10 croissants from various sources and four judges - Jonathan Gold, Betty Hallock, Noelle Carter and I  - settled in for a tasting. Often with contests like this the votes are widely scattered as the differences tend to be minimal. Not so in this case.

Imagine a restaurant set in a demure building at the back of a garden planted with lavender and olive trees. The house is trimmed in the pale muted blue of southern France; the cooking is perfectly Provencal. For a chef like Alain Giraud, who put in years at Citrus as chef de cuisine, Bastide is a dream come true. Open during the week only, Giraud and his small team are always in-house. The kitchen is state-of-the-art, furnished with a fortune in copper pots that are used daily.

Booze in America: On Saturday, the Culinary Historians of Southern California present a lecture on “American Drinking History” at the Los Angeles Public Library. Culinary historian Andrew Smith from the New School in New York will explore what Americans drink and why, considering influences such as traditional British beverages like ale and hard cider, beverages made popular by the arrival of immigrants and marketed concoctions from the beverage industry such as Coca-Cola and Snapple.

IN the end, Bastide was just too French for commercial director-cum-restaurateur Joe Pytka. Later this month, Pytka will be closing the tony Provencal restaurant on Melrose Place that he famously spent $3.5 million to open in October 2002. In its place, he plans to open a new restaurant this spring that will be, well, less French. "I want the restaurant to be more reflective of Southern California," he says.

First there was the Oscar Mayer Wienermobile. Now, there's the Bastide Mini Cooper. We've seen chef Alain Giraud tooling around town in the cream-colored cutie. Giraud, with his shoulder-length white-gray locks, and his company car, with its "B" logo and Bastide license plate, are a memorable sight. Joe Pytka, Bastide's owner, got the idea from his kids. "I had to send lunch over to my daughters, to the school," he recalls.

Alain GIRAUD, the Provence-born chef who has had a long and successful tenure in Los Angeles, most recently at Bastide, has started a company called Four Stars Private Cuisine. Although Four Stars might sound like a small catering company, Giraud rejects the "catering" label because, he says, "I don't have the structure to do big mass catering." Instead, he says, he's doing small dinner parties for 12 to 20 people, drawing clients from fans of his food at Bastide.

Who makes the best croissant in Los Angeles? Apparently, that has been a subject of hot debate on the news side of the Los Angeles Times staff. To settle the argument, they came to the experts - the Food team. They brought in their favorite 10 croissants from various sources and four judges - Jonathan Gold, Betty Hallock, Noelle Carter and I  - settled in for a tasting. Often with contests like this the votes are widely scattered as the differences tend to be minimal. Not so in this case.

The Santa Monica farmers market is more exotic. The Hollywood market is bigger and the new Altadena market more devoted to tiny organic farms. But the most charming place to buy vegetables in Los Angeles may be the Sunday morning market in the Pacific Palisades, a village street lined with flower merchants and fruit growers and bakers of dense sourdough breads. It's just a bit politer, a bit spiffier than the markets tend to be in town - even the strawberries seem to be arranged into neat rows.

IN the end, Bastide was just too French for commercial director-cum-restaurateur Joe Pytka. Later this month, Pytka will be closing the tony Provencal restaurant on Melrose Place that he famously spent $3.5 million to open in October 2002. In its place, he plans to open a new restaurant this spring that will be, well, less French. "I want the restaurant to be more reflective of Southern California," he says.

Alain GIRAUD, the Provence-born chef who has had a long and successful tenure in Los Angeles, most recently at Bastide, has started a company called Four Stars Private Cuisine. Although Four Stars might sound like a small catering company, Giraud rejects the "catering" label because, he says, "I don't have the structure to do big mass catering." Instead, he says, he's doing small dinner parties for 12 to 20 people, drawing clients from fans of his food at Bastide.

Franklin CANYON PARK, a sprawling wilderness in the Santa Monica Mountains high over Beverly Hills, is one of L.A.'s best-kept secrets -- a place to hike, to read in the shade, to relax -- a place, perchance, to picnic. A Mercedes SUV pulls up at road's end next to an open field framed by lazy sycamores and California live oaks. Out jumps Alain Giraud, L.A.'s leading French chef (and until recently the chef at Bastide), followed by his wife, Catherine.

First there was the Oscar Mayer Wienermobile. Now, there's the Bastide Mini Cooper. We've seen chef Alain Giraud tooling around town in the cream-colored cutie. Giraud, with his shoulder-length white-gray locks, and his company car, with its "B" logo and Bastide license plate, are a memorable sight. Joe Pytka, Bastide's owner, got the idea from his kids. "I had to send lunch over to my daughters, to the school," he recalls.

Every chef dreams of having a fairy godmother, someone who can wave a magic wand and magically supply everything needed to make a dream restaurant come true. Alain Giraud got one. His Bastide, one of the most talked about restaurants in Southern California, should open early next month, barring yet another a last-minute delay.

AT one time, French restaurants were the epitome of fine dining in L.A. It's no secret, though, that Angelenos have pretty much abandoned French food and with it, formal dining, for the relaxed pleasures of Spago and the California idiom or for Italian restaurants where maitre d's pass out kisses like bonbons and everybody who walks in the door feels as if they've just landed a plum role in "La Dolce Vita."

Imagine a restaurant set in a demure building at the back of a garden planted with lavender and olive trees. The house is trimmed in the pale muted blue of southern France; the cooking is perfectly Provencal. For a chef like Alain Giraud, who put in years at Citrus as chef de cuisine, Bastide is a dream come true. Open during the week only, Giraud and his small team are always in-house. The kitchen is state-of-the-art, furnished with a fortune in copper pots that are used daily.

AT one time, French restaurants were the epitome of fine dining in L.A. It's no secret, though, that Angelenos have pretty much abandoned French food and with it, formal dining, for the relaxed pleasures of Spago and the California idiom or for Italian restaurants where maitre d's pass out kisses like bonbons and everybody who walks in the door feels as if they've just landed a plum role in "La Dolce Vita."