The greatest Greek restaurant in the history of Los Angeles — and maybe all of California — was Papadakis Taverna in San Pedro. It wasn’t so much a restaurant, as it was a life-affirming experience — a joyous journey to Athens filled with music and dancing, hugs and kisses, wine and food and more wine.
It was impossible to emerge from an evening with the Papadakis brothers filled with anything less than joy, and a newfound zest for life. When they closed, more than a decade ago, those of us who loved an evening of retsina and moussaka with them as the fog rolled in over San Pedro went through a period of mourning.
That mourning wasn’t assuaged by the closing of Papa Cristo’s, which diminutive mustachioed owner Chrys Chrys also filled with nearly as much happiness as brothers John and Tom Papadakis.
In the years since, I’ve ventured to our finite number of Greek restaurants — Los Angeles leans more toward Tehran than Athens in culinary representation from the eastern edge of the Mediterranean. I keep hoping.
Which is how I found myself in the Greek Bistro in the heart of downtown Glendale, just a short hop from the iconic Americana at Brand shopping mall, and close to the legendary Persian eatery Raffi’s Place. (Which is to Middle Eastern cooking what Papadakis was to Greek — a destination on stilts!) The Bistro is a branch of a mall destination in Laguna Hills, where it offers diners the option of sitting outside, and watching shoppers obsessively abuse their credit cards. In the case of Glendale, cars are more common than walkers. But in both cases, options for shopping abound.
And so do classic Greek dishes, mixed with an assortment of foods from the Middle East, and a handful of American — or at least Americanized creations. As in the case of the Fitness Special Plate of grilled chicken skewers, grilled vegetables, hummus, baba ganouj — and, rather than pita bread, cucumber slices.
Dante’s Loaded Fries comes topped with gyro meat, onions, tomatoes and tzatziki. The less operatically named Greek fries are layered with crumbled feta cheese with a garlic sauce dip. (For the record: Dante was Italian. And he never tasted a potato in his life. But hey … it’s a good name anyway!)
Along with regional dishes like hummus, baba ghanouj and falafel, the menu here is a Hellenic greatest hits list. Served in a spacious setting, very soothing and cool, with lots of blue everywhere. I loved dolmas the first time I tasted them many eons ago. And I still love them today — both vegetarian and filled with ground beef in the case of the Greek Bistro (2.5 stars; 135 N. Artsakh Ave., Glendale; 818-322-4343; https://greekbistro.com).
There’s something soothing about the ancient flavor of grape leaves dripping olive oil, with yogurt-heavy tzatziki on the side. This is a taste of the foods eaten at the beginning of Greek civilization. The Greeks knew their philosophy. And they know their mezze.
I get as much joy from eating spanakopita — a crispy pastry packed with spinach, feta and onions — as I do from saying the word. Which trips off the tongue as easily as the ingredients coat the tastebuds. Ditto tiropita, a cousin dish, which is essentially spanakopita without spinach.
Saganaki is seared kasseri cheese — essentially a mound of melted cheese, flambeed in brandy tableside. Or, if you wish, with ouzo and shrimp. Melted cheese on steroids. And the most complex of all these dishes is a tie between the pasta and ground beef with bechamel Greek-style lasagna called pastitsio … and the moussaka, which is pastaless lasagna with eggplant and potatoes replacing the noodles, along with more ground beef.
This is soul-satisfying cooking — home cooking from the ancient world. I lean toward the classic dishes more than the more modern options of wild Pacific cod, Norwegian salmon, branzino and Chilean sea bass. At Greek Bistro, I want to eat like I’d like to imagine Homer did while he was writing “The Odyssey” and “The Iliad.” Though I doubt that he had a choice of cocktails with names like Santorini Sunrise and Athena’s Daiquiri. Nor a puff pastry dessert named for Napoleon.
The hero back then was Odysseus. Napoleon — never really a hero — was a couple millennia away.
Merrill Shindler is a Los Angeles-based freelance dining critic. Email mreats@aol.com.
Greek Bistro
- Rating: 2.5 stars
- Address: 135 N. Artsakh Ave., Glendale
- Information: 818-322-4343; https://greekbistro.com
- Cuisine: Just a few blocks from The Americana at Brand, the northern branch of this lively feta-and-spanakopita destination offers a break from shopping, along with cocktails with names like Santorini Sunrise and Aphrodite’s Passion.
- When: Breakfast, lunch and dinner, Sunday through Thursday; late dinner Saturday
- Details: Wine and sake; reservations essential
- Cost: About $60 per person
- On the menu: 18 Appetizers ($12-$28), 10 Salads ($17-$26), 1 Soup ($12), 16 Plates ($30-$49), 11 Bowls ($20-$32), 7 Pita Wraps ($17-$22), 2 Side Dishes ($3-$17), 6 Desserts ($6-$14)
- Credit cards: MC, V
- What the stars mean: 4 (World class! Worth a trip from anywhere!), 3 (Most excellent, even exceptional. Worth a trip from anywhere in Southern California.), 2 (A good place to go for a meal. Worth a trip from anywhere in the neighborhood.) 1 (If you’re hungry, and it’s nearby, but don’t get stuck in traffic going.) 0 (Honestly, not worth writing about.)