Musso and Frank
In our latest trip to Los Angeles, Mary had to go to some meetings while I had to hang out at the pool and ogle scantily clad seniors who were wearing bathing togs that were much too small for the amount of skin they had. I envied Mary.
To make it up to me, Mary finally agreed to take me to Musso and Frank Grill, an institution in Hollywood that I hadn't previously been able to check out. Mary hadn't been there in years. Musso and Frank is one of the last remaining relics of the glamorous days of Hollywood. The restaurant's heyday was in the period between the Twenties through the Forties, and it's apparently little changed from those days. The tables are all banquettes or booths, the walls are covered with dark wood beams and murals that are faded by decades of cigarette smoke. It has that men's club vibe that I like so well, though nowadays it's obvious that the majority of the clientele come from the tourist trade and a few remaining ancients who have eaten there all their lives.
We went in knowing that the food wasn't going to be particularly good. Apparently they haven't much changed the menu or for that matter cooking methods since the 40's. The menu is a great throwback to those olden days gone by. There are such classics as sardines, which you just know came from a can and are dripping with oil, and which I can't say I've ever personally seen on a menu (there's also a sardine sandwich). Stuffed celery too. Moving on to the salads you can find such bygone classics as chiffonade salad, stuffed tomatoes, and crab or shrimp louie. Where else today can you find a smoked tongue sandwich? I mean other than an old deli in New York, that is? The separate menu section devoted to potatoes amused me greatly. Ten, count them, ten different preparations! Wonderful! Well, one of the dishes encompasses sweet potatoes but I'm gonna count it too.
I took the opportunity to finally sample some sand dabs, while Mary went all traditional and all and had a steak. My fish were floured and fried, I think in butter, and weren't bad, just not dazzling. Mary's steak was obviously not the choicest of grades and while flavorful, took a little bit of jaw action to get through. The accompaniments were nothing to write home about. As someone surmised on Chowhound, the vegetables back in the Forties were canned and there's some speculation that the kitchen has seen no reason to change. I wouldn't completely discount that theory.
Still, it's not the food you go to Musso and Frank for - it's the history. And it does deliver that in spades. I doubt seriously we'll ever go back but I relished the experience. As Mary pointed out, if you can block out the couple in the next booth wearing shorts, flip flops and enough tattoos to outfit the Seventh Fleet, you can almost imagine yourself back in those days when the people were glamorous, the cigarette smoke would kill the average 21st century inhabitant, and the food might charitably be described as inoffensive.
