California Pizza Kitchen: Pies With A Tasty Spin

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1/2 California Pizza Kitchen, 10525 N.E. Sixth St., Bellevue. ($) Lunch and dinner ($4 to $10) 11 a.m. to 10 p.m. Monday through Thursday; until 11 p.m. Friday, Saturday. From noon to 9 p.m. Sunday. Full bar. Major credit cards. No smoking. Reservations and takeout: 454-2545. -----------------------------------------------------------------

The corporate colors of the California Pizza Kitchens ("CPK" on their menus) are a busy-beelike black, white and yellow. A corporate photo on the takeout menu, and also in black, white and yellow, depicts four layers of overlapping California freeways. Home.

California Pizza Kitchens, one of the nation's fastest growing midscale restaurant chains, is spreading faster than milfoil on AARP boat trailers. It was started in 1985 in L.A. by Larry Flax and Rick Rosenfield, based on a regional culinary premise by the innovative, expansive and puckish Wolfgang Puck - designer or California pizza.

(As in Tandoori Chicken Pizza with mango on the side. Or the Moo Shu Chicken Calzone.)

While such cross-cultural adventures might get one incarcerated in Naples or Palermo, they actually can be quite tasty. And the CPKs, from their ebullient L.A. genesis, have since spread from coast to coast. There are now 79.

The Northwest edition landed in Bellevue last year, a mirrored semicircle of smallish, high-gloss tables and booths in blond woods and black vinyl, black carpets, bright yellow ceiling, chrome accents and a yellow neon stripe over white-tiled wood-burning ovens. It's usually packed.

Excellent salads

In variety, audacity and design, the CPKs are a modish step up from most nationwide pizza chains. They offer nine excellent salads - from $3.95 for a small Caesar to $8.95 for a big Shrimp Louie, made with quality Canadian bay shrimp.

Along with 27, mostly non-Italian pizzas (never dreamed of in your philosophy, Horatio), they serve 16 pastas, only one of which - thankfully - contains ginger and black beans. Spaghetti, angel hair, linguini, fettucine, etc. Here, rigatoni is believed to be an opera.

You can start with one of the salads - the Romaine with Watercress ($6.95 for a meal-sized portion, or $3.95 for the half portion, which nevertheless fills up a dinner plate) is lavishly dressed with a Gorgonzola and basil-balsamic vinaigrette (a bit sharp, but engaging) and an oversized scoop of toasted, seasoned walnuts. By way of contrast, I had a similar salad at a tony downtown cafe a few days earlier and paid twice the price for less than half the serving.

Barbecued Chicken Chopped Salad ($8.50 or $4.50) is a more flavorful option than their "Original" Chopped Salad, with cubed turkey breast, thinly sliced salami and chopped greens in a surprisingly mild herb-mustard dressing.

Liked the soups, especially the Potato Leek ($1.95). You can order it paired (side by side, in the same bowl) with Sedona White Corn Tortilla Soup for $3.95.

Flavorful toppings, so-so crusts

The signature items, pizzas, are thin-crusted, about 10 inches in diameter and characterized by the novelty (and freshness) of their toppings. Which is fortunate, because the crusts have almost no character at all. They are soft, mildly chewy and slightly sweet. There is little about them that suggests hard wheat, active yeast, salt - or sadly - the wood-burning ovens they emerge from.

As one friend noted: "The Shrimp Pesto ($9.95) is pretty good, the sun-dried tomatoes are nice and I like the imported black olives, but the crust tastes like something from a Pillsbury tube."

Regardless, the place is popular and the original pizza attraction, the Original Barbecue Chicken ($8.95), is still the top seller.

Tandoori Chicken Pizza ($8.95) bears its poultry sliced instead of cubed (as it appears in most other dishes) and tinted deep red with food coloring, as Indian tandoori also are. The rest of the pie presents sliced yellow squash, fresh cilantro and an appealing tomato-yogurt curry. The mango chutney - a bit sweet, but good - comes in a cup as a side.

Eggplant Parmesan Lasagna ($7.95) is enlivened with Marsala-marinated mushrooms and a very acceptable marinara sauce.

The Linguini Bolognese ($6.95) is a decent bowl of pasta and meat sauce, but hardly a real Bolognese ragu; which isn't surprising. I haven't found the genuine long-simered, cream-rich article yet - outside of northern Italy.

Desserts (around $4) are better than you'd expect from a national chain. In fact, the moist and boozy tiramisu was excellent.

(Copyright, 1996, John Hinterberger. All rights reserved.) John Hinterberger, who writes the weekly restaurant review in Tempo and a Sunday food column in Pacific, visits restaurants anonymously and unannounced. He pays in full for all food, wines and services. Interviews of the restaurants' management and staff are done only after meals and services have been appraised. He does not accept invitations to evaluate restaurants.