Celebrated Chef Plans to Add Flavor to Malibu Dining Scene

The ever-expanding culinary empire of celebrity chef Wolfgang Puck may soon touch the sandy shores of Malibu.

Puck, the creative force behind some of the trendiest restaurants in Los Angeles, said he expects to close a deal soon with one of the largest developers in the coastal community to open a new dining spot down the street from the star-studded Malibu Colony.

Attorneys for Puck and Roy Crummer, president of the Reco Land Corp., met recently to put the finishing touches on a 20-year lease for the yet-unnamed restaurant. It would be in the Malibu Colony Plaza shopping center under construction between Malibu Road and Pacific Coast Highway in the Malibu Civic Center.

“We’re hoping that it will be the jewel of Malibu,� Crummer said. “For a long time, we’ve been looking to get a really fine restaurant that will be a fun place to go. I consider this a coup.�

The new restaurant proposal is the latest in a series of expansions for Puck, who gained fame as a master of haute cuisine as the chef at Ma Maison and then became better known than some of his celebrity clients at Spago in West Hollywood. He became revered for uniting duck sausage and pizza, squab and peach sauce, and crab and ravioli. Later, when he opened Chinois on Main in Santa Monica, he explored combinations of French and Chinese cooking.

‘Capture Beach Flavor’

But the new restaurant, which Puck said would try to “capture the beach flavor� of Malibu, will be unlike his others. Puck said it will be a “modern, Mediterranean fish restaurant� that will cater to the casual, summer beach crowds as well as the richest residents in Malibu.

“The beach is a casual place,� Puck said. “I think the only thing formal about the restaurant will be the food. The restaurant will be different from the others. I don’t like to create clones.

“I see this restaurant to be somewhere in between the other two,� he said, referring to Spago and Chinois on Main. “I think Malibu is a good place for it because there aren’t that many interesting restaurants out there. Our goal is to make the restaurant fit out there.�

Puck said his wife, decorator Barbara Lazaroff, will design the new restaurant along the lines of the open, noisy style she made popular at Spago. Like the chic West Hollywood restaurant, the Malibu dining room will have an exhibition cooking area, with a kitchen near the middle of the restaurant. It will also have an outdoor patio and a bar. The structure will take up about 6,500 square feet of the 100,000 square feet of building space in the new shopping center. Construction costs are expected to run well over $1 million, Crummer said.

Tentative plans call for construction to begin about October. Crummer said the site probably will open about May, 1989.

Met Through Mutual Friends

Crummer said he was introduced to Puck through mutual friends about three months ago, and he asked the chef if he would be interested in opening a restaurant in Malibu. After several more meetings and a visit to the site, Puck agreed.

Puck, who has been criticized by some of his peers in the restaurant business for spreading himself too thin, downplayed the difficulties of opening his third restaurant in Los Angeles. He said the quality of food at the restaurants would not suffer because he has top-notch assistants at the other dining spots and years of experience in opening and running news establishments.

“We have been very successful with the other restaurants so far, and I don’t think this will be any different,� he said. “You have to find good help, and we have. But all I’m going to do is cook. That’s my job. I let the others do the rest.�

Recently, Puck launched a new line of frozen pizzas and desserts that he made fresh and famous among the glitterati at Spago. Last month, Los Angeles City Council, despite many objections from residents, approved a new brewery-restaurant in West Los Angeles, where Puck will serve primarily as a food consultant.

Puck’s ties to that restaurant were largely responsible for getting the pub approved, as his attorneys hired lobbyists and political consultants to sway the council. A majority of the council members seemed convinced that the restaurant, featuring an international menu with cuisine that “goes well with beer,� would be preferable to other uses for the site at 1845 S. Bundy Drive.

Little Resistance

Puck said he was surprised by opposition to that restaurant, adding that he expected little resistance to the new dining spot in Malibu.

“I will do my best to make sure it fits well in the community,� he said.

Malibu residents, who traditionally have fought developments that attract a lot of people to the community and increase traffic responded mildly--and favorably--to the news.

“Putting in one more restaurant is not going to do any more damage to Malibu or the Colony,� said screenwriter Ivan Goff, a longtime Colony resident. “I don’t think people will want to drive all the way out here. They’ll go to Spago instead. But it will be nice to have a very good restaurant in town.�

Leon Cooper, president of the Malibu Township Council, a civic group representing more than 1,000 homeowners, said he couldn’t find fault with the proposed development.

“I imagine that it will attract people from all over the county,� he said. “But I can’t criticize Puck. He’s going where the money is. Out here, I imagine the restaurant will be like a magnet.�

Crummer, the largest developer in the Malibu Civic Center, said he expects the restaurant to become a landmark. The restaurant will be within walking distance of Malibu Colony, a private beach haven for film, television and pop music stars.

“I think the experience of going to a Wolfgang Puck restaurant on the beach in Malibu will be unlike any other in Los Angeles,� Crummer said. “As far as business in Malibu is concerned, I see this to be something like a tide that raises all the other ships.

“But no matter how you look at it, I think it will be a change for the better. At the very least, it’s going to bring a very good restaurant to Malibu. I feel a lot better about it than if we had a Sizzler going in.�