The Wreckoning - May 7, 2007

"I'll Have the Taco Platter and the Mini-Facial To Go..." A reasonable request at Señor Fred.

Señor Fred Restaurant. (Valet in blue.)

Where in Los Angeles can you open a menu and have your choice of taquitos, ensalada de pollo and a custom leather couch? The answer is Señor Fred, a dungeon of a Mexican restaurant on Ventura Boulevard in Sherman Oaks. Owner Andre Guerrero, the man behind nearby Cal-Asian mainstay, Max, has continued his steady take-over of the neighborhood by opening this high-end alternative to its chief rival, the Teflon-coated juggernaut that is Casa Vega. But despite Casa Vega's mediocre food, indifferent service and inexplicable crowds, that place at least bears some measure of authenticity. Señor Fred is pure confection. At Casa Vega, the servers are Mexican men in their forties who have probably been working there for many years. And why not? The joint is always packed. At Señor Fred, your servers will be white kids in their twenties, possibly with headshots.

Everything at Señor Fred seems forced and created, right down to its name, which is borrowed from Guerrero's son, Fred. I have no idea if the younger Guerrero is of Mexican heritage, but one wonders if the link between namesake and cuisine is any more tenuous than that of Andre Guerrero's other son, "Max" to his eponymous, Asian outpost further down Ventura.

Señor Fred offers updated versions of traditional Mexican fare. But in today's restaurant parlance, "updated" means "toned down for white people." Sometimes, of course, this isn't such bad thing. In the case of Chinese food, toned down is a prudent move. Perhaps it was the bowl of boiled chicken feet dumped casually in front of me like a basket of tortilla chips on my last trip to China that made me realize this. Señor Fred is authentic Mexican food like P.F. Chang is real Chinese.

The décor defies description, but I shall try. In a style possibly called "torture-chamber chic," heavy iron chandeliers hang from the pitch-black ceiling like Medieval confinement cages. Snake plants slither up the blood-red walls of the bar. The booths are deep pits that stress inescapability over intimacy. The walls in the dining room appear to have once been gilded gold leaf that's given way to a fuzzy shroud of moss and mold--hardly a wallpaper choice that inspires the appetite--but there are so many bad choices on display at Señor Fred that listing them all feels gratuitous. I only know about the slap-dash tile mosaics on the back wall because I've read about them. In truth, the main dining room is so fucking dark you end up pawing around for your food like a famished raccoon feeling his way through an upturned trash bin. I'm not sure why some Mexican restaurants are compelled to make their customers feel like they are dining in caves. Is this to remind us of some bandits' hideout in the Mexican mountains? Did we go spelunking and stumble upon El Dorado? Turn the damn lights up and let me see how much you over-cooked my enchiladas! Perhaps the seriously cheap IKEA lights that stretch across the ceiling don't get that bright. I wish Señor Fred, Casa Vega, Mexicali and El Coyote took all the money they save on electricity and put it into hiring some valets who won't mess with my stereo buttons.

The lights at Señor Fred are set so low that I couldn't fully appreciate the joint's most egregious display of phoniness until I got home. The menu, all two and a half pounds of it, stands as one of the tackiest, most intrusive and self-defeating offenses I have ever witnessed from a restaurant that isn't The Cheesecake Factory. The thick red binder is so bulky that my friend could barely get it down his pants so that I could properly study it under some decent halogens. On the back of each heavily laminated page is a glossy advertisement for, well, let's have a look...Here's one for reverse mortgages from Wells Fargo which pairs nicely with the dessert selections.

A crippling interest payment, the perfect ending to any meal.

Choosing a wine is always a contemplative process, but add the possibility of getting hair extensions at 20% off and the whole endeavor proved entirely daunting.

Hmmm...red, white or platinum blonde?

But when it came time to choosing between the salmon, the tamales or having my entire house cleaned, I was simply flummoxed.

Apparently this isn't an escort service, but I called anyway.

Not only is the very presence of these ads an abhorrent transgression, but the ads themselves reek with cheese, desperation and bad taste. Headshots anyone?

I can't decide which photo is creepier. Please note the "special offer" above the website.

Three of the ads belong to local realtors stressing their personal touch and flashing American Idol levels of teeth bleaching. But Monty "The Iceman" Iceman takes the cake with his shout-out to the Hollywood set.

Don't you want Monty working your special area? I emphatically do not.

What is so perplexing about the decision to subject customers to shameless, glossy advertisements at a supposedly classy restaurant is why the owners chose to stop with the menus. How about ads on the placemats? Why not put up a few plasma flatscreens to run spots for local merchants? That would cover the lease in no time. Or better yet, scrap the uniforms and put all the servers in T-shirts sporting the name of the local car wash or Tokyo massage. Hasta la commerce!

Señor Fred, a cave in Sherman Oaks. Decent Mexican food, fantastic skin peels, so-so jewelry repair. No prices listed on the tequila page--man, that pisses me off.

Posted by Aaron Black at 3:01 PM