Tall Food, a Tall Order

La Cienega Boulevard’s Restaurant Row is undergoing one of its periodic realignments. Lawry’s the Prime Rib is moving its meat-and-potatoes show across the street, the Greek Connection moved in a few doors down, Koreatown’s Woo Lae Oak is making a bid for the West Side crowd, and Robert Gadsby, the opening chef at Pasadena’s Xiomara and interim chef at Santa Monica’s World Cafe, has turned up at a restaurant called Pyramid.

Images of ancient Egypt decorate Pyramid’s walls, but the true pyramid connection shows up on the plate--Gadsby’s food is tall . Salads are piled high, risotto cakes are turned on their sides and planted with a spare herb landscape, foie gras is stacked like a teeny layer cake frosted with sweet onion marmalade.

It’s too soon to tell whether Gadsby’s food will tend more toward good-tasting things like penne with curried lobster or more problematic things like an overcooked fricasse of scallops, abalone and spinach won-tons. Perhaps the food will become as consistent as it is tall.

* Pyramid, 163 N. La Cienega Blvd., Beverly Hills, (310) 657-6627. Entrees $15 to $18.