RESTAURANT REVIEW : So Near and Yet So Far : Tastes of Moscow and Manila are found in Glendale. Deli serves hearty Russian sandwiches. Tiny cafe has fresh Filipino fare.

GLENDALE —  This city has turned into one of our more vibrant examples of California as melting pot. Along Colorado Street are dozens of strip malls offering delicious encounters with various ethnic foods. In some cases, a step from one storefront into the next can seem like a ticket halfway around the world.

Moscow Deli is a market, not a restaurant, but it is perhaps this city’s best destination for a hearty Russian sandwich. A man named Ruben Babayan runs the business with his sister, Narine, and their colorful glass display case gives you an idea what to expect. Here are dozens of imported and domestic cold cuts, most unfamiliar to non-Russians, and great chunks of smoked fish from Mother Russia herself.

Smaller refrigerated cases around the deli contain more unusual items. There are Baltic, Caucasian and Eastern European foodstuffs, such as tkemali , the exotic Georgian sour plum sauce; Riga rye, a dense Latvian-style rye bread; pertsovka , a peppery sauce with a label that explains it as “Russian salsa, Mexican style.”

You can eat at one of two small picnic-style tables, though most customers order for takeout. Most days, Narine prepares a meaty borscht from pickled cabbage, beets, cubed beef, a bit of potato and a few carrot sticks (no sour cream in this borscht). Her brother will make you The Moscow, a monster sandwich that is the Russian equivalent of a Dagwood: any five meats or cheeses from the deli case, either on traditional black bread or, if you like, on a French roll. Go with the Russian bread, I say--it’s better suited to these assertively meaty flavors--and if you don’t have any preconceived ideas about what you want on the sandwich, trust Babayan’s choice.

I did, and most of the meats on my sandwich were new to me. One was Dragobitch, a Ukranian pork and beef sausage with a garlic and pepper bite. Another was Sovietskaya, a fatty beef sausage. To those, Babayan added a salami called Rostovskaya (it looks like a Genoa), some Finnish Havarti cheese and a few slices of smoked pork shoulder, as well as mustard, mayo, lettuce, tomato and onion. I told you it was huge. I gave up about a third of the way through.

The fish is imported straight from Russia, via a company called Royal Baltic. Babayan sells it either by the pound or in sandwiches livened up with onions, cream cheese and whatever other condiments you care to add. I tried two fish, one a sushi-like smoked sea bass, the other a tender, strongly cured Russian salmon ( semga --the “e” is the peculiar one also found in Russian words like Gorbachev, so semga is pronounced siomga ). The portion sizes are, again, mammoth.

Since Babayan is a Russian Armenian, look for unusual Armenian beverages to accompany the food. Try Tarragon, a strange green lemonade that really does taste like a sprig of the herb. For a stronger taste, consider pomegranate juice--rich, ruddy and nearly as overpowering as any of the salamis.

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A fragrant, five-table cracker box named Cafe Manila is directly next door. Given the limitations of this tiny place, I find the food quite remarkable. Everything is made fresh daily, and there is healthy variety. You might, for instance, order a breakfast dish like tapsilog : cured beef served with two eggs and either a plate of fried rice or a bowl of steaming hot noodles. And then there are the nine or 10 hot dishes--sitting in a pint-sized steam table--which the chef will ladle out generously over a mountain of steamed white rice.

Use the overhead blackboard menu as no more than a rough guide. The chef says it’s all a matter of what’s on hand at any given time. One thing not to miss is the house specialty, beef pares , which may be the best $2.49 lunch anywhere in L.A. It has three parts: rich oyster sauce fried beef, fried rice topped with crisp fried onions and a bowl of hot, spicy soup. Incredible stuff.

One dollar gets you siopao , a softball-sized, Chinese-inspired steamed stuffed bun, with a choice of beef or chicken in the center. The dishes on the steam table are also fine, hearty, home-style foods, infused more often than not with heavy doses of garlic or salt. They include chicken adobo (stewed chicken marinated in soy sauce and vinegar) and beef apritada, a salty beef stew with olives and aromatic spices.

Count on seeing the grilled fish known as hasa-hasa , which has a mackerel-like flavor. You also run into the pork stomach Filipinos call estofado . At the start, lumpia Shanghai are tiny, deep-fried egg roll cylinders with a meaty center. At the finish there is yema , a peanut candy that comes in lollipop-colored cellophane wrappers.

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WHERE AND WHEN:

Location: Moscow Deli, 1415 E. Colorado St., Glendale.

Suggested Dishes: borscht, $1.99; The Moscow, $4.99; smoked fish sandwich, $4.99.

Hours: 9 a.m. to 9 p.m. daily.

Price: Lunch for two, $10 to $16. No alcohol. Parking lot behind restaurant. Visa, MasterCard, American Express, Diners Club.

Call: (818) 547-0799.

Location: Cafe Manila, 1415 E. Colorado St., Glendale.

Suggested Dishes: siopao , $1; beef pares , $2.49; chicken adobo , $2.75; lumpia Shanghai, $2.50.

Hours: 9 a.m. to 9 p.m. daily.

Price: Lunch for two, $7 to $10. No alcohol. Street parking. Cash only.

Call: (818) 247-5787.