To stand outside in the driveway of 2936 E. Chapman Ave. in Orange for any length of time is to feel the bludgeoning force of suburban anonymity.
Platoons of cars blast along the throughfare, the width of an airport runway, with a cumulative rage that makes the mere thought of crossing the street a horrifying prospect. Signage on the other side identifies a gas station, food mart and strip mall anchored by the office of a psychic. The lone human figure, in stationary presence, has no place here.
Just to your right, a horizontal stand of thick vines along a stucco wall forms a protective embrace around a modest, typically Southern California house with a terra cotta roof, as if to shield it from the punishing indifference of the surrounding landscape. A modest sign outside announces The Hobbit, the only notice you’ll see regarding the site of one of Orange County’s restaurant miracles.
A lot of diners think they’re entering some kind of restored mansion when they show up at 7. Such is the transformation from an ordinary house (the upstairs bar is located in what was once a kids’ bedroom) into a cozy, elegant setting you might find at an expensive stop in southern France for those in the know.
The illusion is deliberate. If you consider the leisurely, four-hour dinner the crème of European civilization, or of civilization itself, this is the place for you. Nothing is left to chance. In fact, you can’t even walk in unannounced. There was a time you had to wait a full year for a booking. Now, three or four months is the standard, though if you’re supremely lucky and there’s no upcoming holiday or private party on the horizon, you just might get in under four weeks. If enough diners live up to their 11 p.m. post-cordial and dessert promise to come back, that just makes it tougher for new arrivals.
The drill is this: At 7 p.m., guests arrive at the wine cellar, which stocks more 1,000 labels, for hors d’oeuvres and a flute of Champagne, over which they decide on the wine to have with dinner. Owner/chef Mike Philippi and his wife, Debra, help with the selection if needed. Then the party moves upstairs for a first course of fish or shellfish (on a recent menu: cherrywood-smoked Alaskan salmon with grilled baby asparagus and chanterelle mushroom jasmine rice with bacon) followed by fowl or light meat (fire-roasted lamb sirloin with stewed white bean cassoulet and merguez sausage), and a salad (braised Belgian endive on a bed of frisee with Thai basil vinaigrette, blood orange and grapefruit supremes, crumbled Gorgonzola and toasted walnuts).
A break or “intermission” follows, for guests to sit out on the patio, visit the chef (the entire staff is friendly), or just chill outside. A palate-cleansing sorbet clears the way for the main course, with vegetable, followed by dessert and liqueurs.
The Hobbit’s Yelp page includes 266 mostly boisterous reviews and, as a kind of pictorial samizdat, plenty of savory cellphone shots of entrees like sea bass with saffron risotto and basil, and chocolate lava cake with torched Italian meringue and salted caramel Grand Marnier sauce, enough to exact a twisting sensation of cruel and unusual punishment in the solar plexus of an epicure without a reservation.
With some modification for changing tastes and dining habits, this has been the way The Hobbit has been run since 1972, when a Long Beach couple named Howard and Beverly Philippi, both chefs and Francophiles, decided to scout Orange County to stake a claim on behalf of the culinary good life. In Orange they discovered a Ukrainian place called Ukramata, a former residence situated on what was once an orange and avocado grove, and went into a partnership to make it essentially what it is today.
The choice of J.R.R. Tolkien’s mythic little tribe as a name says something about the spirit of the enterprise.
“The Hobbits,” reads the legend by the door, “love peace and quiet (and) dislike machines … they like to laugh and eat (six meals a day) and drink … they like pranks and the giving and receiving of presents … .”
“It took off rather quickly,” says Mike Philippi, 63. “Women were entering the workforce then and enjoyed the chance to not have to cook. There wasn’t much fine dining in Orange County. Chez Cary, Ambrosia and the Villa Fontana were all pretty much what we had and were situated close together.”
By 1973, the place was booked every night it was open (the prix fixe charge was $14.50; now it’s $86). The wine component came from Philippi-pere’s drives north to Napa Valley to bring back cases of California’s best (he later opened his own vineyard); and to add to the sense of adventure, you entered through a storm door in the back. Now, a more conventional side entrance and foyer gain you access to a central location.
“Ninety per cent of restaurants now are corporate-owned,” Philippi says. “They have no personality. This is the opposite of an In-N-Out burger joint. You can come here expecting a dining experience.”
Like many kids who grow up in a family business (“my parents believed in child labor”), Philippi tried other jobs, such as working an airplane production line as a teenager. But some of his early tutelage came at the hand of European chefs, and it wasn’t long before he came drifting back, beginning as a waiter at Cafe Lafayette in Orange County and then a stint in Saratoga. By the late ’70s, he knew where he wanted to be, and bought the restaurant from his parents. The kitchen is home to him, while Debra deals with everything out front. The young staff is attentive and informed.
“They stay with us,” Philippi says. “We put a lot of kids through college.”
Mike McKinney, 33, is the impeccably turned-out house manager and head sommelier. He was a philosophy major at Biola University, but wryly observes, “Philosophy is not a lucrative profession.
“This restaurant is a landmark,” he says. “It speaks to people who want more than a rat race, or rushing around doing things with no purpose. Sharing a good time over food and wine is one of life’s great pleasures.”
Contact the writer: Got a favorite local restaurant that’s decades old? Email lrchriston@hotmail.com
