As soon as I was seated and took my bearings in the Mecca Restaurant, I had to disagree with the expression of its self-image blazoned across the menu: “Eclectic American Cuisine with Mediterranean Influence.” The handsome decor is Mediterranean eclectic with a touch of American influence.

Roughly a third of the dining area looks like the tent of a Bedouin chieftain, drapes tied back to reveal a dim interior. In the rest of the dining room, however, boldly imaginative wall hangings in shades of beige and brown contrast with the stainless steel open kitchen where a cook or two prepare your meal on the far side of a shoulder-high counter. Overhead, big bright balloon hangings hide chandeliers.

Moving on to the menu, it seems clear to me that the list of entrees is an attractive mix of several cuisines and styles of cooking. Granted, a New York strip steak has a pretty good claim to American citizenship. But what is one to make of that Teutonic classic, a roulade, when it's made with breast of chicken, not beef, and stuffed with couscous, sun-dried tomatoes, and feta cheese? Or an exotic pizza Margarita Napoli?

However fanciful the menu language and the decor, what matters is what the kitchen puts on your plate. In the Mecca's case, the kitchen goes confidently through the menu, and the results are artfully arranged on your plate.

If you're a kabob fan, you'll find considerable satisfaction in the four varieties: chicken, tenderloin tips, seasoned and breaded ground lamb, and a combination of the three meats. The kabobs, disengaged from the skewers, are laid beside a trio of grilled vegetables - tomato, broccoli, onion, - and atop sweet rice. They are great, but as is my usual fate in ethnic restaurants, more than I could comfortably eat.

Inviting an extra splash of seasoning is a small cup of creamy, delicious tahini, which I added bite by bite to both meat and vegetables.

Three menu items deserve special mention: One is a luncheon-size plate of hummus as tasty as I can recall.

Another is the bread baked in this kitchen. A serving is roughly the diameter of a traditional pita, but its lightly toasted crust has risen over a very good, airy bread. If you are a fan of good bread, don't miss this.

Third is a wide choice of nonalcoholic beverages (the Mecca does not serve alcohol), from iced tea to lemonade and a fresh, fruity glass of blended mango, strawberry, banana, and honey. By themselves these are almost worth a trip.

Grape leaves - in a Mideastern restaurant they may be the one appetizer you recognize instantly - are offered, as usual, in vegetarian or meat versions, and I opted for the latter, as I usually do in appraising a Mediterranean eatery.

At the Mecca they are more plump than are served in most other restaurants - as round as an expensive cigar. This led me to wonder whether they are made in this kitchen or bought, frozen, from a large-volume producer, much as many Chinese restaurants buy egg rolls. However that may be, six of these are a filling appetizer, almost a light meal by themselves, except that I found them rather bland.

Dinner another evening was a disaster, not because of a lapse in the performance of the kitchen, but because I was, alas, assigned to an untrained server. Not unduly overworked, he remained out of reach, eye-contact, and earshot for half an hour after taking my order.

I mention this only to say two points if this happens to you. First, a server's poor performance is almost never the server's fault; it is a management problem. Second, it is then the manager to whom you should complain, for to subject a guest to a wretched experience of this sort is unconscionable.

First Published April 18, 2003, 12:14 p.m.