Carpinteria 05/05/08: Juan Carlo / Star staff: Sesame crusted ahi with soy glace and wasabi sauce over soba noodle with salad with ponzu vinaigrette and in the back is baby spinach salad with warm goat cheese herb cakes candied pecans, dried apricots with raspberry vinaigrette dressing at Zookers Restaurant in Carpinteria.

As food purveyors who prefer to focus on local organic produce, Jeanne Sykes and her son Brent Monsour have settled in an ideal spot. Their Carpinteria restaurant, Zookers, is in the middle of the Central Coast's horn of plenty, and they take advantage of fresh greens, avocados, tomatoes and more with a menu full of salads, produce-enhanced sandwiches and vegetables galore. And that's just at lunch, when we visited. At dinner, they roll out entrees like turkey-mushroom meatloaf, lamb shank and seasonal fish.

There's a Mediterranean, or Middle Eastern, current running through such hearty dishes as grilled vegetable salads and sandwiches, hummus with pita, tabbouleh, curry chicken salad and chicken kebabs. A black-bean and brown-rice burrito and jalapeño tuna melt add a bit of Latin flavor.

A profusion of orchids greatly enhances the restaurant's look. The single orchid on each table, and clusters at the entry and on counters, call attention to the fact that flowers, particularly orchids, are a major product of the Carpinteria area. There's a dining porch as well as ample inside seating.

We scanned the blackboard of daily specials and picked the chicken pozole soup to incorporate into our lunch along with a shrimp and scallop tostada, a roast beef and provolone stack sandwich, and half-sandwiches of the curry chicken salad and turkey stack.

The eye-catching tostada ($11.95) featured warm shrimp and bay-size scallop bites tossed with organic greens and avocado. It was served over black beans on a blue corn tostada, blended with cilantro cream and salsa. My friend and I were both pleased with the seafood, especially the freshly prepared shrimp, and enjoyed the overall gentle flavors. Lemon wedges added zest.

A substantial stack of thinly sliced roast beef (our server said the beef and turkey are roasted on site) and a slice of provolone were the basis of the roast beef stack ($7.95), with red onion, sprouts, tomato and aioli layered to a height so grand that it was almost easier to eat the sandwich with a knife and fork. The beef was tender and tasty, with no sense of superfluous seasoning, and the other elements at least made us feel good about adding veggies to the meal.

Sandwiches come with pita chips and blue corn tortilla chips. We found the pita chips hard and slightly greasy. The tortilla chips enclosed with our take-home items, however, were crisp and light, with just the right sprinkling of salt.

The turkey stack was generously proportioned, had good flavor and was surrounded by the same fresh greens and vegetables. The half curry chicken salad sandwich would have made a meal in itself, featuring large chunks of chicken breast piled high on wheat bread with toasted almonds, dried apricots, celery, onion and lettuce, all stirred with a fine yellow curry.

A combo option is a flexible choice for lunch. It's $7.95 for two items, or $9.95 for three. So you can order a half sandwich and a cup of soup, green or Caesar salad, potato wedges, hummus, tabbouleh or a fresh fruit cup, for the lower price; or two different half sandwiches and one of the items. For that matter, you also can order any combination that suits you.

We were delighted with the cups of chicken pozole soup, which radiated flavor from the first scent to the last sip.

Coffee was excellent, and the restaurant also serves smoothies, including Bee Sting (strawberry, banana, bee pollen and orange juice), Mango Mamba (mango, pineapple, banana and pineapple juice) and Peanut Butter Pump (peanut butter, banana, protein powder, nonfat or low-fat milk, malt and chocolate), but we figured if we started with one of those, we'd never be able to address the rest of the food. For dessert or a snack, though, they could be fun.

From among the desserts made on the premises, we shared a light and creamy chocolate-coconut crème brûlée ($6). The coconut flavor was appealing, but my friend and I wondered if we'd been served the wrong brûlée because we couldn't detect the chocolate. We finally figured that it was in the sprinkling on top, providing a pleasant whisper of flavor.

Zookers, for the curious, means nothing in particular; it's the childhood nickname of Sykes' brother.

— Rita Moran visits restaurants unannounced and pays for her meals. If you know of a new, unusual or just plain good restaurant, please contact her at ritamoran@earthlink.net.