Six tables, three cultures and one inspired menu

If L.A. had more than a handful of Honduran restaurants, the opulent seafood chowder called sopa de caracol would be as well-known around here as pad Thai or Caesar salad. It’s the dish you don’t want to miss at Lempira Restaurante Hondureno.

The chowder arrives in huge white bowls, dense with semi-ripe plantains and abalone-like caracol (conch meat). Inhale the aroma of its faintly briny broth and you’ll be transported to the Caribbean. Squeeze in some lime juice or add a splash of hot sauce for a little zip. A side of white rice will help you mop up every drop of the coconut-based broth.

Lempira is the sort of treasured hole in the wall that attracts chefs looking for inspiration and Chowhound chat room devotees who frequent places notable for great food regardless of the settings.

It’s certainly far from grand: It’s a six-table mall cafe on Hollywood Boulevard in the shadow of Barnsdall Park’s grassy hill, which seems to jut straight up behind the restaurant. The decor is mostly a matter of a few touristy, carved plaques brightening the drab walls. Behind the cash register is a display of the Honduran currency known as lempira, for which the restaurant is named: coins and bills bearing the image of the Lenca chieftain Lempira, a leader of the 16th century resistance to Spanish conquest.

Once seated, you’ll want to focus on the right side of the menu. Descriptions of the specialties listed there could be an informal map of Honduras’ culinary evolution. Dishes with pre-Columbian roots based on corn and bean are enriched with the pork and beef introduced by the Spanish along with the plantains and coconut that arrived with the African slave trade.

The platano maduro entero con carne molida is a fried sweet plantain split open like a hot dog bun and mounded with achiote-stained ground beef. A thatch of shredded cabbage and aged white cheese tops the meat, adding a refreshing crunch and a salty tang. Tajadas con pollo frito are green bananas fried as crisp as snack chips and topped with a fried chicken leg and the same garnish of cabbage and cheese. Offered in a more upscale presentation, these might be something from a Nuevo Latino menu.

Baleadas, rustic relatives of burritos, are made with thick, hubcap-sized flour tortillas straight from the grill. They’re slathered with creamy refried beans and folded over fillings such as avocado and ground meat. A familiar idea, but the bit of voluptuous Central American-style sour cream in them elevates these peasant snacks to a world-class indulgence.

It’s said that Honduran cuisine includes nearly 100 kinds of tamales. In the three styles offered at Lempira, you can get an idea of the variety. Montucas, made from freshly grated corn and filled with braised pork or chicken, have a rough yet moist texture. Also made from grated corn but without a filling are tamales de elote (corn tamales), two small, lightly sweetened logs of steamed corn, garnished with sour cream and savory mashed beans.

In contrast, the tamales wrapped with banana leaves, like those of Guatemala or Belize, feature a creamy, polenta-like masa that encloses stewed pork or a piece of chicken flecked with tiny olives. (Note: Tamales are often available only on weekends.)

Lempira’s seafood cocktails are loaded with shrimp or caracol tossed in fresh peppery salsa. These go nicely with empanada-like pastelitos stuffed with a salpicon (minced, braised seasoned beef) that’s also served solo. A glass of a tropical fruit juice, such as maracuya (yellow passion fruit) or guanabana (soursop), can offset the heat of that salsa.

The left side of Lempira’s menu offers country-style breakfasts such as chorizo and eggs and entrees such as stewed beef with onions. But these dishes aren’t the restaurant’s strong point

Nor is the service, which, while friendly, is slow, because a lone woman seems to do all the cooking, from making vats of soup to patting out tortillas.

But for homesick Hondurans -- and the rest of us with a yen for a little-visited cuisine -- the dishes from the right side of Lempira’s menu are worth a wait.

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Lempira Restaurante Hondureno

Location: 4848 Hollywood Blvd., Los Angeles, (323) 662-2927.

Price: Appetizers, $1.25 to $7.50; main dishes, $4 to $12.25.

Best dishes: Sopa de caracol, baleadas, platano maduro entero con carne molida, tajadas con pollo frito.

Details: Open 9 a.m. to 9 p.m. daily. Parking lot. No alcohol. Cash only.