AT MAMBO'S, STEP UP TO GOOD EATING.

Byline: Larry Lipson Restaurant Critic

``It's one of the best places around here for lunch,'' said local businessman Robert Wexler, a regular at Mambo's Cafe in Glendale, and whose Wexler Corp.'s Burbank headquarters is located nearby.

Mambo's has been a fixture at the busy Victory Boulevard and Western Street intersection for more than a dozen years. It's a vibrant Cuban eating spot, decorated with black and white tile on floor and walls. A colorful musician-themed mural above the tiles decorates the rear wall, and there's an attractive small outside patio.

And the price is right.

Menu items that include generous accompaniments of white rice, black beans (Moros y Christianos) and maduros (fried plantains) plus a lettuce and tomato garnish cost no more than $7.95, and that includes a bountiful portion of garlicky, moist chicken ($6.25) and a tasty, juicy, thin-cut sirloin steak ($6.95) topped with grilled onions.

A similar steak, breaded and fried milanesa style, is $1 more, as is a comparably cooked, flattened chicken breast.

Day or evening, one of the best things to eat here is unquestionably the house rendition of the classic Cuban sandwich ($3.75) grilled on superb Cuban bread and stuffed with roast pork, ham, melted Swiss cheese, mustard and pickles. For $1 extra, you can make this a satisfying meal with an order of nicely wrought french fries.

You'll find sangria, beers and wines, coffees, tea, juices and the like as beverage choices, and an excellent chicken soup comes in a giant Mambo's cup ($2.95).

If you like nibbling Cuban-style noshes rather than soup prior to your main plate, the pork tamale ($2.25) or croqueta ($1.50) fills such needs admirably.

Mambo's, with its constant Caribbean-music background, produces daily specials like ropa vieja, the traditional shredded Cuban beef recipe named after ``old clothes,'' or tail-on shrimp in an orange-hued garlic sauce.

Satisfying endings can be experienced from either a distinctive, eggy flan ($2.50) of perfect texture, topped with shredded coconut, or a good rice pudding ($1.50) of gratifyingly restrained sweetness.

Incidentally, for the vegetarian set, Mambo's kitchen produces half a dozen meatless items priced from $3 to $7.

It's truly a happy eating place for everybody.

MAMBO'S CAFE

Where: 1701 Victory Blvd., Glendale.

When: Open for lunch, dinner and snacks from 11 a.m. to 8 p.m. weekdays, from 11 a.m. to 6 p.m. Saturday. Closed Sunday.

Recommended items: Cuban tamale, croqueta, chicken soup, roasted chicken, thin-cut sirloin steak, Cuban sandwich, coconut-topped flan, rice pudding.

How much: Starters and sandwiches from $1.50 to $5, entrees from $5.50 to $8, desserts from $1.50 to $2.50. Beer and wine. AE, MC, V.

Wine list: Tiny list of unnamed wines (described as white, red, chardonnay, merlot, zinfandel and cabernet).

Reservations: Helpful. Call [phone].

Our rating: Three and one half stars for food; three and one half stars for service; one half star for wine; three and one half stars for value.

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Photo:

Mambo's Cafe owners Raul Gonzales Jr., left, Raul Gonzales Sr. and Migdalia Gonzalez offer an array of delicious yet inexpensive dishes in front of their Cuban cafe in Glendale.

Hans Gutknecht/Staff Photographer