Our dining guru and la.com contributor, Eric Rosen, garnishes our pages with these to-taste prix fixe and budget-conscious L.A. offerings.

Just because times are tight doesn’t mean our waistlines have to be. (‘Tis the season after all!) This issue we bring you a list of outstanding eateries offering weekly prix fixe and budget-conscious dining options catered to your culinary and economical interests. Bon Appetite!

Marco’s Mondays
marcoswesthollywood.com

Thanks to Marco’s Trattoria and Pizzeria’s amazing Monday night “two pasta dishes for the price of one” deal, both your wallet and waistline will remain happily padded. With a myriad of pasta dishes priced well below the $13.95 maximum limit—the spinach and roasted garlic ravioli and the penne alfredo con pollo are popular options—in conjunction with its primo West Hollywood location, there’s no way to go wrong! See their Web site for additional specials every night of the week. 8136 Santa Monica Blvd., WeHo 323/650-2771

Campanile: Monday Family-Style Prix Fixe
campanilerestaurant.com

It can be hard to find enough time for family during the work week, but Campanile on La Brea makes it easier with its Monday Nights family-style prix fixe dinners. For $40 a person, you and your loved ones are treated to a simple but gourmet three-course meal, and it is one of the most popular events in town. The menu changes every week and is usually focused around a particular food like pork loin or steamed mussels, so the choices can be limited and you should check ahead to see what will be available. A recent Monday found the following dishes on order: a tomato and fennel tart with pancetta and apple to start, porchetta (a traditional seasoned Italian pork roast) with mashed potatoes and long-cooked green beans as the main course and a dessert of cream cheese custard with fresh fruit compote. If only all family dinners could be this good. 624 S. La Brea Ave., L.A. 323/938-1447

Ciudad: Tuesday Paella on the Patio
ciudad-la.com

Thanks to L.A.’s glorious weather, one of the most popular prix fixe menus around town is Ciudad’s Tuesday Paella on the Patio. For $29, you can dine downtown under the stars and watch the week’s two special paellas being cooked right in front of you while you enjoy a glass of Spanish wine or sangria. The three-course prix fixe meal includes an appetizer, salad and of course an entrée of paella. Each week presents two new choices of the famous Spanish dish, like the traditional paella Valenciana with seafood, chicken, chorizo and saffron rice; or a paella negra, which is dyed black by using squid ink. Recently, the menu also featured a vegetarian paella with herbs, pine nuts and manchego cheese, as well as a paella with rabbit, spinach and artichoke in a red pepper sauce. As the Spanish would say, buen provecho! 445 S. Figueroa St., Suite 100, L.A. 213/486-5171

Josie: Wednesday Farmers’ Market Prix Fixe Menu
josierestaurant.com

Chef and owner Josie Le Balch’s innovative seasonal menus (and changing daily specials) have made her Westside restaurant a stylish dining destination in L.A. That’s not to say her menu is trendy, but rather that she knows her way around the kitchen and can cook in a variety of styles using an eclectic mix of ingredients—after all, she’s been doing this since she was a kid in her parents’ Valley restaurant. Every Wednesday night, you can see her skills on full display when you pop in for the $35 three-course Farmers’ Market Prix Fixe menu. Each week, Josie finds the best produce at that day’s Santa Monica Farmers’ Market and whips up a new menu. For instance, a recent Wednesday night started with fennel and persimmon salad, followed by grilled flatiron steak with corn succotash and a corn tart and finally a dessert of almond quince tart. The choices are limited (there is only one option for each course), but who cares when the food is this good? 2424 Pico Blvd., Santa Monica 310/581-9888

Melograno: Sunday Night Menu Fisso
melogranohollywood.com

Melograno has fast become one of the most talked-about Italian restaurants in L.A. thanks to its lovely ambiance, its accessible location right on Hollywood Boulevard and the unique culinary flair of its Piemontese chef, Alberto Lazzarino (not to mention the tastiest pork chop in town). Though the normal menu is a little on the pricey side, now Melograno is hoping to lure back patrons whose 401(k)s might have taken a hit in the recent economic turmoil by offering a Sunday night three-course prix fixe menu for $35. Right now, the dishes are autumn specialties from Italy, like baby artichoke hearts over wild arugula, organic butternut squash with amaretto and cinnamon, pasta with Barolo wine-braised hare and pomegranate, gnocchi with porcini ragu and desserts like pumpkin flan and hazelnut panna cotta. We’re told the special Sunday menu will be available until the economy improves—so you should be able to enjoy it indefinitely. At least there’s one bright spot in this recession. 6541 Hollywood Blvd., Hollywood 323/465-6650

Mark’s Restaurant: Dishing It Out Five Nights A Week
marksrestaurant.com

“We’re doing the best we can to keep it in the community,” says Chef/co-owner Wayne Elias of Mark’s Restaurant’s recent expansion of their Monday half-priced menu from Sunday to Thursday. Popular items now offered at discounted prices include a pecan-crusted chicken breast in a chipotle aioli and an ancho-chile apricot glaze, as well as a Mediterranean grilled sea bass served on a bed of sautéed spinach with capers, cherry tomatoes and kalamata olives. Although not on the discounted menu, the lobster risotto with seared fresh sea scallops remains a popular option, and is a steal at $26! Of their homemade chocolate hunk “iron skillet” cookie, served with vanilla bean ice cream and chocolate sauce, Chef Wayne contends it’s “a winner every night of the week!” 861 N. La Cienega Blvd., WeHo 310/652-5252