Ask Mr. Gold

QUESTION: I got punched in the mouth last night, and it hurts real bad. I’m not saying I didn’t deserve it. There are some things you should never say about somebody’s girlfriend, no matter how much she is pissing you off at the time. But at the moment, the Double-Double I bought for lunch might as well be an Octuple-Octuple for all the chance I have of actually eating the thing.

Could you recommend a restaurant where the food is really easy to chew? Because I don’t want to spend the next two weeks living on porridge.

Keep it real.

—Doug, Monrovia

ANSWER: There used to be a local barbecue chain whose motto was “You need no teeth to eat Jim’s beef,” but unfortunately for your bicuspids, the last outlet closed years ago. Any number of restaurants have a dish or two that fall into the food group that a friend of ours likes to call Softy-Puddy: the Welsh rarebit at Musso & Frank’s comes to mind, as does the steak tartare at Daily Grill, as does practically all of the southern Indian vegetarian menu at the new Los Feliz Boulevard branch of India Sweets and Spices. The McCarthy salad at the Polo Lounge, the restaurant’s inspired variation on a classic Cobb, is chopped into pieces so small that you could probably suck them up through a straw.

But there may be no restaurant in the world more dedicated to the aesthetic of softness than Moffett’s Family Restaurant & Chicken Pie Shoppe, a wonderland of mashed potatoes, cruciferous vegetables cooked to the point of odorous collapse and already-soft potpies blanketed with thick yellow gravy — perfect fare for its dentally challenged clientele. If you finish all your cauliflower, maybe the waitress will offer you dessert: Jell-O, rice pudding or soft, soft pie. 1409 S. Baldwin Ave., Arcadia, (626) 447-4670.

Got a burning culinary question? Try us: askmrgold@laweekly.com