Medgrill San Diego is the third incarnation of a restaurant that originated under Lebanese ownership in 2004. After a successful four-year stint of serving up things like shawarma, kabobs and falafel to the gyrations of belly dancers, the place hit rock bottom when falling into the hands of different owners, who attempted to marry humdrum American fare to the Middle Eastern offerings. The interior became disheveled, the food turned wicked, and in what seemed like a blink of an eye, everyone stopped going there.

The latest proprietor, Seto A. Marselian, is an Armenian fellow who brings to the immense, two-level structure a steak-seafood-pasta concept backed by 31 years of working within the eats industry. His menu bows extensively to Italy while making a half curtsy to Greece with fresh, parsley-infused hummus and a basic Greek salad.

Marselian has done well cleaning up the negligence left behind by last year’s owners. He’s hung a few vivid wall paintings and draped the tables with crisp linens. But the expansive interior still somehow yearns for additional cosmetics to distinguish its new identity.

Despite abundant recessed lighting contained in the high ceilings, they bathe the interior in a dull, monochromatic hue. Tables to the left of the entrance offer more spectral warmth because of a few sconce lights perched along that wall. And the sound system, playing a mishmash of tunes stored in Marselian’s iPod when we visited, pricks the ears with a whole lot of treble and not enough bass.

“It’s a tricky space to work with,” I said to my companion while scanning over a sea of neatly arranged tables, many of them empty the night we visited. “Needs more color, maybe some funky appointments and definitely some eye-level lighting or candles,” we concluded.

From an appetizer section comprised entirely of commonplace items like seared ahi tuna, fried calamari, crab cakes, mozzarella caprese, etc., we picked two victors from the list; a plate of carpacio resulted in raw beef sliced not quite to the conventional thinness of paper, but still clean, fresh and supple to the bite. The meat was heavily crowned with Parmesan cheese and capers, and served with a sidekick of old-fashion yellow mustard that worked oddly well with the assembly.

We chose the hummus served with piping hot pita bread for sentimental reasons, recalling our fondness for the satisfying Lebanese cuisine served here in the restaurant’s younger days. Marselian’s recipe is spiked nicely with tahini, parsley, garlic and lemon. And it washed down nicely with a bottle of honey-tasting Mythos beer. A third appetizer we ordered, mushrooms in garlic and Madeira wine, was riddled with too many chewy shiitakes that resembled the toughness of undercooked bacon. They came mixed with tender button caps. Meaty, lissome portabello shrooms, we felt, would serve as a fine replacement for the shiitakes.

Lobster bisque reigns as an unexpected signature dish – incongruous to the menu’s Italian theme, though providing great pleasure to the senses. The recipe uses shrimp shells, a good dose of sherry and a restrained measure of cream, which give way to generous orbs of sweet lobster meat floating within the smooth liquid. Since opening Medgrill San Diego last year, Marselian has made his menu available to customers at the nearby Alibi and San Diego Sports Club. The bisque, he says, is among the big offsite sellers.

A salad comprised of artichokes, red bell peppers, tomatoes, onions, olives and garlic was more appealing to us on paper than in our mouths. The culprits were a brazen lemon dressing battling with an excessive amount of brine from the artichokes. Their combined acidity was overbearing.

Our favorite dish was the mixed grill, a meat lover’s dream listed on the entrée menu. The colossal platter featured multiple servings of petite lamb chops, succulent pork tenderloin, lean and well-flavored Italian sausage and assorted grilled veggies. A lone puck of filet mignon from Hamilton Meats in the arrangement was as silky as filet you’d find in top-quality steakhouses. All of the ingredients boasted a robust grilled flavor, as evidenced by their prominent stripes. The trick says Marselian: “We keep our grill to a hot 550 degrees.”

The charry essence that we savored in the red meat, however, didn’t carry over into the cubed chicken tossed throughout penne al pollo. The pasta dish is laced with a garlic-cream sauce, kind of bland, but thick enough to snuff out any carcinogenic flavor lingering on the poultry. As far as penne pasta recipes go, and with this also containing broccoli and chunky sun dried tomatoes, I’ve been there, done that.

The same could be said for menu items such as chicken Marsala, eggplant Parmesan, grilled salmon, rib eye steak, etc. – classic holdouts for those who would rather sink their forks into mushroom ravioli and a decent hunk of tiramusu rather than some trendy version of foie gras mac-and-cheese.