With so many good restaurants now upping the ante in the suburbs, it's interesting to see how a successful suburban restaurant fares in Center City. Pelican Fish, which opened last August, is the twin sibling of a seafood-focused BYO in Sewell, N.J. In Philly, however, owners Dominick and Jai Stulpinas have wisely chosen to develop a different menu, one better suited to citified tastes. The question is, what can a suburban restaurant bring to a competitive urban dining scene?

It's not apparent visually. In the former Girasole space, the decor is spare, ostensibly meant to evoke the sand and sea with turquoise banquettes, waves of fabric draped across the ceiling and glittering candles in wine goblets. Misused, minimalism can be read as a lack of style, and in this case the emptiness feels more unfinished than deliberate.

What Pelican Fish has going for it is a fairly strong concept. Its mission is not to "reinvent" but to "innovate and experiment with" classic seafood—a distinction that sounds vague on paper but makes sense on a plate. Despite the fancy menu descriptions, these dishes are pretty straightforward, like the oysters Rockefeller with the addition of fennel. When international (mostly Asian) flavors are used, they are there to enhance the fish rather than whip it into some kind of unnatural cross-ethnic fusion.

We saw it in appetizers like the Indian curry-spiced croquettes, addictive round nuggets of mango and ground chicken. The prototypical calamari salad—rings of crisp, lightly fried squid over greens—had the unexpected spark of fried lemon and a creamy citrus dressing.

More predictable was the gulf red tuna tartare, served in a martini glass and obscured by a dollop of mint-green wasabi créme frâiche, a sprinkling of glimmering tobbiko (cured fish eggs) and the towering stalks of chives that would make frequent appearances throughout the rest of the meal. It seemed like a lot at once, but it turned out these were much-needed additions; the rosy chunks of raw fish were fresh but not tasty enough to eat au naturel.

As in New Jersey, there are just two raw bar options on the menu, littleneck or top neck clams and oysters. But the half-dozen oyster sampler here is more interesting. (The night we visited we actually got a bonus one to bring it to seven. Our loquacious server explained that the chef must have miscounted.) The selection, laid out on ice and black seaweed, included the Californian Hog Island, Virginian James River, and Maine-harvested George's Bank varieties, plus a tangy mignonette for dipping.

Compared to the appetizers, the entrees were more far ranging in their influences and aspirations, but they were also less consistent. On the menu, the crab cake served over a mushroom cake sounded redundant and heavy, but in actuality it made for a nice pairing. Conversely the pan-seared scallops that sounded so delicious were soft and undercooked, which was even more disappointing because the underlying zucchini puree with white beans was pure, green, garlic-spiked velvet. A nicely textured cashew-crusted cod fillet, bland but for its coconut curry sauce and coin-shaped slices of fried plantain, could have used a chili-pepper infusion.

There was an appealing simplicity to the broiled lobster tail stuffed with a generous heap of jumbo lump crabmeat, though it was chewy and dry in places. On the side were roasted new potatoes and limp sauteed snap peas. Even the "candied garlic" butter mostly tasted like regular drawn butter, but that was probably okay.

The homemade desserts showed more promise. Two flat slices of a flourless chocolate paté were rich and creamy without being particularly sweet or even deeply chocolately—a matter of debate for our table. Those of us looking for more antioxidant-boosting flavonoids got our fix in the Mexican chocolate sorbet, which was deeper and darker than the paté. There were other homemade sorbets like raspberry, and an oddly salty and piquant mango, which should be left out of the sampler. Another surprise was the pumpkin maple créme brûlée whose surface was intriguingly granular. Best of all, though, was the apple walnut cake, which was moist and dense and aromatic, soaking up a softening scoop of vanilla bean ice cream. It was the chef's grandmother's recipe, we were told, and we could understand why it was passed down. It's the kind of thing you can't get anywhere else.

Pelican Fish

1305 Locust St., 215-546-0711 www.pelicanfishco.com

Tue.-Sat., 5-10 p.m.

Appetizers, $8-$12; entrees, $19-$26

No wheelchair access. Smoking permitted at bar. Credit cards accepted. Reservations recommended.