"You two behave yourselves," our waiter chided as my companion and I battled over the last of the vanilla gelato and bourbon caramel sauce underneath The Social's heavenly apple fritters ($6). Dessert was a pleasant surprise after our first, less-than-stellar meal here. Uniformly underseasoned, bland, and overdressed, the plates were beautiful, but had all the taste of plastic and wet wool. That said, I'm happy to tell you that on two subsequent visits, the food was so good that I checked to see if I was in the same restaurant. It was perfectly seasoned, lightly dressed, served on white plates in interesting shapes, and so pretty that it seemed a shame to take them apart.

Start with one of the Belgian beers, a glass of wine, or one of the restaurant's many martinis. The drinks will give you the time to take in The Social's menu based, according to owner Donna DiMarzo, on dishes that are "healthy, seasonal, organic" and, when possible, local. The Social features some New York wines, and the menu is studded with New York products - Lively Run goat cheese, Freshlink Farms greens, Evans Farm House dairy products, and Northern Soy tofu. Organized around a series of small entrees or largish appetizers (the dishes don't really fit comfortably into either category and they are entirely too large to be called tapas), Chef Seth Lindahl and his crew offer a menu that plays with the memories and emotions that food can evoke.

The chicken wings ($6) first struck my eye. If a chef is willing to put them on a menu and unblushingly charge $1 per wing, they must be spectacular. Perfectly cooked, walked across the restaurant's hardwood-fired grill (which lends a bacony aroma), and dressed with a sweet, spicy glaze, these were some of the best wings I've eaten. As the heat builds you'll be grateful for the creamy Maytag dressing - thick with marble-sized crumbles of bleu cheese - to tame the fire.

Chef Lindahl reinterprets other bar-food favorites as well. We ordered the pommes frites ($5), the popcorn shrimp with curry sauce ($11), and the steamed mussels ($8). The heaping bowl of fries was a good foil for the two sauces that came with it: an aioli and a ketchup, both house-made. The ketchup is a real triumph. Almost orange, spiked with a bit of chipotle, and given a good bite with both garlic and a shot of sherry vinegar, this might ruin you for Heinz. The popcorn shrimp - sweet, crispy, piping hot, doused in a coconut milk-based Thai curry sauce, and served with both a cool, creamy raita and a side of the curry sauce - were also good. The mussels, though, were our favorite. The bowl arrived enveloped in steam, rich, spicy, and briny all at the same time. Cooked in beer, tomatoes, onion, jalapenos, and garlic, the mussels sat in a rich broth that is a pleasure all by itself. The chef thoughtfully served crispy toasts to sop up the comforting and spicy soup.

The menu also includes high-end items like duck breast, Wagyu beef, crab cakes, artisan goat cheese, and truffles. The duck breast ($17), a special "entrée," had a crisp, creamy skin on the outside of the thin slices of medium rare meat that provided an extra kick of smoky flavor to the dish. The small frisee and peach salad sitting next to the duck added a sweet, slightly astringent bite that caused the flavor of the meat to pop in my mouth, just as a good gastrite should. The Wagyu flank steak brochettes ($10) were simple and tasty. Three skewers of the char-grilled ubersteak were served on a bed of mixed greens and dressed with a sauce combining vibrant lemongrass and sweet, fresh tomatoes.

The crab cake ($9), a rich ball of shredded crabmeat studded with bits of carrot and herbs, was closer to a crab stuffing than a cake. It was very good, but lacked the briny taste of good crabmeat and the lumpiness of a true crab cake. The roasted shiitake and frisee salad with Lively Run goat cheese ($5) started with excellent ingredients, including a truffle vinaigrette, but somehow the ingredients - each perfect on its own - failed to marry well. We had a similar experience with the roasted beet salad ($5).

All three of the desserts we tried - the apple fritters, the banana split, and the root beer float - were superb. Chef Lindahl puts an adult twist on childhood classics, adding chunks of crisp Granny Smith apples to his fritters; placing caramelized bananas on his banana split; splashing a shot of dark rum into his root beer floats; and using an incredibly intense vanilla gelato to top it all off. These are desserts that are meant to be shared, and, ultimately, fought over.

The Social at East Avenue

330 East Avenue

325-2010

Tuesday-Thursday 5-10p.m., Friday-Saturday 5 p.m.-11 p.m.