Omai, NY

The Vietnamese-inspired Omai is orders of magnitude more creative and fully realized than the diners, dives and dens I usually frequent. It may be my favorite place to eat right now.

I've been there a half-dozen times in the past year. The food has always been excellent and everyone who works there is so nice. I was in the neighborhood last week with the Grumpy Diner, and we impulsively decided to see if we could get in without a reservation. We were seated immediately at the only vacant deuce.

We ordered four dishes to share. I practically gasped with delight at the first taste of seafood dumpling soup -- the rich, basil-infused broth had just a hint of garlic and ginger. The dumpling wrapper was paper thin, slightly al dente, stuffed with tender, tasty chopped shrimp. Delightful.

Velvety-textured seared tuna was wrapped in crispy greens and came with a mildly spicy soy-based dipping sauce. Bun cha pork was cooked to the consistency of crisp bacon and had an intense, concentrated meat flavor. It was served with plain rice-vermicelli, lettuce, and some slightly funky preserved cabbage and carrot salad. The funk was a nice contrast to the other flavors and textures.

Our entree, grilled scallops, shrimp and veg over several squares of tender rice noodles in lime and basil sauce, contained the largest scallops I've ever seen. They were meltingly tender. Veg included eggplant, zucchini, asparagus and green beans, all lightly grilled and delightfully tasty.

I recommend making a reservation on the early side. Once the place fills up -- and it has every time I've been there -- it's so loud it's impossible to hold a conversation. Omai attracts an interesting crowd, so it's always fun to eavesdrop on the people at adjoining tables, or even those across the room who you can hear because of an odd acoustic bounce. Or you can play a one-person game of "telephone" and try to imagine what your companion is talking about.

Or you can do what I usually do: focus on the excellent food and the spare but interesting decor, and catch up on the conversation later, over tea and dessert elsewhere.