Doggy Paddle Your Way to a Table

Waiting for a table at Osianna on a Saturday night is  like steering a skiff over a titanic wave that continues to gain magnitude but never seems to break. The minutes waited pile up like the crest of a minatory swell.

You ask: When will the wave finally crash, sweeping you and your party to a table? Nobody knows, not even the maitre d'.

A 30-minute wait easily turns into an hour; devastating, I know. Worse is that the maitre d' tries to placate the situation by constantly assuring you that "your table is almost ready." I was told that three times. The third time, fortunately, was a charm.

There is no lounge to endure the wait; the bar is merely a station to fill drink orders; cramped, seatless and not for mingling. Waiters scuttle by in sea-dog get-up: Striped French sailor shirts, white pants.

Because there is no sitting room, victims of this formidable wave can be found drifting outside, wine glass clutched in hand like a buoy, resisting hunger's undertow-like force that tries to drag them to any number of less-crowded Post Road restaurants.

But, if you have the patience and endurance to wait out the wave, calm waters are on the other side, and those who survive are vested comestible refuge.

Begin with zucchini flowers; plumped with rice, feta and leeks, deep fried for a delicate shell. A tomato cream made incandescent with Ouzo, a Greek anise liquor, is the ribbon around these flowers. You can continue to stay Greek by ordering the tomato salad: Chunks of salty feta, thick cucumber and briny Kalamata olives or go Sicilian with the fried, pillowy rice balls, teased with tomato, coupled with a Kalamata aioli. Think twice before swimming with the fried calamari; that dish is pulled along by a flavorless current.

As with the Greek salad, waiters may tell you that the salad portions can feed three people. Unless the chefs are accustomed  to cooking for diners with aberrantly small appetites, that, just like the supposed 30-minute wait,  is a miscalculation.

It's obvious that chef and owner Biagio Riccio took nautical and Mediterranean cues for Osianna's concept. The name itself is partially derived from Oceanus, the Greek God of the ocean, and certainly the waitstaff boasting sailor garb is a declaration in its own right. The walls are faux-stucco, fluctuating in color between ocean blue and sandy yellow; perhaps a play on the contrast of land and sea.

Bouillabaisse is a dish of the sea, a crustacean and mollusk melting pot of scallops, squid, shrimp and clams mounded like an oceanic volcano.  A tomato broth spews forth for an orally explosive experience. There is halibut, a delicate filet of milky flesh, contiguous with a corn and tomato "farotto" (a risotto made using the farro grain.) It wasn't creamy like  classic risotto; simply calling it farro would have done just fine.

Dining at a seafood-cored restaurant is simple: Stick with the surf, stray from the turf. Nuggets of pork are skewered and grilled until dry, remniscent of chewy raw hide. Despite this, I found myself eating its accompanying Tzatziki sauce by the spoonful: Tangy yogurt  heightened with dill, cucumber and lemon. That was good.

Dessert is worth lingering for, at least for the karidopita: a moist, Greek walnut cake doused with a honey syrup, fragrant with cinnamon and nutmeg. It tastes like the holidays, making Christmas in July possible.

At that point, patrons still waiting outside for a table may stare at you through the plate-glass windows in hopes to spur you to completion. But don't worry, the congenial waitstaff won't rush you. You waited long enough for your table, float on as you please.

Osianna

70 Reef Rd, Fairfield, CT; (203) 254-2070; www.osianna.com 

ATMOSPHERE: Modish Mediterranean taverna with a nautical tide.

SOUND LEVEL: Lean in to your table and listen carefully.

RECOMMENDED DISHES: Arancini; zucchini flowers;  bouillabaisse; halibut.

WINE LIST:  International whites, roses, reds and bubblies; glasses $7 to $12; buying a bottle is also an option.

PRICE RANGE: Small plates: $7 to $15; salads: $13; entrees: $22 to $30.

HOURS: Lunch: Monday through Saturday, 11 a.m. to 3 p.m; Dinner: Monday through Saturday, 5 p.m. to 10 p.m.

RESERVATIONS: No reservations accepted for Friday and Saturday dinner. Reservations are, however, accepted for lunch daily and dinner Monday through Thursday. Call 203-254-2070.

CREDIT CARDS: All major cards accepted.