Pelican Restaurant

Some long hots stuffed with prosciutto and Gorgonzola were addictively good - although they were so hot, they woke me up at night. And Fischer's appetizer pastas are so huge, I can't imagine ordering an entree. I loved his pancetta-laced paccheri Amatriciana, as well as penne René lavished in a blush cream filled with crab, peas and smoked salmon.

The main-course seafood entrees were worth saving room for. A brick of house-butchered Chilean sea bass came perfectly browned with frizzled leeks, citrus butter and escarole sauteed with pine nuts and raisins. Crisply seared fillets of silvery orata came over a perfect seafood medley tossed with orzo, standing in for the usual risotto.

One of Fischer's actual risottos, filled with mushrooms and truffle oil beneath seared scallops, was one of my mild disappointments, if only because the rice was a shade dry and some of the scallops were lightly overcooked. It was an unexpected misstep for a veteran scalloper.

But Fischer more than compensated with the whole branzino, which he brought himself for a tableside fillet. It wasn't the most artful knife work, but the flaky mound of flesh he removed from the charcoal-crisped skin was downy soft and memorably moist. Fischer's eyes especially lit up, though, when we asked for the nuggets of cheek meat before he departed. Sensing an appreciative audience, he launched into an enthusiastic account of the bass' other hidden morsels. He eagerly removed a tiny jewel of meat from behind the eyes for us to taste - and it was more intensely branzino-y than any other part of the fish I've eaten, a revelation.

In thanks, I shook his hand, and it swallowed mine with a firm and calloused grip that bespoke his years of long line labor aboard a boat. And with that he smiled, and Fischer the fisherman happily returned to his kitchen.

Next Sunday, restaurant critic Craig LaBan reviews MidAtlantic in University City. Contact him at 215-854-2682 or claban@phillynews.com.