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Last night marked the opening of the Oceanaire Seafood Room on 40 Court Street in Boston right by Government Center. For those not familiar, the Oceanaire Seafood Room is a chain of ultra high-end seafood restaurants with locations all around the US. Think of it as the debonair offspring of Legal Seafoods and McCormick and Schmick’s.

From the site (with excellent use of Zuegma in the first sentence):

Some menus are written by the whims of a chef. Ours by the moods of the sea.

Nowhere else can you overdose on luxurious ultra-fresh seafood, bask in exceptional service, and lose yourself in a classier era of Americana. From the moment you enter the Oceanaire you feel a sense of place and time akin to a classic 1930s ocean liner. No detail is left to chance. From cocktails in the lounge, to our raw oyster bar, to a main course of ultra-fresh fish, a rendezvous at the Oceanaire is the perfect occasion to indulge your unfettered senses.

The Oceanaire is housed in a spacious bank-vault of a building, which is vivaciously lit and gives the ambiance of class without stodginess. It even injects a sense of humor. The men’s bathroom sports the great Joycean quotation, “The snotgreen sea. The scrotumtightening sea.” on the wall. I should have asked if there was anything similar in the Ladies–maybe something about the ocean’s fertile womb?

The joys of Oceanaire's oysters after the jump! Image from Wikimedia Commons

The food I sampled was all superb, including treats such as triple smoked bacon, buffalo shrimp with blue cheese dressing, as well as classics like lump crab cakes, oysters Rockefeller, and clams casino. Not to mention the amazing oysters from the massive circular raw bar which serves as a major aesthetic focal point for the restaurant. All of this I washed down with a remarkably subtle and delicious cucumber mojito. The servers were friendly and knowledgeable, and were each equipped with an arsenal of alligator-clipped chains for assistance should the need for the donning of a lobster bib arise.

While priced handsomely with main dishes running from about 30-60 dollars a pop, the Oceanaire seems like a great place for a special occasion, or even just to sit down at the bar for a glass of wine and an appetizer. Right now, the Oceanaire is open for dinner, with lunch service coming along in the Spring. Let’s hope they follow the lead of The Great Bay and offer a weekday bar menu!