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Building on the success of their uptown location, owners Bobby and Laura Shapiro opened the West Village outpost Flex Mussels on the first floor of a stately brownstone. The menu offers the same 23 excellent and seasonally changing variations on moules frites as well as a smattering of tasty if somewhat puny seafood dishes. Pounds of chef Michael Sullivan's meaty P.E.I.’s can be savored with simple, white-wine-based broths or with more distinctive concoctions: There’s a tangy parmigiano-cream-based skillet accented with Meyer lemon and cubes of salty prosciutto as well as a vibrant Thai-influenced curry sauce. Raw oysters, like brilliant Maine-hailing Pemaquids, are served alongside the mussels. Top Chef: Just Desserts finalist Zac Young displays evil genius on the dessert menu. He deep-fries whoopie pies—soft, warm grenades of black chocolate cake harboring a thick cream cheese middle—and then bombs the plates with sugar glitter. The airy space is an urbane ode to the coastal villages of the northern Atlantic. Wavy backlit walls and a room-spanning marshy mural hint at sun-drenched New England beaches without spilling over into under-the-sea kitsch. It’s a little like taking your date on a picnic in Halifax without going north of 14th Street. — Edna Ishayik

Pemaquid oysters, $3 each; Parma mussels, $21; Thai mussels, $19; whoopie pie, $10