Dinner and a show on Long Island

Don't get hungry for dinner till 8? Long Island's growing supper club scene offers a chance to get out of the house almost any night of the week and enjoy high-quality live entertainment along with food creations by a number of the island's better-known chefs.

On a recent Saturday evening, the Ted Hefko Trio, which also plays gigs in Manhattan and Brooklyn, filled the bar and dining room at Hemisphere in Bay Shore with New Orleans-style jazz.

"The music brought us here," says Steven Kane, 50, of Bay Shore, while finishing a meal of short ribs with his friend Michelle Bering, 50, also of Bay Shore.

A supper club vibe also enlivens the atmoshpere at the newly opened Suffolk Theater in Riverhead, at Grasso's in Cold Spring Harbor, which is introducing a new spring menu, and at the redecorated Puglia's in Garden City.

118 E. Main St., Riverhead

First opened in 1933, the former Art Deco movie house recently reopened with cabaret-style tables that seat 350, rather than conventional theater seating.

9 S. Park Ave., Bay Shore

Cozy and elegant, Hemisphere has seating at the bar, in a dining room and in private booths.

987 Stewart Ave., Garden City

The Long Island branch of Puglia's nearly century-old restaurant in Manhattan's Little Italy was hopping with the sounds of a disco band on a recent Friday night. Many come two or three nights a week for the mix of live music and Italian fare. "Puglia's is the last game in town for people 40 and up," says Angelo Amato, 75, of Plainview, a regular.

134 Main St., Cold Spring Harbor

Grasso's also features dueling pianos on Thursday nights, when Frank O'Brien and Tim Givins perform show tunes and contemporary hits.