Vern opens on the water in West Babylon

Bergen Bay isn’t one of Long Island’s best-known bodies of water, but this narrow inlet in West Babylon is worth exploring — a task that can easily be accomplished while dining on the deck at Vern. The eclectic eatery recently replaced the more casual Seagull Restaurant, which closed last year.

First-time restaurant owner Vernisha Persaud runs a construction company, and she tightened and brightened the building, enclosing more of the dining area and giving it a sharp black-and-white scheme. Outside you have your choice of shade or sun. Almost all of the 125 seats have a view of the quiet channel and its less-quiet resident gulls.

Vern’s kitchen is run by chef Lamar Todd, a Long Island native who spent almost 20 years with the Butera’s restaurant group, opening the locations in Smithtown and Bay Shore. For the last five years he’s been a caterer and private chef but, he said, “after a while you miss the restaurant business. There’s something about the chaos — every day, you never know what you’re going to get.”

Todd’s lunch menu focuses on crowd-pleasers — clams and oysters on the half shell, sauteed mussels and baked clams, lobster roll, lobster mac & cheese, grilled chicken-avocado club, Caesar and Santa Fe salads — but there are twists and turns too: tortilla chips with a mango-crab salsa, fried calamari is tossed in a Caribbean-inspired sauce, a Vern burger slathered with a secret green “Vern sauce” (I was able to discern cilantro and mayonnaise). Except for the lobster roll, everything is less than $25.

At dinner he spreads his wings a bit with pan-seared duck with chili-cream sauce, grilled lamb chops with rosemary, thyme and Vern sauce, Caribbean pasta in a spicy cream sauce with tricolor peppers. Dinner mains range from $24 to $38.

The restaurant has a separate bar and plans to have live music as the season gets underway.

Vern, 301 Bergen Ave., West Babylon, 631-620-3340, @vern.newyork. Open Monday to Saturday 11 a.m. to 10 p.m., Sunday 10 a.m. to 9 p.m.