Part bar, part lounge, and part Latin-Caribbean fusion restaurant, Saba Blue Water Café manages to combine elements into an atmosphere that is, like its Fourth Street neighborhood, sleek and chic and always seemingly in motion. Dark lighting, wooden beams looming overhead, and a tan brick wall give a down-to-earth urban feel to the place. At the far end of the café and behind the bar are bright blue glass panels and paintings of dark-skinned islanders frolicking, occasionally baring it all. All the while, blaring music makes the place resonate, rendering dinner conversation quite a task. As you shout to your dinner companions, a Saba staff member brings over a sexy blue bottle of iceless tap water (it’s supposed to be elegant, but it’s mostly just lukewarm) and a plate of delightfully crispy, multi-colored shrimp chips that pair well with chile oil and balsamic vinegar.

The best way to eat at Saba is to order several small plates, which are generally likable, if hardly works of genius. In “Tempura Tuna,” meltingly tender tuna chunks with a soft green shell are layered on top of a sweet honey-like sauce that has an overwhelming wasabi punch. (Subtlety is not a goal in a place where most communication consists of groping and lascivious looks.) Ceviche is well balanced, and fried oysters on yuca chips, topped with cilantro and ranchero sauce, are a good exercise in flavor and texture counterpoints. Main courses, however, can be disastrous. Mahi-mahi comes in a chewy, tasteless hunk with bland sauce atop a hill of dry, clumpy rice. The dish is only rescued, in part, by sweet grilled bananas that slide off of their peels.

Things get better with dessert. A key lime crème brûlée, beneath its crisp, sugary top, has citrusy hints of the pie, with the same creamy texture. Cocktails are another strength here—a caipirinha is unusually well balanced (avoid the awful, bar-like wine list)—and food service is surprisingly friendly and attentive. You’ll have a good time, so long as you haven’t got much to say.