Dining out in St. Michaels poses a kind of chicken-and-egg conundrum.  Namely, is the food scene here the logical outgrowth of a community of sophisticated foodies, or are the increasingly upscale dining options raising the expectations and heightening the palates of locals and visitors?

Anyone who knows St. Michaels already knows where to get a fabulous meal in the Talbot county town.  There’s the venerable Inn at Perry Cabin’s restaurant, Shorewood’s Landing.  Then there’s Town dock, anointed by Michael Rork, a shef of some renown who put Baltimore’s Harborplace on the map.  Finally, there’s Bistro St. Michaels.

And now there’s Shore.

In a space once occupied by the restaurant Harbour Lights, Shore Restaurant & Lounge opened its doors amidst the flurry of last year’s St. Michaels Food & Wine Festival, a little risky in anyone’s book.  On that weekend in may, when an extra 1,200 or so visitors pulled into the Eastern Shore town to sip wine and nibble the results of cooking demos, the new restaurant jumped right in with a festival meal prepared by Doug Schook, from Louie’s Backyard in Key West.

Gone from the dining room were the heavy white linens and duck decoys, Streamlined seating replaced formal chairs; a sleek row of banquettes stood where a bar used to be.  The room was painted beige, and a white cloth was suspended from the ceiling to the wall of windows overlooking the harbor.  And the menu, resplendent with seared foie gras and savory gorgonzola cheesecake, duck cassoulet, and sea scallop seared with fennel and leeks was a far cry from Harbour Lights’ offering of such standards as steak and crab cakes.

This new anchor restaurant, which seems to be filled with happy diners even off-season, is part of an overhaul of the St. Michaels Harbour Inn, Marina & Spa, a place that, at 10 years old, has finally found itself.

Originally envisioned as small condominiums adjacent to coveted anchorage space, the building became a hotel in the late 1980s. The spa was redesigned with warm contemporary colors and an array of services, from eyelash tinting to body polishing. Room by room, the inn is becoming more mod, with an earth-hued decor, puffy duvets, gleaming faucets, and oversized in-room Jacuzzis. Establishing a restaurant worthy of both the new Harbour Inn and St. Michaels' burgeoning food scene was fairly easy. Sidney and James Trond, who had been running the popular Gourmet by the Bay, a local take-out and specialty shop with a large catering business, were eager to step into the space, bringing both experience and an enthusiastic clientele.

The Tronds came to St. Michaels from Nantucket, where they worked at the Wauwinet Inn and later were influential In establishing the reputation of Oran Mor, one of the island's most acclaimed restaurants.

“We wanted to open our own business, and it just wasn't financially feasible on Nantucket," says Sidney.

So the husband-and-wife team settled on St. Michaels, satisfying Sidney's longing for the south, where she was raised, and James desire to be near the water. Gourmet by the Bay was a logical first endeavor. On Nantucket, a community not unlike st. Michaels, "we had a friend with a gourmet store," says Sidney. 'We used to go there on our days off to buy bread and cheese and wine to go to the beach." The Tronds' informal due diligence revealed that affluent weekenders would arrive with coolers filled with specialties from the city. "Now they leave the coolers at home," says Sidney. The shop, already known for homemade breads, cookies, scones, and chicken salad, began producing meals to go (some of which now appear on Shore's menu), like searedsalmon over wild rice, pork loin with pear and apple chutney, and quart containers of bouillabaisse. Soon, the catering business took off.

Gourmet by the Bay offers "a different kind of catering-it's not for everyone," says Sidney. They bring all ingredients and cook on site, a philosophy of freshness that is also behind the restaurant. Meals at Shore, says Sidney, "are made as they are ordered." And everything is prepared on site, including bread, pasta, and sorbet.

On a winter's eve not so long ago, the dining room at Shore was filled, but the placement of the tables and the attention of our waitress gave us the impression that we were in a place with room to spare. Not so our stomachs when we left- They were filled by a meal of myriad flavors, colors, and textures. We began with hand-cut tagliatelle, rich with chunks of seafood in a creamy sauce. Foie gras, seared and drizzled with honey, melted on the tongue; accompanied by a sweet poached pear, it could easily have been dessert.

The main courses were generous: the osso Bucco, a hunk of falling-off-the-bone lamb, sat on a bed of creamy risotto laced with Parmesan. The butterfish is a tender- yes, buttery-fish that here comes glazed in soy and served on a polenta-like rice cake with sesae and ginger, with crisp temputa scallions on the side.  The dish arricved with a pretty purple dendrobium orchid perched on top.

For dessert,we tried the tiramisu, shich arrived in a martini glass – an appropriate vessel for the rum-and espresso-soaked treat.  An apricot cake came with a scoop of house-made apricot sorbet – a nice balance to the heavy butter cake.

While Shore is a place worthy of stand alone status, it’s also a nice fit for the Harbour Inn.  After a decadent meal, it’s wonderful to simply wander back to your room and charge up th e Jacuzzi for a frothy soak.  And if dinner has put you in a romantic mood, consider ordering one of the inn’s specials: a bottle of Champagne sitting bedside an already drawn, rose-petal-strewn bath (surrounded by soft candlelight, of course).

The Harbour Inn – like most establishments in town – has been preparing for the surge of visitors for the St. Michaels Food & Wine Festival (scheduled this year for April 27 – 30).  The inn will offer a pack-age that includes passes to the festival, a shuttle service to and from the Chesapeake Bay Maritime Museum, and a wine dinner at Shore.