2650 Virginia Ave., NW (202) 298-4455 Hours of Operation and Prices Breakfast: Daily, 7 a.m. to 10:30 a.m. Lunch: Monday through Saturday, 11:30 a.m. to 2 p.m. Brunch: Sunday, 11:30 a.m. to 2 p.m. Dinner: Daily, 5:30 p.m. to 10 p.m. Other Information • Reservations Suggested • All Major Credit Cards • Smoking in Bar and Private Dining Room Only • Full dinner with wine, tax and tip $50 to $75 per person

At the end of last year, soon after it opened in the Watergate Hotel space once occupied by Palladin, Aquarelle had seemed to me not quite good enough, the food too inconsistent and the service too offhand for its high prices. But when acquaintances raved about recent dinners there, I decided it was time for a reassessment.

Signs of improvement were apparent when I called to make a dinner reservation (anonymously, of course) and asked whether it would be all right to bring a young boy dressed casually for his Little League game. The answer was charming: Men always wear jackets at Aquarelle, but "a child is a child. They are the priority. Always." Indeed, I saw two groups with children dining happily at Aquarelle that evening, though certainly the prices would discourage families in most cases. Nevertheless, the restaurant has a welcoming, friendly air.

The visual drama of this dining room takes place not in the room itself but outside: Long stretches of glass bring the Potomac River and the other Watergate buildings into the picture, framed by window boxes of geraniums. The interior decorations remain silly, with tall glass bottles of colored water serving as centerpieces. (I saw one child tinting her drinking water with the red stuff, and hoped she wasn't going to down it.) Fortunately, the eye is drawn past those and the innocuous pastel watercolors on the walls to that panoramic view.

Unlike in the days of the Watergate restaurants' world renown, the room is no longer staffed by glamorously tuxedoed waiters who look cast for the part by a Hollywood studio. Nor are they chic young people waiting tables between acting gigs. These are workaday waiters in white jackets, with heavy accents that leave you sometimes worrying whether they have understood your requests. As it turns out, though, they not only understand, but are devoted to their diners' comfort, serving with a good-natured wit that doesn't slip into "Hello, I'm your waiter" phony friendliness. At Aquarelle, you can expect your wine to be poured in a timely fashion, your silverware and napkin to be replaced at the least provocation. If your dinner is slow, it is the fault of the kitchen, not the dining room staff.

Chef Robert Wiedmaier's food has improved in the last several months, though not as much as I had hoped. His presentations are beautiful, with little skyscrapers of phyllo-wrapped mushroom rolls accompanying the quail, and sweetbreads formed into plump disks that look almost like crab cakes. His plates are complex: Meat and seafood entrees are dressed with vegetable purees; carved vegetables form spokes; sometimes a soft bed of cooked greens provides color contrast. Depending on the season, there might be an eggplant puree with the seared salmon appetizer, celery root puree with the squab, white bean puree beside the rack of lamb. One night, best of all, a pear-turnip puree had been matched with the duck.

Given all those different purees, it is a surprise to find many of the sauces repetitious. They might be called by different names -- Banyuls sauce, cumin Madeira sauce or red wine with violet mustard -- but they all leave the same impression: a dense, dark wine sauce reduced to a near glaze, almost sticky and with a sweet finish. After a parade of these, the simple lemon and parsley butter with capers that accompanies the skate wing seems a revelation.

The advantage in Wiedmaier's complexities is that nearly every plate has some memorable component, and when all the parts work in unison his food is worthy of drum rolls and salutes. Thus, at lunch one day when I started off with a gateau of crab, I was ready to dole out stars. It was a fragile custard quivering with the weight of lump crab meat, poised on lightly cooked arugula drenched in a buttery emulsion with lobster coral, which lent an interesting fish richness. Another appetizer, a tuna medallion, faltered just a bit: It was overcooked. Yet the thick chunk of fish was vividly seasoned with thyme and pepper, topped with bits of garlic caramelized to near candy. With its red wine glaze and the puree of garlic alongside, the dish played rollicking games on the tongue.

At dinner, my beginnings were more mixed. A small copper pot of fresh morels swimming in butter sauce with a hint of truffle oil -- what could be more seductive? And squab cooked rare, on a celery root puree with a small mound of sauteed mushrooms -- just fine. But the balancing act crashed with the quenelle of pheasant; airy as it was, it tasted tired, and the artichokes with it had a metallic undertone. Most disappointing, though, was the roasted lobster tail. Before he came to Aquarelle from the Cafe on M, Wiedmaier had in part gained his reputation from this dish, the lobster fresh and pearly with its interplay of fennel, endive and Riesling, under a cap of hair-thin fried potatoes. This time, though, the lobster was opaque and dry; I'd have bet it was frozen.

Here's a Wiedmaier entree at its best: A salmon fillet is coated with coriander and fennel seeds, cooked at a heat high enough to form a crust while leaving the inside nearly melting. It's perched on a mound of crisp field greens with a slick of lemony dressing that has a faint vanilla perfume to balance the acid, all so lightly applied that it seems as if the taste is coming from the leaves rather than coating them.

Wiedmaier's perfect timing doesn't apply to the quail, which is puffed with a lovely spongy and faintly meaty mousse. Too bad the quail itself is stringy and overcooked. At a dinner when the chef was off duty, even more flaws surfaced. A special of duck breast had flabby skin, though its little sausage on the side was a fine spicy bonus, and that pear-turnip puree is inspired. Not so the turbot, which was itself delicious but clashed with a risotto reeking of saffron and Parmesan. Sweetbreads formed into a disk aren't half as delicious as sweetbreads plainly sauteed. So when in doubt at dinner, I'd stick with the skate wing.

And I would definitely save room for dessert, whether the butter-rich three-chocolate terrine or the thin, crisp round of hot plum tart with cinnamon ice cream. The chocolate marquise looks like a gift, with its thin chocolate wrapping paper enclosing cake, raspberries and chocolate ganache. But then all the desserts look like a party, with stripings of red fruit sauce against big blue-and-white plates. The plainest, however, is ultimately the most impressive. A little dish of creme brulee is as soft and silky, understatedly rich and perfect as eggs, sugar, cream and vanilla could hope to be.