This is the season for Three Seasons, a downtown Palo Alto restaurant with lots of open-air dining opportunities, now including a raw seafood bar. Another plus is that you sit in an alley rather than trafficky University Avenue or Castro Street.

Back in 2002, this contemporary Vietnamese restaurant transformed a soaring space that had housed a couple of clunkers after the legendary 42nd Street Bar & Grill closed. Luckily, 42nd Street's now-octogenarian wooden bar, whose top meets the mezzanine floor, remains intact, except for the bullet holes it acquired in New York City.

If you sit inside, enjoy the large Italian glass dome. Venue choices include high tables, low tables, upstairs tables and lounges.

The Bay Area and Vietnamese food were made for each other, whether it's pho, banh mi sandwiches, seven-course beef dinners or spring rolls. We have access to fresh ingredients and the taste for variety.

Three Seasons has carved out a niche that once may have been derided as fusion, starting with a smaller restaurant in San Francisco's trendy Marina district. They do it pretty well, at a reasonable price for very pleasant surroundings.

Need a pick-me-up after work? Happy Hour (5 to 7 p.m. weeknights) provides half-price on oysters and refreshing cocktails, such as the cucumber martini.

Need a quick lunch with a picky eater? Three Seasons' menu encourages sharing, but you don't have to, especially at lunch with the three-item bento box.

Our dinner kickoff was played by miyagi oyster shooters ($3.50 each with quail egg), dotted with fish roe and shredded chives and a smidgen of yuzu gelee.

Then there was a fumble. I ordered honey quail satay ($12), a dish I remembered fondly, the first listed among five satays. But the kitchen was out of quail — early on a Saturday night. We punted with sea scallop satay ($11), three sticks each with two very lightly grilled, plump scallops.

Less good, a small plate of pork ribs ($13) drowned in cloying, sticky sauce.

The maki dragon roll ($13) features slabs of avocado and eel resting across nori-wrapped sushi rice, sweet-tart ponzu sauce and pickled ginger. Like the oyster shooters, the dragon roll is a dance of textures and flavors.

If every dish were so multidimensional, a meal at Three Seasons would require too much attention. You'd get tired. Better to mix in some straightforward items such as sea bass ($26), stingy-looking at first but satisfying in the end, steamed with ginger, lily buds and mushrooms. Access to produce like mushrooms is a fine example of the Bay Area-Vietnam coalition.

We finished with the signature banana spring roll ($8), six crisply fried wrappers keeping the banana warm inside and the chocolate melting outside. A small scoop of Tahitian vanilla ice cream accompanies.

Service can be sketchy. Pacing is not part of the regimen, but replacing the paper atop the tablecloth is, so be thankful for that. As mentioned, this food is meant to be shared. The table gets messy.

In case you wonder why the name is Three Seasons instead of four, chef/owner John Le Hung had three reasons the last time I asked. That was shortly after opening in Palo Alto, when he explained the homage to Bay Area filmmaker Tony Bui's movie "Three Seasons."

Also, Le said that in Saigon, where he was born, they really don't have winter. So there went one season. Finally, he had a fantasy of being open three seasons and taking the other season off. Not gonna happen.