RESTAURANT REVIEW : Fishing for Perfection in Great Atmosphere : Pier 17 feels right and offers such winners as a generous fried calamari appetizer, but lacks consistency in pricing and preparation.

Fisherman’s Wharf at Channel Islands Harbor has seen much change in recent years: the addition of new shops, the growing popularity of the Ventura County Maritime Museum, and slow but steady improvement in dining opportunities.

Enter Pier 17, a seafood house that months ago took over the blue clapboard space once claimed by Charlie Brown’s. The good news is that Pier 17 makes a strong entrance: The place is a well-conceived fish house with often satisfying results. Moreover, Pier 17’s cavernous interior is right out of Boston Harbor, and successful for it: an old-fashioned, barn-like waterfront room with exposed beam ceilings and ships’ appointments that tastefully transcend nautical kitsch. Sawdust and peanut shells on the floor bespeak a casual air and beg a little kicking up.

The bad news--one hopes it is provisional--is that some of the dishes are overcooked and others are well beyond the kitchen’s reach. Pricing, too, needs consistency: Some entrees are a downright bargain, while others, as well as certain wines by the glass, seem steep for the quality offered.

Soups show mixed results. New England clam chowder (included with some dinner specials or $2.95 a la carte) is rich in clam flavor but too thickened for this reviewer’s tastes--a valuable attribute, perhaps, for preventing leaks when it is served as a $3.95 meal-in-itself within a hollowed-out loaf of bread. Seafood chowder bears the same viscosity but less flavor and fewer bits of ocean bounty.

Of the salads, Caesar is best and offered with entrees for an additional $1.95. While not a classic preparation, its blended dressing is loaded with garlic, light in body and nicely tossed with shaved fresh Parmesan cheese.

Best appetizer of all is the fried calamari ($5.95). Unlike lighter, Italian-style ringlets, this is a bargain meal in which chunky, finger-sized strips of fresh white meat are coated in herbed batter and deep fried. It’s less than airy, perhaps, but a “meat-and-potatoes” approach for those who really love the taste of squid.

Char-grilled salmon ($14.95) was perfect at dinner--seared outside, succulent and sweet within--but dry, overcooked and mealy in texture at lunch ($8.95). In both cases, it was a substantial fillet and arrived with perfectly prepared and abundant fresh steamed carrots, broccoli, cauliflower and squash--a clear strong point of this kitchen--as well as firm, herb-freshened rice.

Somewhat surprisingly, the bull’s-eye dish turned out to be a fish that often suffers for lack of flavor: Pacific red snapper ($6.95 at lunch, $12.95 at dinner). Six small fillets--or the sides of three whole fish--were dusted in flour, quickly sauteed to crispness, and served with chopped fresh tomato, garlic and green onion accompaniment. With a dash of lemon, this meal sparkled for its freshness, tenderness and abundance. Another dish often lost to wanness--sole ($12.95)--was handsomely seared to seal in juices and delicate flavor, and it, too, arrived in rare abundance.

Scampi ($13.95), redundantly called Shrimp Scampi on the menu, are just OK at best: a half-dozen large shrimp, inadequately cleaned with their black veins clinging like lost thread, arrive atop a bed of rice. Sadly, the smaller of the shrimp are toughened from overcooking, and the classic garlic/butter depth of this preparation is all but missing. Wanting for flavor, it goes half uneaten.

Bouillabaisse ($18.95) seems just beyond Pier 17’s capabilities. Yes, it contains shrimp, clams, mussels, red snapper and the obligatory half-lobster; but no, it is not a tomato-based stew redolent of herbs, garlic, shellfish stock, white wine and perhaps a fiery dash of rouille to brighten everything. Instead, what the menu calls a “West Coast version of this classic” is merely a bunch of seafood awash in bland tomato broth.

The mussels are tender and flavorsome, the clams and shrimp rubbery from overcooking; the lobster is properly cooked but, in its apparent age and Gargantuan size, lacking the distinctive sweetness of a small Maine crawler. One has to give the house points for presentation--the dish draws oooooohs and ahhhhhhs from neighboring tables--but its lack of flavor and center might well put it on the menu’s retirement list.

Pier 17 makes much of its three-layer chocolate cake for dessert, but its towering height--more than a foot--was beyond this reviewer’s mettle. It, too, is a breathless presentation and does indeed appear to please those at neighboring tables who devour it.

A small wine list is smartly chosen and distinguished by having everything available by the glass. But one glass of Steele Chardonnay, from the revered efforts of former Kendall Jackson winemaker Jed Steele, lacked the fruit and finesse for which it is known, and tasted flat, or stale. This won’t do at a steep $7.50 per glass. One would, in the company of wine-drinking companions, do better to select a less touted but moderately priced bottle, such as the Mondavi Central Coast Chardonnay, for $19.95.

Clearly, Pier 17 has some fine-tuning to do. But this room with a view already has a generous hand in the kitchen--and shows the promise of becoming the popular anchor this boutiqued harbor needs.

Details

* WHAT: Pier 17.

* WHEN: Breakfast from 7 to 11 a.m. Monday through Friday; lunch from 11 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. Monday through Saturday; dinner from 4:30 to 9:30 p.m. Sunday through Thursday, till 10:30 p.m. on Fridays and Saturdays.

* WHERE: 3910 W. Channel Islands Blvd., Oxnard.

* HOW MUCH: Dinner for two, food only, from $20 to $60.

* FYI: An all-you-can-eat brunch, featuring freshly shucked oysters, from 10 a.m. to 2:30 p.m. on Sundays.

* CALL: 985-3922.