Fusion confusion is on the outs. No longer can most chefs get away with serving food fabricated with competing and sometimes contradictory fixings – say, smoked-duck and ham quesadillas drenched in chocolate-watermelon salsa. Nowadays customers demand meals crafted with a synthesis of flavors, not a confusing scramble.

Below are two successful big-city eateries that feature well-honed repasts inspired by assorted cuisines from far-reaching parts of the globe.

Pambiche2811 N.E. Glisan St., Portland; (503) 233-0511; 11 a.m. to 10 p.m. Sunday through Thursday, 11 a.m. to midnight Friday and Saturday

appetizers and salads $3 to $10.50, lunch $6 to $9, dinner $7.50 to $17

beer and wine, only

Mastercard, Visa accepted; no personal checks, no reservations

PORTLAND – We could’ve been in Havana. Or Miami, anyway. Except the evening summer air was agreeable instead of sweltering, there were fir trees rather than towering palms growing in the neighborhood and no one was smoking a cigar.

Still, at Portland’s pint-sized Pambiche (the restaurant’s name derives from the way Dominicans pronounce Florida’s famous Palm Beach), the mood is tropical, the restaurant is painted in colorful Caribbean hues, salsa music blares in the background, and the servers all understand Spanish and often speak it. Even the menus are done up in magenta, orange and yellow.

Chef-owner John Connell Maribona’s food is as vibrant as the atmosphere and decor. Forget Tex-Mex; Pambiche’s Cuban Creole cuisine is an appealing harmony of Latin, African and European cooking. Beans and rice are a staple, sure, but think fried yucca root smeared with a creole garlic sauce (Yuca Frita), taro root (Malanga) or pumpkin squash (Calabaza) fritters, smoked-ham croquettes (Jamon) and the island version of French fries, Tostones – deep-fried green plantains dripping fresh lime (a favored condiment is tomato ketchup buoyed with hot peppers and flavored with bananas). And those are just some of the appetizers at this funky sidewalk cafe that opened in February 2000.

For main courses our quartet selected a potpourri of moderately priced but generously portioned meals, including Camarones Enchilados (Cuban shrimp Creole) freshened with West Indian spices; and Ropa Vieja (“old clothes”), shredded beef matched with yellow onions, green peppers and peas, then propelled into high gear via a passel of pimentos and oodles of garlic. Ensalada Caribena – red and green cabbage tossed with grated carrots, citrus and fresh herbs – and black beans blended with oregano and Spanish olive oil are typical side dishes. Sharing is almost mandatory.

My Arroz con Pollo was a half-foot-high feast of saffron rice crowned by fall-off-the-bone fowl simmered in zippy spices and tropical beer. A sassy garlic sauce enhanced our jumbo Gulf Coast prawns that took center stage in the Camarones al Ajillo, while Rabo Encendido (“oxtail on fire”) featured oxtail braised in a piquant red wine sauce, a repast roughly equivalent to North American barbecue.

While sipping sweet cafe Cubano, our server suggested we peer into the counter case before deciding among almost a dozen postres apambichaos. Most captivating was Tres Leches, cream-frosted vanilla sponge cake served in a pool of strawberry daiquiri salsa. But Island Carrot Cake laced with a rainbow of tropical fruits, iced with mango cream cheese and flavor-boosted with mango margarita salsa was the yummiest dessert. Mango pie, Caribbean chocolate cake and Pudin de pan, Cuban bread pudding concocted with almonds and sherry-soaked raisins also looked mighty enticing.

Place Pigalle81 Pike St., Seattle; (206) 624-1756; 11:30 a.m. to 11 p.m. (approximately) Monday through Saturday

appetizers and salads $3.50 to $11.25, lunch $9.95 to $14.75, dinner $16.75 to $23.75

full bar, extensive wine list

personal checks and all major credit cards accepted; reservations suggested for dinner

SEATTLE – Everyone who dines at Place Pigalle revels in the vistas from high above Seattle’s waterfront. Expansive Elliot Bay, sundry harbor traffic and scurrying island ferries backdropped by the Olympic Mountains are all within eyereach. It’s probably the finest view from any restaurant in Pike Place Market.

The food – a mingling of Italian, French, Northwest and other styles that is mostly on target – garners only slightly less acclaim, although the lunch and dinner menus scream high-end (and they’re both expensive). Beefy-thick French onion soup capped with warm Gruyere, chilled Dungeness crab, sauteed calamari, Rotolo di Pasta and a burly open-faced chipotle chicken sandwich on toasted sourdough all share space on the lunch sheet.

Dinner is even more diverse: roasted rabbit packed with chestnuts, spinach, apple bits and blue cheese; lamb with curried eggplant; and a bounty of seafood swimming in a saffron-tomato-thyme broth, a kind of Seattle bouillabaisse.

As is the trend in urban areas, many diners like to share starter plates such as steamed mussels garnished with bacon, celery and shallots, a plate of warm asparagus spears and shiitakes tossed in a red-miso vinaigrette, and caraway-cured gravlax heightened by a wasabi dressing.

Servers can appear big-city pretentious, particularly by mellow coastal standards. Ours became flustered by a hard-to-pop cork in a bottle of Yakima Valley viognier, a deal at $20. Then she offhandedly shrugged off the advice about how to more easily open a wine bottle from one of my dining companions, a savvy wine guy who apparently wasn’t chic enough for her tastes.

A dozen wines (plus four desert wines) are offered by the glass from Place Pigalle’s extensive wine list, with some tempting choices – for instance, a Joseph Drouhin (the same French family that operates Oregon’s Domaine Drouhin winery) white Burgundy for $8; or a $7.50 Giesen sauvignon blanc from New Zealand’s Marlborough region.

On a crystalline autumn afternoon or evening, the panorama from the teeny deck or one of the window tables is well worth the price of an asparagus salad and a glass of vino, if not a full meal.

Contact the Mouth at The Daily Astorian, P.O. Box 210, Astoria, OR 97103 or phone (503) 325-3211 or e-mail mouth@dailyastorian.com