At 4:30 pm, an hour before their restaurant is scheduled to open for the evening, chefs Marcia Miller and Erica Mahlkuch don't seem the least bit stressed. Instead, they sip iced coffees and nibble oatmeal cookies and chat about how much they love to cook. When the time is pointed out to them, Mahlkuch smiles and says, "Oh, we are very well organized."

It might seem that two executive chefs in one kitchen is a recipe for bruised egos and discontent, but in the kitchen of Sabroso in Rhinebeck, Miller and Mahlkuch wouldn't have it any other way. They say they thrive on each other's input and inspire each other's creativity. They refer to the style of their food as Latin world cuisine, and the heavily weighted seafood menu pulls from different regions of Latin America.

On a Friday night in summer I sampled a Sabroso margarita on the rocks. The glass arrived heaped with ice and holding an elixir that was refreshing, potent, and not too sweet. My company ordered starters from the tapas menu: a startlingly delicious corn lobster tempura with a sauce of emulsified sea urchin, ginger, and soy, beside fried sweet plantain disks; chili-dusted calamari with poblano lime aioli and a sweet and smoky guajillo sauce made with tomatoes, ginger, onions, and garlic; and the trio of ceviche. The ceviche trio changes with the tide, often daily, and is made with the freshest fish of the day's delivery. Citrus blends of lemon, lime, or orange vary according to theme. We sampled Ecuadorian-styled shrimp in a tomato based sauce with cilantro, onion, roasted red peppers, and roasted jalapenos; Peruvian styled scallops dressed in mango and poblano; and Asian styled tuna in a sauce of ginger, sesame, and soy. The little square dishes hold big, well-rounded tastes.

For main courses, we tried an evening special, the Catalonian-style pasta with jumbo shrimp, scallops, mussels, and clams heaped atop a layering of wide fresh-made noodles, with a smoky chipotle tomato sauce made of fresh tomatoes and sofrito paste. (Miller and Mahlkuch describe sofrito as a "mother seasoning" in Latin cooking that varies depending on the region, and it may be jarred, dried, or frozen.) The chefs make their sofrito from scratch using onions, peppers, garlic, bacon, cumin, and culantro (similar to cilantro but bitter). The seafood portion was generous and cooked to perfection. We also tried the lump crab cakes. They arrived atop a divine corn-infused saffron cream sauce that dissolved in the mouth. Near the fat cakes, sautéed squash blossoms lay like a fan, and near these were tiny red pearl onions. A garnish of vibrant green cilantro oil created a surprising flourish against the white plate.

"Erica and I love food and we love feeding people," says Miller. "We get excited about an ingredient. We talk about it and what we have done with it before. We work together and ask each other, 'How about this—or that?'"

"Like with the lobster tempura. We used Latin corn flour instead of regular white wheat flour. And I had never worked with sea urchin before and I had wanted to. It has a texture like foie gras, and because it is salty, it adds the taste of the sea," says Mahlkuch.

"They don't come up with a dish in five minutes," says Christopher Long, the third partner-owner, host, and front-of-the-house manager.

"It takes weeks," says Mahlkuch.

"There was a dessert we wanted to do, leche frita [fried milk]. We threw thoughts around for a year," says Miller. The crispy-on-the-outside-and-custard-on-the-inside leche frita is currently a desert special, on its way to the regular desert menu.

The two chefs plus Long have worked together on and off over the past ten years, beginning in Virginia when fifteen-year-old Mahlkuch was hired for pantry and behind-the-scenes work at an Italian restaurant (with a Spanish flare) owned by husband-and-wife team Miller and Long. When Mahlkuch moved to Miami a few years ago, the three stayed in contact, and when Miller and Long decided to relocate to Rhinebeck, they invited Mahlkuch to join them. (The area is familiar turf to the couple as both were raised in the boroughs of New York City and have been visiting and vacationing in the Hudson Valley for years—even when they had to travel from Virginia to get here.)