What happens when a Michelin-star chef team opens a casual neighborhood restaurant? Mixed, but often delightful, results.

The laid back magic of Her Place Supper Club doesn’t necessarily conform to the stuffy clichés of fine dining, even if chef Amanda Shulman’s unique restaurant was the first in Philadelphia to be awarded a Michelin star. But the pressure of gastronomic expectations can be daunting, especially for a chef with projects that traverse various styles of dining.

The timing of that November accolade was challenging for Shulman and her husband, chef Alex Kemp, who also own My Loup, the French Canadian hit that’s on my current Top 10. They were on the precipice of opening their third restaurant, Pine Street Grill, a deliberately casual restaurant and bar on Fitler Square serving chicken wings, burgers, and brunch.

PSG was conceived as a neighborhood haunt with thoughtfully updated comfort foods, relatively reasonable prices, and a kid-friendly ambiance, inspired in no small measure by Shulman and Kemp’s own status as new parents who live nearby. It is intended to impress the neighbors rather Michelin inspectors or, for that matter, a star-chasing influencer from New York who promptly descended one week after the restaurant’s opening and then declared it “not life-changing, go cry about it!”

The trend-seeker’s hot take, though, misses the point. A new restaurant does not need to shimmer with Michelin-level polish (as Her Place and My Loup certainly do) to be worthy and impactful. There are very few restaurants in Center City these days where one can eat a quality menu of American classics with a dinner and drink average under $50.

We need more good restaurants for everyday dining, not just splurge nights. So what Shulman and Kemp are building at Pine Street Grill, when it’s fulfilling its potential, can be quality-of-life-enhancing, indeed.

There I was solo on New Year’s Eve, for example, while the rest of my family was off traveling, walking in spontaneously to take a seat at one of the comfortable open seats at the bar. Not only did I enjoy the rare pleasure of a patiently poured pint of Guinness, I spooned through the comfort of matzo ball soup, then devoured a double-decker burger whose juicy dry-aged chuck was layered with caramelized onions and molten Cooper Sharp.

I chatted with the two women to my right who were pre-gaming for the night’s festivities on some brown buttered chicken wings that left them giddy. I made friends with an airman from McGuire Air Force Base to my left who noshed on a shrimp Louie salad while he waited for food to bring back to his wife at a hotel near the fireworks. His emptied seat was immediately taken by an off-work bartender I recognized from Atlantic City, and we caught up. If a great neighborhood spot should be both friendly and delicious, Pine Street Grill, which stays open for late night $20 burger-and-beer specials between 9:30 and 10:30 p.m., was already hitting some key marks a few weeks in.

It hasn’t entirely been smooth sailing. The baggage of expectations that comes with being one of Philly’s restaurant power couples was inevitable even before the Michelin star and Shulman’s most recent nomination as a James Beard finalist. As with their other restaurants, it’s ridiculously challenging to snag a reservation, which can feel like a dissonant barrier of entry for a place that — with its open kitchen, checkerboard floor, and lively dining room — functions like more an updated diner than a plan-ahead destination. Yes, they roast the turkey and cure the maple bacon in house for the excellent turkey club. But it’s still a turkey club sandwich.

But I like their compromise solution. At least half the 58 seats are set aside for walk-ins, a neighbor-friendly policy that worked well for me multiple times with reasonable waits, especially midweek evenings before 7 p.m. that avoid the prime-time two-hour waits. Fostering that locals-first sensibility, along with a menu that has everyday appeal, is a fitting approach for this sunny corner room overlooking the pocket park gem of Fitler Square, the space where Dmitri’s became one of Philly’s most beloved (and still most missed) neighborhood dining institutions.

The bigger challenge has been perfecting a menu that strikes the ideal balance between familiar comforts and cheffy tweaks. How do chefs accustomed to cooking luxury tasting menus ease up enough so it feels like they’re cooking fun, unpretentious food for friends?

It’s the kind of format this couple has been craving for themselves since they moved into the neighborhood and had their now-1-year-old daughter, Evie, who could be seen in Shulman’s arms with smudges of blueberry compote and ricotta pancake on her happy cheeks as the two cruised the brunch crowd greeting no fewer than four tables flanked with highchairs and PSG-branded baby plates.

There are fresh chicken tenders and grilled cheese sandwiches to please the toddler set. For grown-ups, the scratch cooking pays dividends, too. The turkey club really is outstanding, despite being cut in half rather than quarters, a seemingly picayune detail that vexed my wife, the club sandwich traditionalist.

There’s also juicy, crispy-skinned Green Circle chicken off the rotisserie with gravy made from the drippings that, for $30 a half bird, is a fairly priced simple pleasure — even better “Alex-style” with sides of slaw and the fresh-cut fries that take two days to make. (A limited number of whole chicken dinners to-go with sauces and sides to serve four are available weekdays for $70.) Bang Island mussels come in a garlicky green butter broth studded with seared Spam. There was an excellent turkey chili and a soulful beef stew for winter’s coldest days, too, although those are now just memories as this fast-changing menu now strides into spring.

One signature that’s always present: the shrimp pil pil, a tribute to the Dmitri’s standby that uses the old recipe as a base, but with bigger shrimp and some adjustments to make it saucier, less spicy, and more buttery, but with a splash of lemon to retain its zing.

Calibrating the right level of embellishment hasn’t been automatic. I appreciated the unexpected shade of richness that brown butter lends to the saucy Frank’s RedHot zap on the chicken wings. But it quickly becomes an overused crutch of high-low signaling across the menu. Brown butter-toasted corn flakes atop the mac and cheese. Brown butter in the mustard hollandaise for the excellent soft pretzel made by “pretzel freak” Emily Wilson. Brown butter in the sourdough chocolate cookie that, always so adorable as a coin-sized bonus after dinner at Her Place, becomes cloying when supersized at PSG into a sticky-bottomed skillet dessert.

But Her Place pastry chef Jess Stern’s deep dish carrot cake, intentionally served here ice box cold as a rum syrup-soaked, carrot jam-laced fantasy topped with cream cheese mousse, is likely the best update to the genre since Philly’s Commissary made it a national trend to begin with in the late 1970s.

I’ve tasted progress over the first few months as the kitchen, led by chef de cuisine Jonathan Rodriguez, successfully dialed-in the right tone. The broth on my first bowl of matzo ball soup tasted too much like the richly fortified chicken stock of a pro kitchen rather than a homey brew inspired by someone’s Bubbie. The soup has since lightened up, the earthy sweetness of parsnip bracing the natural chicken broth with rustic shreds of tender meat, veggies, and herbs garnishing the matzo ball floaters.

Other dishes still need work, like the sloppily built pastrami Reuben whose house-cured meat didn’t taste like pastrami at all (not a whiff of smoke). The snack plate with mortadella-stuffed cherry peppers and crackers was skimpy. Even the popular Philly Balls have digressed since their hit runs at both Her Place and My Loup, the one-bite tribute to the roast pork sandwich devolving into deep-fried nuggets of rubbery fennel sausage.

The “fat eggplant parm,” a crisped terrine of layered eggplants over Marcella Hazan’s iconic tomato butter sauce is one delightful cameo from Shulman’s repertoire that easily makes the leap to this high-volume setting, where she can see more customers in one night than an entire week at Her Place.

The drink program has been a strength, with well-crafted and playful cocktails, including a freezer martini, a tequila-grape soda “Transfusion,” and a Chartreuse combo with birch beer that I loved. There is also a smart wine list of largely Euro producers available by the glass, plus a surprisingly robust bottle list. Engaging servers such as Kiana Remy and Shilo Kendall were well-versed on all the options.

In the recent debut of brunch, Pine Street Grill has found a well-tuned expression of its relaxed vibe and sense of place. With sunshine pouring in through windows framing the lively farmers market on the Fitler Square, I savored a perfect breakfast sandwich of a fluffy egg frittata layered with a fried round of kosher salami. A tender crab cake, overshadowed in sandwich form at dinner by a bready brioche bun, shined atop an English muffin as bruchtime pedestal for a Benedict egg and hollandaise.

And then there was the spelt waffles for dessert. It’s crisped to a caramelized crunch in the Belgian Liège style, but earthier from that ancient grain, and … is that irresistible extra richness from brown butter? Yes, it is. I’ll have another, please.

2227 Pine St., Philadelphia, PA 19103; pinestreetgrill.com

Dinner Monday, Wednesday through Friday, 4-11 p.m. Saturday and Sunday, 5-11 p.m. Brunch Saturday and Sunday, 10 a.m.-2 p.m. Closed Tuesday.

Dinner entrees, $14-$32. Brunch, $14-$24.

Not wheelchair accessible.

About 70% of the menu is gluten-free or can be modified. Gluten-free bread is also offered.

Menu Highlights: Brown butter Buffalo wings; matzo ball soup; turkey club; mussels with Spam; PSG burger; chopped Greek salad; roast chicken; fat eggplant parm; shrimp pil pil, carrot cake. Brunch: salami and egg sandwich; crab cake Benedict; spelt waffle.

Drinks: Aside from one of the city’s best new pours of Guinness (and Saison Dupont by the bottle), the bar offers affordable and playful cocktails, creative Citywides, and an appealing list of largely Euro wines by the glass and bottle.