The East Village has its share of Southeast Asian restaurants, but not many that stand out from the pack. Tigerland, a new entrant, attempts to pull ahead with the help of a tightly composed menu and high-grade ingredients.

Chef Jimmy Tu, who runs the restaurant with his sister, has worked at Eleven Madison Park, Nicole’s, and other Manhattan destinations. Those restaurants’ fine-dining influence is visible less in Tigerland’s casual concept and more in its expert execution.The kitchen uses, in the words of the menu, “mostly organic produce and naturally raised meats.” “Organic” here is deliciously free of the word’s sometime associates, “low-fat,” “vegetarian,” and “dull.” The first piece of evidence is a fatty, flavor-packed entree of Berkshire pork ribs ($16.50). The natural juiciness of the Berkshire breed’s meat is enough on its own to set the dish apart, but the garlicky ribs are braised in mildly spicy coconut juice, in which they develop an unearthly savor and succulence.

A lot of the menu is in this vein: dense, flavorful riffs on Thai and Vietnamese dishes, neither hidebound nor elaborately creative, that depend on their components for distinction.Thus, good free-range chicken is the salvation of an otherwise ordinary green curry ($15.50). Crunchy okra and mini-eggplants give the spicy dish character, but the moister-than-most chicken really excels. A Thai-style red curry of free-range moulard duck ($16.50) outdoes even the pork ribs for richness: Each piece of meaty fowl is rimmed with half an inch of luscious roasted duck fat, and the coconut-based sauce has its own oily payload. Natural beef (a step down from organic, which is pretty hard to find) is the star of a simple lemongrass-heightened Vietnamese dish ($16.50): just lots of tender, deep-flavored beef, piled on a cress salad.The difference between this and lesser versions is vividly apparent.

With that kind of raw material, and the chef’s unarguable skill, all the food should be great, but sometimes the two factors get in each other’s way. The dishes that work less well are the ones that don’t let the ingredients have their say. Num tok ($8.50), a cool beef salad starter, is a victim of its own recipe: that excellent beef, grilled to a T and delicately flavorful, drowns in pungent lime and spice. Short ribs ($17) fall short in a similar way: Super-tender and doubtless full of beefy savor, they suffocate in a fierce, cinnamon-powered massaman curry, which they share with organic potatoes and carrots, and which completely overpowers the dish. A strong, delicious sauce isn’t a bad thing, of course, but tasting the quality of the meat in other dishes here (and the poor quality of meat in curries elsewhere), makes one regret the massaman’s masking effect.

A few dishes are just ordinary, like blandish noodles in a clay pot. Seared scallops and shrimp hoist the dish’s price to $19, highest on the menu, but beyond the seafood, there’s not a lot going on. The house rendition of pad thai ($14.50) teeters a little toward the too-much lime brink, but its chewy, earthy noodles haul it back.

Main-course portions are oversize, so starters aren’t strictly necessary, but to skip them means missing a lot of the menu’s excitement. “Angel wings” ($8.50 for a pair) aren’t shorn from actual angels, the staff insists: They’re from chickens, with the bones taken out and replaced with a savory glass-noodle stuffing. The wings are then breaded, fried, and served with a sweet chili-fired dipping sauce. Banh xeo ($8.50) are rustic Vietnamese crepes, served hot and incorporating mushrooms, shrimp, and Berkshire bacon. They’re best torn into ragged pieces, enfolded in lettuce, and dipped in fish sauce. A vegetarian version with three kinds of mushroom is $8.

Desserts play a minor role: There’s a choice of coconut-laced tapioca ($5), too rich to really be refreshing, but well offset with fresh pineapple; or a deeply creamy coffee custard ($7). More impressive are the restaurant’s house-brewed sodas, in such flavors as tamarind and ginger ($3.50). Steeped strong, with just barely enough sweetening, they make a fine complement to the food. Diners in the mood for stronger stuff will find Kirin on tap ($4.50) and a dozen New York State wines, all available by the glass. They include Paumanok’s Bordeaux-style “Assemblage” ($12/$47), a rotund, dark blend; varietal offerings from the same vineyard, including a dry riesling ($8/$31) and a cabernet franc ($9/$34), pack a simpler punch. Wolffer’s reserve chardonnay ($9/$35) is another versatile choice.

The choice of natural meats and produce does, as intended, set Tigerland apart, but it’s odd to see such treats buried rather than highlighted. So many restaurants treat their ingredients as fetish objects, however, Tigerland’s offhand approach is refreshingly upbeat, as though these delicious products were everyday pleasures.

Tigerland, 85 Avenue A, between 5th and 6th streets, 212-477-9887.