This fall, Aaron Chambers, a Bar Boulud and Boulud Sud veteran, quietly stepped into Craigie on Main’s kitchen as the new chef de cuisine. The Cambridge nose-to-tail restaurant has stayed true to its classics: burger, fried pig’s tails, whole roast chicken. But changes are coming. Chambers and head honcho Tony Maws are redesigning the menu, and guests can sneak a first taste. On select Tuesdays, the two will cook six-course dinners for Craigie’s new “Chef’s Whim: R&D’’ series. Diners at the chef’s counter will watch the two interact in the kitchen and can interview them after each dish.

“The four people perched up there could watch us do everything,’’ Maws says, sitting with Chambers in a corner of the dining room. “So when we presented a dish, it wasn’t just, ‘This is blood orange with scallops.’ We said where they came from, how we did it, that it started as a Meyer lemon dish but we didn’t like the Meyer lemons. We let them into the process.’’

Based on feedback, the chefs will construct a new set of dishes for Craigie’s next chapter, but loyalists need not fear: According to Chambers, the essence of the institution will remain intact.

“We need to make sure the people who came to Craigie 13 years ago are having a similar experience here,’’ Chambers says. “It’s a different chef, but it’s the same relationship with food.’’

When former chef de cuisine and “Top Chef’’ contestant Carl Dooley left Craigie last spring, Chambers called Maws, thinking about his next step. A few hypothetical conversations later, the Boulud boy was hooked. They began talking through concepts, and started to draft dishes that, after the first “Chef’s Whim R&D’’ Jan. 19, made the nightly menu.

For instance, Maws mentioned using phytoplankton in cannelloni he once made. Chambers loves the combination of dashi and phytoplankton, so Maws suggested he rehydrate the luminous plants in dashi and use the liquid for chitarra dough. Maws and Chambers considered the seafood in season — Maine uni, for instance — and, with a bit of fine-tuning, created a new seafood appetizer combining all of their ideas (phytoplankton chitarra pasta, pictured). When they presented the plate at their first “Chef’s Whim R&D,’’ Maws says the guests dropped their forks.

Now, a version of the dish is available any night of the week.

“Chef’s Whim: R&D,’’ Craigie on Main, 853 Main St., Cambridge, 617-497-5511, www.craigieonmain.com. Feb. 16, 6 and 8:30 p.m., six courses for $57. Reservations by phone only.

Brooke Jackson-Glidden

Brooke Jackson-Glidden can be reached at bjacksonglidden@gmail.com.