Watch out, Congress. Here comes Yvette Clarke.

The newly elected and fiercely stylish Democrat from Flatbush, N.Y., strides into the Starfish Cafe on a recent chilly afternoon. She chose the colorful Caribbean eatery because it’s a reminder of her immigrant-laden district — and because, being so near to Capitol Hill, it’s a place to take a breather smack in the middle of a busy congressional workday.

Clarke isn’t your typical half-lost, conservatively dressed freshman. More runway than House floor, upon arriving at lunch she unwraps a thick, multicolored scarf and removes a long, pretty beige overcoat to reveal an animal-print Gianni Versace suit — a mid-thigh-length skirt accompanied by a short blazer. A beige fur cap covers a sleek new hairdo. “Now that my hair’s so short I can feel the breeze,” she says, explaining that she recently removed her hair weave. She says people in Congress have been doing double-takes at her fur cap. She doesn’t care. She stands tall in black wedged heels.

Clarke, whose parents are Jamaican immigrants, is at ease and ready for anything. Starfish is her kind of place. Salsa music in the air, the cafe is charming, upbeat and laidback, much like Clarke, who settles in while her chief of staff, Terrill North, parks the car. The restaurant has a cool, tropical feel with a green fish sculpture seeming to swim along one wall. Complimentary hush puppies arrive at the table as an appetizer.

Her attitude? Unapologetic. The congresswoman orders a cranberry juice with a lime twist and peruses the menu.

“I think I’m gonna go for the fried seafood platter minus the oysters,” she tells the waitress, asking for extra crab rolls instead.

This isn’t a woman afraid of fried food. She’s shapely with a fast metabolism. Today she spears her french fries with a fork, laughing with North that this isn’t how they eat them in Brooklyn.

Clarke, 42, has lived in Flatbush her whole life. She lives in the home her parents bought after she was born. They now live just down the street and she sees them often. “I figure if I am going to rent, I might as well invest in something I will inherit,” she says.

Speaking of mom and dad, they’re bursting with joy over their daughter’s seat in Congress. “Oh man, they’re walking around the house high-fiving each other,” Clarke says.

In 2001 Clarke was elected to the New York City Council. She succeeded her mother, Una Clarke. In 2004 the younger politician challenged Rep. Major Owens (D-N.Y.) but lost. When he announced his retirement in 2006, she ran and replaced him.

At the same rate that she changes her hair and wardrobe, she varies her diet. Favorites include jerk chicken, oxtail or roti (flatbread with potatoes and chick peas). “It’s so filling — it’s a meal unto itself,” she says of the latter. Clarke loves seafood, especially lobster and all things Caribbean: “It’s delicious,” she says of curried goat, eyes widening, then reels off a list of other dishes. “Curry shrimp, rice with beans, fried plantains.”

Growing up, her mother did all the cooking. But Clarke? As a single, professional woman, she rarely finds time: “One person? It’s not really a consideration. If I had kids or a husband, that would make a difference.”

Breakfast always includes coffee, sometimes fruit and occasionally a bacon-and-egg sandwich on a buttered roll.

Clarke is enjoying the new vibe in Congress. “It’s spectacular, it’s really dynamic,” she says. “There’s a real energy that’s running through the place right now that has been very responsive to the November elections.”

Politics comes naturally for Clarke, having been exposed to it from an early age. Her mother was active in local politics and due to the family’s low income, young Yvette went everywhere with her mother rather than staying with a babysitter. That meant attending late-night activist meetings as a little girl.

“I would come with my coloring book and Jell-O pudding cup and have to sit quietly until the meeting was over,” Clarke recalls. Afterward her mother would take her for dessert as a reward for good behavior.

“I was listening,” Clarke says of the meetings. “They were idols to me. They were going to make sure our community was safe.”

Here in Washington, Clarke lives in a two-bedroom townhouse down the block from the Congressional Cemetery. “Somebody told me if I run into any old colleagues, run for my life,” she says, laughing.

Although Clarke won her race handily with 89 percent of the vote, the election wasn’t without its tough moments. For instance, she repeatedly was accused of lying about graduating from Oberlin College — she left school a few courses shy of completing her degree. She says the charge was portrayed inaccurately and she paid the price of having her integrity questioned.

There were also funny moments. Her GOP challenger was Dr. Steven Finger. “I was like, I hope he doesn’t give me the finger!” she says, adding that there were a lot of middle-finger jokes throughout the campaign. “He came from nowhere. I have never heard of Dr. Finger before.”

Clarke won a tough four-way primary, even beating out Rep. Owens’s son.

She’s plowing through her plate of crab balls, catfish and shrimp, dipped in Dijon tartar sauce. “This catfish is great,” she says. Though she adds, “I eat for energy. I don’t eat because I love, love, love food.”

Yet she mentions a phenomenal lunch she had the previous day, which involved a bacon cheeseburger and coconut-custard pie from the Rayburn Cafeteria. “I love sweets,” she says. “It’s horrible.”

The one thing that won’t pass her lips? Liver.

The congresswoman remarks on the “strong pockets of poverty” that exist in her district and says, “I’m unnerved by that kind of poverty in America.”

She also adamantly opposes President Bush’s surge of troops into Iraq. “I’m not a military expert,” she admits, “but it seems to me you gotta see people talking. We’ve created an environment where people can continue to annihilate each other. Our credibility? We’ve lost it.”

A mere mention of Bush causes Clarke to let out a strong sigh. “He just didn’t seem 100 percent ready to be president,” she says. “I don’t know if any of us are 100 percent ready to do anything, but he just doesn’t give me any confidence whatsoever.”

Among Clarke’s ongoing causes has been HIV awareness and prevention. “Today you can prevent HIV and you can manage it and live with it,” she says. “It should be part of our conditioning.”

Clarke says she has worked hard to change the stigma of the disease, telling people that it’s not just a gay man’s disease. She’s also encouraged rapid HIV testing, in which results are divulged in 20 minutes. A year ago, she herself took a rapid test to show her community they could do it, too.

How hard was the wait?

She smiles, “I was like, life is a gamble and it’s one bridge I want to get over. Let’s face our fears together.”

When asked about her bold fashion sense, she reasons that not everyone in Congress has access to the designers that she does in New York. “I’m sure if they had access they would knock it up a bit,” she says. “I gotta be me. I don’t even know what Washington is in terms of dress.”

The freshman fashionista has spoken. She has also nearly cleaned her plate. “This was great, Terrill,” she says looking toward her top aide. “Two thumbs up.”