140 Thames St.
Newport, RI 02840
(401) 849-6334
July 24, 2014
I’ve never heard a bad word about Brick Alley Pub, but
Mom and I had never been. The parking is
horrendous, the restaurant is always packed and for some reason or other it has
always been one of those “we’ll get to it” types of places. We were in Newport picking up my paycheck and
figured that since it was early on a weekday, we might be able to find a
parking spot right in front – and we did!
Now that the car was in a safe place, we went
inside. We were met with a large set of
stairs leading customers to the second floor, but “ain’t nobody got time for
that.” We wanted to dine on the first
floor, so we were taken to the very last room at the back of the restaurant because
it seemed as though the other rooms were filling up fast. We did get a sort of “tour” of the first
floor, all of the crazy stuff on the walls and the large salad bar area which
looked fantastic.
When we were finally seated, our waitress – Kaelan – brought
over two large menus for us to peruse.
Mom and I were overwhelmed – in a good way – with so many choices. (Click here to view the menu.) While we were making our decision, Kaelan
took our drink order. I chose the Sparkling
Blackberry Sangria ($7.50) and Mom had the Brick Alley Mudslide ($8.75) on the
rocks – both were fabulous. For our entrees, Mom went with
the chicken parmigiana with angel hair pasta and her choice of a side of garlic
bread ($19.95) and I had the lemony chicken piccata with my choice of a side of
Nancy’s creamed spinach ($19.95). Our
dinners each came with a free soup and salad bar option, and for an appetizer
we chose something that my sister loves – the cheese nacho platter ($8.95). We definitely went all out today!
Kaelan told me how to get to the salad bar and what to do
when I got there so I wasn’t totally lost.
She told me to take two chilled plates from the cooler for our salads,
which is all Mom and I were going to get from the bar since we were going to be
having so many other things. I made
awesome Caesar salads with all the trimmings and brought them back to the
table. I could have gotten some soup or
a few pieces of bread as well.
The salads were cool and crisp and everything tasted
fresh. While we were still picking at
them, our nacho platter arrived. It was out
of this world. A thick layer of tasty cheddar-Jack
cheese had been melted over top of a large platter of colorful homemade
tortilla chips. The gooey cheese was
great with the crunchy chips, and the plate of nachos was accompanied by two
large cups of sour cream and salsa. Mom
and I absolutely could not leave the nachos alone. Kaelan had to bag them up for us so that we
would be able to save room for our chicken dishes! The nachos are now our new favorite
appetizer.
After we almost overdosed on nachos, our entrees
arrived. Thank goodness we still had
room in our bellies because they both looked amazing. My lemony chicken piccata was a pan-seared
boneless, skinless breast in a white wine and lemon sauce and topped with capers
and fresh lemons. All I could smell was
lemon! The chicken was cooked perfectly
and the taste of the sauce was outstanding.
I loved the added bitterness of the capers and the meal was appropriately
portioned. My spinach was also
delicious. That Nancy, whoever she is,
certainly knows how to cream spinach. It
had a little bit of toastiness on top from the cooking process which gave it a
lot of added flavor.
Mom loved her chicken parmigiana. The breaded breast was pan-seared and topped
with parmesan and mozzarella cheeses.
(It comes with a fresh basil chiffonade on top, but Mom asked for it to
be left off.) It came with a side of
marinara sauce and her chosen angel hair pasta.
The chicken cut easily and was beautifully white inside. The breading wasn’t too thick and was quite
flavorful. The angel hair was cooked
nicely al dente which is hard to do because of the thinness of the pasta, and
the sauce was pleasingly seasoned. Mom
also enjoyed her side of toasted, buttery garlic bread.
Kaelan returned to ask if we wanted coffee or dessert,
but we could barely move. This was
certainly a divine dining experience.
From the very helpful waitstaff to the friendly hostess and busboy and
the eclectic adornments hanging about, we absolutely cannot wait to eat here
again. Our total came to $70.31. A bit pricey, but worth it for all the top
quality food we had.
I have no idea why we waited so long to visit the Brick
Alley Pub. All of my parking and crowd
concerns didn’t seem to matter anymore.
I’m a pain in the ass when I have to wait to get into a restaurant, but
I would actually wait to eat here. And I’d
even consider – wait for it – paying for parking. It’s that good.
