I loved everything about this restaurant except one thing, which I'll explain, and which caused 5…read morestars to become 4 stars (I wish I could just knock off a half star but that's not how it works, I guess):
My next door neighbor Judi has a hobby of catching the Newport ferry from Providence, sometimes spending a few hours and coming back, or just staying on the boat and heading back, just so she can lean back in a seat and soak up the sun. Lately she'd been telling me about a chocolate martini from The Brick Alley Pub & Restaurant, and being the martini and chocolate fan that I am, I simply had to experience it. So I finally got a day when I could join her on a trip, and so we went there on Labor Day.
Once there, we walked right in at 11:30 am, and were seated immediately. The interior is fun and interesting -- antique this and that, including a huge iron door that looks like it went to a furnace, and had embossed lettering, I believe it was Newport Highschool. Perhaps the restaurant location is where the HS coal room was originally???
Anyway, one the way to the table, the hostess said something about the soup and salad bar being over there to my right, and so I went to check it out, and once I took a gander inside the two soup containers, I grabbed a bowl of Portuguese Kale Soup and brought it to the table. Judi said "That's all you're gonna get?" And I said "Of course not, I'll grab some salad and maybe get a sandwich or something." "Oh" she said, and then got up to check out the soup and salad bar herself.
Meanwhile as I'm slurping the delicious, heart y soup, loaded with chourico, potatoes, carrots, kale, beans, etc., I'm perusing the menu and I notice that it says that if you purchase a sandwich of $9 or more then you get the soup and salad bar for $10, and then the soup and salad bar alone was $18. Okay, so perhaps I just wasn't thinking about the world in which I now live that basically has you paying for the bread basket you might get served. But again, the hostess just basically slurred out something about the soup and salad bar and my brain heard that it was complimentary. I honestly have to wonder if that's part of the trick(?) to get you to go for it, and not realize that it's considered a meal in itself, and then you order a sandwich or whatever, and now you're paying twice the amount you thought you'd be paying, but hey, it's Newport and people are spending $40 on a stupid baseball cap. And so, you know, if you end up having to pay a bit too much at a restaurant, you don't make a scene, you just say "Yeah, I meant to do that".
Okay, I'm trying not to be sardonic here, trying not to sound like one of those "everybody's out to get me" kind of folks, so I'll just shut up at this point, on this particular point. I just hope that the owners and/or managers will inform the hostess to be a bit more clear on what the soup and salad bar actually means. That'd be nice.
So there was no way I was buying a sandwich to go along with the soup and salad bar -- I simply cannot eat as much as I did when I was in my 20's and couldn't gain a pound if I ate all day long. I was able to (slightly) save face once Judi went for the soup and salad bar herself and was satisfied with the freshness and deliciousness thereof.
But the piece de resistance, the very reason we both came to this establishment in the first place ... the chocolate martini! So this martini looks nothing like you'd expect as clear as water. I believe it's got a vodka base, and then some creme de cocoa, and is showered in grated chocolate flakes. It was absolutely splendid! Nice and boozy without being overpowering, and the flavor was amazing.
And then for some strange reason, Judi is looking at the dessert menu. She reads of a few of them, asking me if I'd like something like that. I keep saying "I'm pretty full Jude", but she was persistent. She especially was taken with the Ghirardelli Fudge Brownie with 4 Scoops of Vanilla Ice Cream. She said "What if we can get them to split it in half on two separate plates?" I said "Ohhhhkaayyyyy..." And our waitress said "Absolutely!" She came back with two large portions (see attached photo ... just remember, that's a picture of HALF of the dessert serving!). Oh my word! It was large and quite yummy. A nice, crunchy and soft brownie made with Ghirardelli chocolate, with plenty of walnuts therein, two lovely scoops of ice cream, all drizzled with chocolate sauce. A splendid way to cap it all off.
So I'd go back again, just with the knowledge that it's EITHER the soup and salad bar OR a sammich, at least for a guy my age and size and appetite. But definitely for that lovely chocolate martini ... and maybe that fudge brownie to make it complete :)