Dining Review: Moonshine Alley in Providence

Moonshine Alley’s interior. Photography by Angel Tucker.

Moonshine Alley has two distinct personalities, separated when the clock hits 9 p.m. Early in the evening, its sprawling space is lit by filament bulbs and neon, an ode to not just the South but to all things American. A video wall lords over the bar, where you’ll usually find a dozen guys hanging with a laptop and working their way through a menu that’s part roadside barbecue and part Cheesecake Factory. The soundtrack shifts from Taylor Swift to Old Crow Medicine Show or, in other words, across several demographics until everything settles into a national comfort zone. 

Short rib grilled cheese. Photography by Angel Tucker.

But all of this is a preamble to the night shift, when the restaurant welcomes live music and a crowd that’s over twenty-one. The clientele diversifies as the night settles, the overhead bulbs burning like the inside of a carnival tent at a country music concert. There are plenty  of tables for sit-down dining, but people seem to gravitate to the bar, and it’s not always easy to negotiate the menu standing up. 

Thankfully, much of the food is utensil-free eating, but all of it speaks to our cultural penchant for excess. Fried chicken is served Nashville hot and spilling out of its bun, along with a haystack of cider slaw and spicy honey ($14.95). Even the chicken tenders are over-the-top, served in long, curled strips that seem larger than the bird itself and, coated in crumbs rather than batter, manage to feel like the healthy option in a sea of hedonism. 

Nashville naan. Photography by Angel Tucker.

The housemade sauces are all slightly off-kilter in an enviable manner: Hot sauce is loaded with garlic and teriyaki has a distinctly maple streak. Braised short ribs are packed into grilled cheese and served on Texas toast ($16.95),
a Dagwood of a sandwich that pales only in comparison to a rack of sticky ribs ($20.95), or a rib-eye topped with honey butter ($25.95). Of course, there’s a Southern playbook at work here, which means veggies are always on call to soften the impact of a pork-pa-looza, the best of the bunch being a soft pile of green beans with enough garlic to ward off a monster ($6). There are myriad ways to translate Tennessee culture, but this particular snapshot is always of a late-night put to music with a buzz built from fruity booze.

If you need more evidence that Moonshine is all about the party, the name should say it all. Moonshine is the building block on which cocktails are built and flavors run the gamut from watermelon to mountain java to butter pecan. If that’s not aggressive enough, you can get a slushie made from vodka and Red Bull, a Kenny Chesney rum drink poured for two or a moonshine sangria that goes down like grape Fanta. This is a place that loves to be two drinks in — so much so that ice cream is served in the de facto late-night vessel: a red Solo cup. You might not get to the spiritual side of the South in Moonshine Alley, but you’ll make it to the Saturday night bash before Sunday morning church.

Nashville hot chicken sandwich with hand-cut fries. Photography by Angel Tucker.

Moonshine Alley

52 Pine St., Providence, 861-0001, moonshinealley.com 

Serving lunch and dinner daily. 

Must get: Nashville naan, chicken tenders, short rib grilled cheese, green beans, cocktails and an Uber.

Moonshine flight. Photography by Angel Tucker.