While revelers of every nationality love to play Irish for the day, the Newport St. Patrick’s Day parade separates the men from the McBoys. Listen up, Chad. Your green sweater won’t fool anyone if the road’s rising up to meet your face by noon.
Don’t be that guy! Pace yourself. For starters, like your mom said, “Eat something.” And keep noshing throughout the day. The restaurants are ready for you, and with a broad selection of Irish whiskeys and countless kegs of Guinness on tap, you’re gonna need to pad your gut.
Kick it off at Tavern on Broadway with breakfast sandwiches and pizzas to fuel your rowdy road ahead, with lunch and dinner specials rolling out all day long. Making a big Irish splash on the Tavern Parade Day menu is the Dublin favorite, the ‘Spice Bag,’ featuring popcorn chicken, fries, veggies, sausage, spices, and curry sauce. Mid-afternoon, you’re gonna need one of their famous Reuben Egg Rolls or a corned beef and cabbage bowl.
For that classic, hearty Irish breakfast, you can’t beat Malt or Buskers. “We do our big traditional Irish breakfast from 9 a.m. until around 3 p.m. or until we run out. (We’ll have) Irish bacon, similar to Canadian bacon, Irish sausages, black and white pudding, and Irish baked beans,” said Malt’s Chelynn Sheehan. In the afternoon and evening, there will be Reubens and corned beef sandwiches, corned beef dinners, battered sausage and chips in curry sauce, Smithwick battered fish and chips, and more.
Similarly, Buskers is the place for a morning feast of eggs and rashers, pork sausages, toast, fried tomato, and more. Later in the day, their potato skins topped with corned beef are the perfect stick-to-your-ribs snack.
On Cinco de Mayo, everyone’s suddenly Mexican, so Diego’s knows what you need to outlast the onslaught of a cultural appropriation party, and you can start your day there at 8:00 a.m. with a hearty Mexican kickoff to your leprechaun cosplay. The Bowen’s Wharf location’s brunch options include corned beef hash and eggs with breakfast potatoes, peppers, onions, and two sunny side up eggs. Special menu items for later in the day include shredded corned beef tacos on grilled flour tortillas with Baja cheese, black beans, Pico de Gallo, and Diego’s aioli; and Dublin nachos with Oaxaca cheese, corned beef, spicy pickled cabbage slaw, Pico de Gallo, Thousand Island dressing, and sour cream.
The Corner Café, a well-known breakfast mecca with a perpetual morning line, serves up its famous corned beef hash on parade day, but get there early if you want to get in. Or fuel up for the big day at The Quencher on Long Wharf, where an all-you-can-eat brunch is being offered from 10 a.m. to noon, loaded with scratch-made dishes and Irish specials like their own corned beef hash and eggs for just $18. If you go for brunch, you get free admission to see The Pourmen, playing there from 12:30–3:30 p.m. Other food specials that day at Quencher: Shepherd’s pie empanadas and a pizza, Patty’s Pie, topped with corned beef, cabbage, caramelized onions, Thousand Island, and crispy fries.
To even get into the parade’s after-party at the Hibernian Hall, you’ll have to ante up a $25 cover charge, but there are live bands and a lively mob scene at this old-home-week, Irish-centered spot, and loaded hot corned beef sandwiches are just $9 all day.
Feeling a little green from all that corned beef and the scent of boiled cabbage? No law says you can’t zip up Memorial Blvd. to Nikolas Pizza for a coupla slices and a Pepsi, always a go-to for mid- or post-party padding.
Back downtown, you can always count on a solid pub bite at Speakeasy where Rob Biela plans on cooking 40 lbs. of corned beef for sandwiches and dinners to be served all day along with their hearty burgers, stuffies, tenders, nachos, and more.
On Bowen’s Wharf, for early afternoon Guinness sopping, the Wharf Fish House is offering Irish dumplings stuffed with corned beef, sauerkraut, and Swiss cheese, served with Thousand Island aioli, and parade day fried rice with pickled carrots and cucumber topped with a sunny side egg and crispy shallot. Next door at Wharf Southern Kitchen, Irish tater tots topped with corned beef, Swiss cheese, pickled cabbage, and mustard aioli is a bomb snack, or tuck into a full dinner of corned beef and cabbage, potatoes, carrots, and pearl onions served with whole grain mustard, or a classic Reuben.
Wandering? Diego’s Taco Cart will be set up by the Bowen’s Wharf flagpole serving those tots along with tacos and burritos, weather dependent, from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m.
Remember, if you’re looking to capture the luck of the Irish on parade day, pace yourself. Eat something.
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