Wayne and I went to the long-awaited Alleia at 25 E. Main Street, at its intersection with Market.
The inside of this restaurant is really something different! The outside is rather non-descript and the sign doesn’t even have Alleia on it. When you enter through the large door, just past the hostess stand you will see a very long communal table. It conjured up a thought of seeing movies where guests were having dinner in a castle at such a table.
At the far end of the table is another taller table covered in candles and wax has melted down, appearing as icicles. I thought this was beautiful.
We had made a reservation and upon arrival were shown to one of the front rooms looking out onto Main Street. There were only four tables in the room and both side walls were mirrored, causing you to see yourself forever – there must have been hundreds of us!
Talk about a difficult time trying to decide what I wanted! I wanted EVERYTHING!
We decided to start with Fried Rhode Island Calamari ($10). This was lightly battered, fried crispy and we thought it was delicious. Alleia does not serve a dip or sauce with the calamari, but it was so good, there was no need to mask it with a sauce.
Other appetizers include Tomato-Borlotti Bean Bruschetta ($5), Taleggio-Black Truffle Flat Bread ($9), and Polenta with Porcini Mushrooms and Parmesan ($6).
Wayne wanted a salad, so I thought I would go ahead and order one as well, but I wanted something different. He ordered the House Salad with baby spinach, raw vegetables and basil vinaigrette ($6). I narrowed it down to either an Organic Soybean Salad, pine nut pesto, red wine vinaigrette ($7) or Wood-fired Vegetable Salad with marinated mozzarella and balsamic ($8). I went with the vegetable salad, and while it was good, it was much too large for me and I found myself wishing I had ordered the soybeans, although I thought the mozzarella was wonderful.
All the pastas are made in-house and I did want to try it. I had narrowed it down to Conchigle with peas, sausage, mint and cream ($13) or Butternut squash ravioli with sage and brown butter ($15), but then I noticed Quail with charred tomato ($19).
Wayne ordered the Pork tenderloin with white balsamic and spring onion ($18). All main courses are “simply grilled and served with radicchio and new potatoes”.
I can’t say enough about how delicious the skewered and fired quail was. Of course, Wayne said his pork tenderloin was far better than my quail – but it wasn’t . . .
Alleia also has pizza cooked at 750 degrees in the hand made masonry oven. A lady at the table next to us ordered a pizza and said it was very good. Her dining partner had the Conchigle I almost ordered. Not only did it look tasty, the person who ordered it said it was great!
Even though we were full, our server tempted us with the house made gelato ($6). Wayne ordered strawberry-raspberry and I ordered peach. I could have been tempted to take a bowl home!
Alleia – a wonderful addition to the Chattanooga restaurant scene.
Hours for Alleia are Monday through Thursday from 5:00 PM to 10:00 PM and Friday and Saturday until midnight.
