Evelyn's Drive-In - Tiverton, RI

Posted By Michael Stern on January 12, 2011 4:00 AM

Evelyn’s is a summer-only drive-in with the nicest possible outdoor dining area: a row of covered picnic tables perched over Sakonnet Bay with a view of pleasure boats and the Newport shores. The outdoor dining is strictly self-service – carry your own food from the order window. We actually saw one couple spread a tablecloth and open their own wine to accompany lobster plates.

Regular customers tend to eat inside at tables and a short counter, where the view is of each other and the tight quarters are filled with conversation and the hum of air conditioning (rather than the lap of water and the screech of seagulls). We noted that many of the locals order non-seafood meals from the broad menu: meat loaf, burgers, chicken pie, and one oddity we couldn’t resist ourselves: a chow mein sandwich. It is a plate of frizzled-crisp Hoo Mee brand chow mein noodles, soy-sauce gravy, and vegetables (beef optional) with a hamburger bun floating in it. Weird!

For us travelers, Evelyn’s is a seafood shack, where the blackboard menu lists market prices for fried clams, scallops, and lobster. Scallops and clams are available in small and large size plates, the large being immense. In our experience, the clams are extraordinary uniform in shape – the classic diamond-ring formation, with a chewy hoop and a gooey belly. The lobster roll, available with butter or mayonnaise served on the side, is only pretty good – more shredded meat than chunked. Chowder and clamcakes makes a nice single-digit-priced meal – those market prices for seafood can dispossess your of a $20 bill or more for a single lunch. You want to have a little cash to splurge on the Rhode Island favorite for dessert: Grape-Nuts pudding.

Overall Rating

lobster

clams

chowder

Chow Mein Sandwich

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Posted By Ellen Dericks on July 17, 2011 2:42 PM

I had been interested in checking this place out for years now. We finally went for lunch today and I have mixed reviews.

First off, the service wasn't that friendly and the setting wasn't as nice as I had hoped, since there is the busy road right there. We ordered the chow mein and the fish sandwich. The fish was good, the chow mein was inedible. I don't know how a restaurant can put this on their menu. The look of it is 100% unappealing and the flavor: bland and spicy at the same time. No redeeming qualities.

I left and went to Flo's where the service was much friendlier and they offered a fish sandwich done well.

Overall Rating

Chow Mein Sandwich

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Posted By Mark Thompson on October 26, 2010 11:11 AM

Evelyn's is an overrated shadow of its former self. The portions have shrnk while the prices have grown. Moreover, the food is average at best - the clams were not nearly as juicy as the could've/should've been, and the cole slaw ws clearly an afterthought. I was also dispaoointed with the service; while the food arrived within a reasonable time, the waitresses were notparticularly helpful and appeared inconvenienced.

At Evelyns, you are essentially paying for the view.

Overall Rating

clams

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Posted By Jeannine Chanes on September 12, 2007 10:13 PM

Sometimes food is just food, but sometimes it's an epiphany. Evelyn's belly clams were a clam epiphany.

As a born-and-bred Midwesterner, I hardly qualify as an expert on clam shacks or seafood, but I've eaten at a few. After reading the Roadfood recommendations I was looking forward to trying Evelyn's, and I certainly was not disappointed. No, I should say I was DELIGHTED with the clams. Absolutely positively the best belly clams I have had in my 50+ years on this planet, no contest. Okay, so the portions are relatively small as clam shack portions go (a "large" order of belly clams was maybe two cups max, and probably more like 1-1/2 cups). And the prices are steep (a breathtaking $29 for my two cups of clams). And the presentation is non-existent: the clams are unceremoniously heaped into a small (VERY small) cardboard carton.

There was a LONG wait for my order, even though there were only two people (already waiting) ahead of me when I arrived -- maybe they had to go out and dig the clams first? -- and it was difficult to find a parking space even at 3pm. But, those quibbles are unworthy in light of the food. Oh! the clams! Every tender nugget was a joy. I am usually a fairly light eater, but I ate most of the clams all by myself while sitting in the (very pleasant) outdoor seating area. Even after I decided that I had had enough and should/would leave the rest over, I ended up polishing off the last six or so in the car (after all, they wouldn't reheat well, would they?).

"Ambiance" is typically clam-shack-y, complete with a parking lot "paved" with clam shells and flower beds fertilized with seaweed. I am already trying to figure out how I can get back for another batch (P.S. By way of comparison, I live in Southbury, CT, where Denmo's is located, and I have only eaten there once in 20 years and would not willingly go back. Evelyn's is in a whole 'nother universe!)

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Posted By Jonathan Cohen on August 11, 2004 10:48 PM

If you'd like a nice clam-shack meal, Rhody-style, head down to the pleasant country roads of Tiverton and stop at Evelyn's. In particular, go with the "cakes-and-chowder" combo. The chowder is the thin, brothy kind- unique to the South Coast and just shore-liney enough. Clam cakes in these parts are round doughboys, sometimes of the "sinker" variety- but not these babies, which are crispy-chewy morsels with just enough shoreline tang. Add a boat of excellent, completely greaseless fries and you're in business, especially if you bathe the whole deal in malt vinegar, the Rhody way (via the French-Canadians around Woonsocket). For a drink, make room for coffee milk, which came in a cup with syrup streaks on it.

Evelyn's is one of the few eating places on the road to moor-like Sakonnet Point. The modest building includes tables facing calm Nannaquaket Pond, highly recommended on pleasant afternoons. There are non-seafood items as well, though we weren't brave enough to try the chow mein sandwich (although we happened to have grown up on these kind of noodles, made in nearby Fall River).

Though we're grape-nut pudding fans, we recommend the ten-minute drive down to Gray's ice cream stand for dessert.

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