Water Street Cafe

The Water Street Cafe was a nice-looking restaurant in the downtown area of Plymouth, Massachusetts. It had a little bit of a residential look with the stairs up into a two-story standalone building. They had a tent set up next to the building for outdoor dining, but we chose to eat inside. There was a counter immediately to the right upon entering, and then a couple of rooms with tables and chairs to the left. The tables and chairs were pretty basic, typical of what you would find in a cafe.

I wasn't terribly impressed with the menu description for the sandwich, which didn’t give any details but said that the Reuben was “Traditionally done.” That leaves some room for uncertainty.

The sandwich arrived pretty quickly, and I immediately liked the way that the corned beef was sticking quite far out of the bread, inviting me into the sandwich. The corned beef had an amazing rich flavor and was excellent. The Thousand Island dressing and the sauerkraut seemed to be pretty lightly applied to the sandwich, just appearing in the middle, atop the beef. With such a light amount of dressing and sauerkraut, the sandwich ultimately tasted more like a good grilled corned beef and Swiss sandwich. The marbled rye had what seemed to be a liberal amount of butter applied, so the bread was buttery and delicious.

The chips served with the sandwich tasted pretty cheap and were nothing of note.

It was a good sandwich overall, and was despite the minimal amount of dressing and sauerkraut, it was really the corned beef and the bread that saved the day and allowed this Reuben to be rated as highly as I did.

The service at the Water Street Cafe seemed to be overtaxed, or else not very good. When we came in for lunch, we sat next to a table that not yet been bussed and cleaned off. By the time we finished our lunch and had paid and were leaving, that table was still a mess. So that is reflected in the Atmosphere and Service ratings.