40 West Coffee Café

New to the dining duo, 40 West Coffee Café is located in the Omni Hotel downtown. Jennifer had an errand to run nearby so 40 West was quick and convenient.

The small cafe advertises that it serves Boars Head meats, so we assumed that we’d find tasty sandwiches. What we hadn’t expected was the tempting ice cream displayed in a side case. Unfortunately our tight time-constraints meant we had to pass on the ice cream, but it really looked delicious.

A menu board on the back wall lists lunch options, which included basic sandwiches and soups. We both quickly settled on our sandwich choices, but had some real confusion over where exactly to order. Finally that was settled and we then had even more confusion over payment – there was some language difficulty with the one employee and Sheila had a real challenge with ever getting someone to add a drink to her sandwich order.

Jennifer ordered the Reuben, and while she wanted the New York version (with cole slaw instead of sauerkraut), she had to settle for the traditional version when they ended up being out of cole slaw. Sheila ordered a beef and pastrami on a kaiser roll. All sandwiches are served with a pickle spear and chips.

Jennifer really enjoyed her Reuben, although she wished that her sandwich would have been wamer–either go cold or go hot with this sandwich, but don’t go with the in-between. The marble was spot on and the meat was tasty. However, just as Sheila had had a challenge getting a drink added to her order, Jennifer had to remind them to make the mocha that she ordered–the service was really lackadaisical.

Sheila thought the meat on her sandwich was excellent, although the roll itself was somewhat stale. A side bar of condiments allowed her to add plenty of mustard and even some mayo in order to made the bread easier to handle.

The atmosphere is nothing that special – a small dining area along the street and hotel lobby – but the lobby itself is very pretty and it’s doubtful anyone goes to this cafe for the atmosphere.

Service was friendly enough but the language difficulties slowed everything down excessively since the one lady had to juggle her own customers and most of the other lady’s as well. It’s questionable how they would have managed if they’d had any sort of lunch rush, since just managing with the 2 other customers who were in there with us proved to be beyond them.

It’s highly doubtful we would ever go back – there are just too many other places to try and places we really enjoy to bother with such an “eh” place.

Food **
Atmosphere * 1/2
Service * 1/2
Overall * 1/2