Anna's Water's Edge Restaurant — Restaurant in Phippsburg

Assessibility: the restaurant (at least part of it) is level and handicapped accessible.

We go to Maine every year, and have eaten at a LOT of small, out-of-the-way seafood shacks/restaurants. This one was unilaterally the worst we have ever eaten at. The menu looked promising, and there was a fairly long list of "daily specials". Thinking that daily specials are usually, well, special hubby and I ordered from that list, while adult daughter chose something from the standard menu.

We started with an appetizer of the day - crab dip. I knew we were in trouble when the platter arrived at the table covered with ruffled potato chips out of a bag. None of us were able to identify a flavor other than perhaps some Tabasco sauce, There certainly was no crab flavor, or crab that we could locate in the dip either.

Salads came next - very pedestrian, limp greens with thin, watery out-of-the-bottle salad dressing (thankfully on the side). Hubby had ordered the blue cheese dressing; unfortunately the blue cheese was MIA. I tried mixing some of the nondescript "crab dip" with the salad dressing to try and salvage something of either. This worked with little success.

Our entrees arrived shortly afterwards. My entree was listed as broiled haddock with "Kate's Lobster Newburg Sauce." The fish was woefully over-cooked making it so dry it was almost impossible to eat. Newburg sauce generally contains seafood, butter, cream, sherry, brandy and egg yolks. This topping contained none of these. It was dehydrated orange-colored blob that in no way even remotely resembled a sauce. The rice mixture that accompanied the fish was dry, cooked without any salt or other seasoning and so cool that it would not even begin to melt a pat of butter.

Husband had another special - scallops while adult daughter had haddock "stuffed" with what was supposed to be crab stuffing. Both were supposed to be topped with a Parmesan cream sauce. The scallops were barely cooked but edible. Daughter's dish was a glob of stuffing (no detectable crab) in the bottom of an au gratin dish topped with an overcooked piece of fish. Both had a small amount of what amounted to milk with some Parmesan sprinkled on top. These entrees were accompanied by the same lukewarm rice side dish.

The best part of the dinner was definitely the friendly, polite waitress and the bottle of wine. Surprisingly the wine was correctly chilled and quite good.

I did notice that the positive reviews for this restaurant were several years old, with newer ones less favorable. Perhaps something has happened in the intervening time. For now, save yourself the drive and the money and...

The view is BEAUTIFUL, and the burgers are good (but you pay extra for cheese, and for the price, it only comes with a mini bag of chips). The wait staff are wonderful. That's why I gave 2 stars. Here's why I didn't give 5....

The wait to get in, isn't usually too bad, but there's no bar if it's busy. The wait for your food, can range from 30 mins to an hour, or longer during dinner. The place is very rustic and fairly clean, but it really should be scrubbed from top to bottom, at least once a year, before they open, and they never do. It's common to see dust, cobwebs, etc. And, don't put your elbows on the table when you sit down, because they always clean them with wet rags and leave them that way.

The seafood's definitely frozen (not good quality either - Inexcuseable, because there's fresh seafood available all over town!) Don't order any fried food (including the fries and onion rings) because they're the cheap, frozen kind, and are extremely greasy. For years, their frying oil hasn't been hot enough, so grease, literally drips out of the food. Gross! (It's also obvious that they don't change their oil regularly.) We only go there on occasion because it's convenient. It's unfortunate that they're not concerned about food quality there. It's probably because they live out of state. (come for the summer to make their money and leave)

The chowder isn't thick and creamy. It's very watery, with not much in it. The lobsters come in just 1 size, and they're SO small that they barely look legal. (menu says 1-1.25 lbs, but there's no way) And, the lobster rolls are VERY small, and WAY overpriced (You'll be mad.). They stuff a small hot dog bun with lettuce and put 2 tablespoons of lobster salad on top, so it looks like more. (No tail meat, just shredded knuckles and a small claw.)

So, go for a buger and a beer, and take some nice pics, but don't waste your money on anything else,. Go over to The Dolphin Restaurant in Harpswell. It's expensive too, but you'll get your money's worth. And, for a really relaxed atmosphere, and lobster and clams, check out Estes Lobster House, also in Harpswell. They always have a $19.99...

I’m a vacationer who has been coming to this area in Maine for a while and who has enjoyed many meals here, but today’s meal is the last for us at Anna’s. Everything from the food to the service was not just disappointing, it was offensive.

They close at 4, we got there at 3:30 and were rushed the entire time. We ate outside. We asked for umbrellas for the picnic tables but they wouldn’t provide them because they had already put them away as part of their closing chores. The teenagers were pushy about collecting our trays and were clearly motivated to leave by 4:00.

The scallops were disappointing. They were flavorless and tough.

The real reason for this review though was Anna herself. I’m still in shock at the way we were treated. She inappropriately yelled at my child for climbing on some maritime object. She embarrassed her and crushed her in front of everyone.

It’s a greasy spoon, family friendly restaurant with open fields where kids play. Kids make mistakes. And we tell our kids when they’re making mistakes. But if an owner has items so precious to her, she could put up signs, fence things off, or just not leave them out in the open. She also could communicate her needs to people, including children, respectfully. But she didn’t.

I spoke with Anna privately at the end of the night saying she didn’t have to scorn my child. She could have spoken to me or communicated without shaming her but she double-downed on her offensiveness, aggressively continuing to insult my child to my face. She behaved as if she was looking for a fight and needed a target to unleash her aggression on.

In any event, as long as Anna is running Anna’s restaurant, we will never return and I told her that. I don’t think she will mind, she seemed to not want our business from the moment we got out of our cars today. I’ve just never experienced such ugly behavior before. She should be ashamed of herself. Maybe she’s unwell and needs emotional and mental support. Tonight I’ll pray that God gives her some grace and hopefully she can find some peace so she won’t have to take out her aggression on her...