For a generation, the shortest sentence in west-metro dining was "meet me in Wayzata." Broadway had the lake view, the parking, and the reservations worth calling ahead for. Excelsior's Water Street had charm and Maynard's and a handful of shuttered storefronts that had never quite recovered from the pandemic.
That sentence no longer holds. Over the past eighteen months, four operators have opened on a single block of Water Street, Rustica has planted a flag on Wayzata's Lake Street, and the city council has spent its summer approving patio expansions and concert permits along the shoreline. If you already live here, the practical consequence is simple: your fall Saturday has more moving parts than it did last September, and the best of them are farther south than they used to be.
Water Street, four doors in one summer
The building at 200 Water Street used to be one address with one restaurant in it. It is now three. Jester Concepts, the group behind Parlour and P.S. Steak in Minneapolis, opened Shiki, a 30-seat noodle bar drawing from Japanese-inspired cuisine with dumplings and ramen, alongside Mirabelle upstairs and a lower-level outpost of Parlour. Mirabelle is a neighborhood restaurant celebrating timeless American comfort food with modern touches, with rotating nightly specials like lasagna, meatloaf, and fried chicken. The cast-iron fireplace and the mezzanine are original to the building.
Across the street at 205 Water Street, chef David Fhima opened Vagabondo, named for a childhood nickname from his Sicilian grandmother. The coffee lounge runs 8 a.m. to 3 p.m. daily, with dining from 5 to 10 p.m. Sunday through Thursday and 5 to 11 p.m. Friday and Saturday, and the bar stays open an hour later. The sourdough is worth ordering for its own sake; the bread basket is made from Fhima's family's 130-year-old starter, which is also the base of the Neapolitan-style pizzas that run $20 to $27 and can easily feed two.
What is genuinely new is the density. As reported by the Star Tribune in September 2025, Water Street's turn as a dining destination came after restaurants that had anchored the street closed after the pandemic and remained vacant, which chef Mike DeCamp described as depressing to see every day at the main entrance of the city. The turnaround is not incidental. Excelsior is trying to grow its year-round population and daytime foot traffic, and after the success of the new parking garage, more apartment units, medical offices, coworking spaces and other developments are in the pipeline.
The open question is not whether Water Street can pack a July patio. It is whether four new operators can fill seats in February. The parking garage, the apartments, and the coworking space are the answer the city is betting on.
Wayzata's response
Downtown Wayzata is not conceding the argument. Rustica, the Minneapolis bakery and cafe, opened its newest location in downtown Wayzata a few blocks from where co-owner Mike DeCamp grew up. The Wayzata store is not a copy of the Minneapolis original. It is the first location where the company will debut a more robust savory program, adding breakfast and lunch dishes to the full lineup of pastries, breads and coffee drinks, with the goal of elevating the food offering rather than turning Rustica into a sit-down restaurant. Savory development is under chef Arash Pashaei; the bread and pastry program is still overseen by Shawn McKenzie in Minneapolis. If you have been asking about the olive loaf for the last two years, DeCamp told the Star Tribune it may return to the case starting in Wayzata.
A block away on Broadway, Eloise has been quietly rewriting its footprint. According to reporting on wayzata.com, the Wayzata City Council voted 4-0 on July 21 to approve a new outdoor sidewalk cafe permit at 332 Broadway Avenue South, allowing the restaurant to add seating along Broadway for the remainder of the 2026 season. That is a small procedural note with a large practical effect on how the block feels in September and October.
A quick reference for what has changed in the past year:
- 200 Water St., Excelsior — Mirabelle (supper club), Shiki (ramen), Parlour (burgers, lower level)
- 205 Water St., Excelsior — Vagabondo (Sicilian, day cafe)
- Downtown Wayzata — Rustica bakery and cafe, with an expanded savory menu
- 332 Broadway Ave. S., Wayzata — Eloise, with new Broadway sidewalk seating through the 2026 season
- 294 Grove Lane East, Wayzata — Macanda, which drew a 4-1 council vote on June 2 approving a special event permit for HIFI on the Lake
The Macanda vote is the outlier worth watching. The council approved a special event permit for HIFI on the Lake, an outdoor electronic dance music concert planned at Macanda near the Boatworks area, despite a staff recommendation to deny the permit. Whatever your view of amplified sound on the water, that vote signals a council willing to lean toward activation over caution. Expect more, not fewer, event permits along the shoreline in 2027.
The fall anchors residents plan around
The dining reset sits on top of a calendar that has not changed much and does not need to. Three anchors do most of the work.
Excelsior Apple Days, September 18 to 20. As Lake.com notes, since 1935, Excelsior Apple Days has marked the transition from summer to fall with a three-day festival celebrating local heritage, handcrafted goods, and apples, with the 2026 festival running September 18-20 on Water Street in downtown Excelsior. The Chamber's preview schedule includes a pie baking contest, cruises hosted by Paradise Charter Cruises, and a festival kickoff aboard a chartered boat. The practical note for residents: Water Street will be closed for the weekend, which now affects reservations at four restaurants rather than one.
The Minnesota Landscape Arboretum's scarecrow season. The Arboretum's fall programming, including the Scarecrows in the Garden displays, continues to be the low-friction move for residents hosting out-of-town family. The grounds are twenty minutes from any bay on the lake, and the fall installations photograph well enough that no one will ask why you did not book brunch.
Lake Minnetonka Regional Park in October. The Three Rivers Park District's flagship park on the lake offers roughly 3.2 miles of paved trails plus connections to community trails, and the fall light makes for incredible reflections on the water, mornings can be calm and ideal for kayaking and canoeing from the public boat launch, and cooler water often drives fish into shallower areas, which makes fall an excellent time for anglers. If you have been meaning to actually use the launch you drive past every week, October is the month.
Back Channel Brewing in Spring Park remains the after-hike stop that requires no explanation.
A fall Saturday, in one paragraph
Start with a croissant and the new savory menu at Rustica on Lake Street around 9. Drive south on County 19 to the Regional Park boat launch by 10:30 for a paddle on Halsted Bay while the light is still low. Lunch on the Vagabondo patio at 205 Water Street, then walk two blocks to the Excelsior-Lake Minnetonka Historical Society, whose collection on the Hotel Lafayette and the Tonka Bay Hotel gives the shoreline the context most residents have never actually sat down with. Beer at Back Channel on the way home. If you are hosting guests the following weekend, book Mirabelle for Saturday dinner now, because that room fills five days out.
The larger point is not that any one of these places is transformative on its own. It is that Water Street has quietly acquired the density Wayzata used to hold alone, and Wayzata has responded by leaning into its own upgrades rather than defending an old lead. For residents, that means the practical calculus of a fall Saturday has more good answers than it did two years ago, and more of them sit on the south shore than the north.
If you are considering how these shifts affect the value of a home in Excelsior, Wayzata, or one of the bay communities in between, Ian Petersen and the Petersen Team live and work in this corridor. Reach out when you are ready for a conversation about what the market on your street is actually doing, or request a home valuation when you want a number grounded in the block you live on.
