Big Disappointment...My Birthday Meal at Coral Reef

[aes74]

Well my birthday was today, and we ate lunch at Coral Reef to celebrate. We had never eaten there, and although we had read mixed reviews here, I decided to try it. Man, I wish I hadn't. Since, with the DDP, all seatings were full at all restaurants...except Rose and Crown and I think Morocco for dinner. However, we had to leave the parks by four, so we didn't feel like we had time to eat dinner instead. I am still recovering from a long foot injury, so we made the trip with a wheelchair, and my poor husband had to push me around with our two little ones on my lap (since we couldn't use the stroller) and we (especially he!) were tired and hungry.

First, always ask the prices on your kids' drinks. The server suggested it would be fun for them to get a blinking ice cube in their drink. She said the battery lasts a long time, and it can be turned on and off. Well, folks, that blinking ice cube turned their plain old soda into a "blue wave" and cost $6.50 for each!! Lesson learned for me!! Never assume that it couldn't possibly cost that much!

So onto the food:
The one yummy thing of the meal was the Lobster soup. My husband and I shared it and it was very good.

For my entree, I had the Mahi with the Israeli couscous. It was terrible. There was no flavor, and I didn't even finish it. I was really dissapointed in the menu. There were only eight things to choose from, and I really wasn't excited about any of them. I was very disappointed in the selection. There were things I might have gotten in another place, like chicken, or the caeser salad, but since we were at a seafood restaurant, I reallly wanted seafood. I had looked at the blackened grouper, but the server told me it was super spicy, and I can only do semi-spicy.

My husband had the BBQ salmon sandwich, and he wasn't very impressed with his either.

On the + side, my daughters liked their dinners, one with pizza, celery, carrots, apples w/ brown sugar, and the other with fish, rice, green beans, and a yogurt/strawberry parfait.

So the server said to me, since it's your birthday, you get the dessert for free. We ordered the Chocolate Wave. It was dissapointingly icky. It wasn't quite cooked all the way through (I'm talking about the part that's supposed to be cooked, not the inside gooey part) and had the most bizarre taste. And, we ended up getting charged for it. But we were so tired, and disappointed, we were just ready to go so we didn't say anything. Maybe I wouldn't care so much, but it was really expensive for a tasteless dinner.

The aquarium was nice; we saw a shark and a big sea turtle. But it wasn't fifteen dollars a plate nice. Forgive me for being a party pooper. I am just so bummed!! I read other good reviews, and I wonder, Should we have ordered something different? Is dinner good and lunch not?

[SLDL]

I'm sorry to hear your b-day meal was a disappointment!! I have only eaten at Coral Reef once & really liked it. I can understand you may have not liked the food, but the Chocolate Wave! That is the best dessert on property, imo. There must have been something wrong with yours if you didn't like it! I hope you complained or told someone you were not satified. Happy Birthday, though! :wizard:

[swankybeth]

Sorry to hear you didn't enjoy your birthday meal. DH and I tried Coral Reef for the first time last month and we were also disappointed. I enjoyed the atmosphere and a couple of the items we tried were good, but overall it lacked quality. I'm glad I tried it but I probably won't be back unless the food changes. Our chocolate wave was excellent, though, and it sounds like you got a bad one. :scared:

[lillygator]

Sorry to hear of your disappointment. We celebrated DD's birthday there with the diver and all and the food was fantastic. We booked again for this coming May. I hope I didn't make a mistake! :(

[aes74]

Sorry to hear you didn't enjoy your birthday meal. DH and I tried Coral Reef for the first time last month and we were also disappointed. I enjoyed the atmosphere and a couple of the items we tried were good, but overall it lacked quality. I'm glad I tried it but I probably won't be back unless the food changes. Our chocolate wave was excellent, though, and it sounds like you got a bad one. :scared:

I think I must have gotten a bad chocolate wave!! I have heard so many good things about it! UGH! I love chocolate!

[Topo Bella]

I have to say that the Coral Reef was also a dissapointment to my family, but for different reasons. We thought the food was good and my sister, a vegetarian, LOVED her meal, but the portions were small considering the cost and the selection very limited. I think you really need to have the sort of family that loves fish to enjoy a dinner there. Otherwise, it's just an OK meal with a great view.

[aes74]

I have to say that the Coral Reef was also a dissapointment to my family, but for different reasons. We thought the food was good and my sister, a vegetarian, LOVED her meal, but the portions were small considering the cost and the selection very limited. I think you really need to have the sort of family that loves fish to enjoy a dinner there. Otherwise, it's just an OK meal with a great view.


Well, I certainly agree with you that the selections are extemely limited. I also felt like they were very bland, safe choices. Not much originality or excitement. But my husband and I do love fish, and the fish was just plain awful. I am still wondering if dinner is better, but if it is, that doesn't really make me feel better...so you only get to enjoy the food if it's dinner?

[cocoswife]

I'm sorry your birthday meal wasn't what you expected. Coral Reef it's one of those restaurant that gets many positives and negatives reviews :confused3

By the way,


HAPPY BIRTHDAY!!!

party: :bday: party:

[SnowWitch]

Since the fish recieves such mixed reviews we ordered the NY strip x4 on our visit last summer. I must admit the steak was better than what we had had earlier in the week at Le Cellier. We enjoyed the lobster bisque and the shrimp cocktails which are no longer on the menu were okay. Our chocolate waves were fabulous. The service was top notch, probably one of the best servers we had the whole 2 weeks. Since we were on the dining plan the cost wasn't as painful, had we been paying cash the bill of $243 would have been ridulous for the quanity and creativity of the dishes ordered. But all in all we would give it high marks for a Disney restraurant.

[Eganclan]

Sorry that your birthday meal was disappointing. We celebrated my BIL's
50th there and we had an amazing time. Four adults and eight kids great meal and our server was fantastic (I wish I could remember her name). The older kids were even allowed to order off the kids menu if they wanted to. Hope the rest of your trip went well.:goodvibes

[beth_cam]

We didnt' enjoy our meal there. I dont know if i had plannd using the wrong menu on allears or what. I really wanted to go there for the experience but we are pretty picky. We found out our first trip on ddp that while I like trying new things the rest really dont so much and after a few days it gets kind of old. We like having nice meals and a break in our day but not for strange food. We aren't into ethnic food and I'm the only seafood eater. So I scoured all the menus to be sure that everyone was happy and there was lots of beef but alternatives too. I was shocked when I saw the lunch menu at Coral reef and finally decided to just order one kids meal and one adult meal and share it among the four of us. We didnt like much of it. I ordered two different salads and neither me nor my daughter liked either my hubbs barely got enough to eat from what he could pick out of the one thing on the menu he thought he might eat (i ate his leavings) I dont remember the kids main course but I think it was OK but it had to feed them both so nothing left over. The deserts were a hit. But this was the only meal we were hungry again before long and it wasn't the only one that we shared 1 adult 1 kid between the 4.

[3DisneyBuggs]

I did not enjoy CR either. We had wait long time for our ADR. Then the restaurant was freezing. The fish were lovely to look at but I was an ice cube. Our server took so long to bring courses. My short ribs appetizer came out cold. I sent it back and it came out lukewarm. The chicken caeser was good but by then I wanted to leave and the kids did too. DH didn't like his shrimp cocktail but like his steak. I won't be returning to CR.

[castleri]

CR seems to be the one place that people coment on the portions being small. Usually you hear about how there is just too much food everywhere on the DDP. When they brought out my DHs pasta dish last year his DD and I both thought it was a small portion but he said it was filling and that by the time he ate the appetizer and entree he had had plenty. In fact all of us (8)
had plenty to eat and for once didn't feel stuffed or like we had wasted food. Everyone liked their meals but some weren't that crazy about their apps. We plan to do it again this year and hope for at least as good an experience. i hope to be able to have the diver show up with a sign for DD and DSIL anniversary.

[distrekker]

We ate at the Coral Reef in Oct. when we were there and were very disappointed. The atmosphere is cool, but it was noisy, dark and the menu did not have much variety. The service was mediocore at best. We wished we hadn't wasted our DDP on the CR. I would not recommend it.

[NDAMomX2]

Our group of 12 had an awfull experience at Coral Reef in summer 2006. This started when our group showed up on time for our ADR and ended up waiting and waiting and waiting. There is very little seating and the inside areas were jam-packed with people sprawled out all over the floor/laying down on the limited seating. When we were seated for dinner we noticed a family being seated farther away from the aquarium than they would have liked. I understand this is Coral Reef and people WANT to see the fish, but the place was packed, I didnt think they could have moved them. Well the family just got up and decided they would move to a table right after a family had left. This table was not even clean yet. The waitstaff just ignored the family, and didnt deal with the family, and left the dirty dishes on their *new* table way too long. We were very close to the situation and it started out our meal on a rather uncomfortable note. Our waitress was incredibly rude and absent most of the meal. She yelled at the eleven year old in our group for eating her brother's meal. (They both got the same thing, Mac and Cheese) Brought my daughter salmon instead of the kids chicken and mashed potatoes. And fixed it by bringing chicken and ziti (all she wanted was the mashed potatoes). The Mahi Mahi tasted as if it had been drenched on soy sauce *yuck* and the soups were cold and not tasty as we expected. The calamari looked as if it had just come out of a less popular fast food joint and tasted worse than they looked. They were extremely tough and no one in our group finished even one. We never got refills on any of our drinks, and ended up asking another table's server if the youngest could get a glass of cold water because he was so thirsty. Over all we had an awfull experince. After the meal our waitress added up our bill wrong for the drinks (we were on the DDP). We didnt notice the error, we were just in a rush to leave after an awfull meal. Well as we are making our way through EPCOT we hear our waitress SCREAMING at us to get back. She explained that she messed up with our bill (the difference wasnt that much) and that we needed to pay. We never would have stiffed her and we paid up, realizing that we should have caught the mistake. Howevor, it was a bad ending to a bad meal. And seeing our RUDE waitress chasing us after almost never seeing her during the meal made me us all angry and dissapointed.

[a1tinkfans]

Sorry to hear about your lunch disappointment :(



WISHING YOU A VERY HAPPY BIRTHDAY!!!!!!

[TnTsParty]

We had my DH's birthday lunch there 2 weeks ago and it was great. Although the portions were a little small. I had the mahi mahi and I thought the fish was very good (and I know my mahi (dolphin) since I live in south Florida) The sauce was interesting and tasted good I wasn't too crazy about the couscous but all in all it was good. My DH loved the NY Strip and thought it was better then the Concourse Steakhouse. I had arranged for a diver to come over to the window with a sign and my DH was surprised about that. We got there early and were sitting within a few minutes. The waiter was very attentive and although a very expensive lunch it was worth it to surprise my DH like that.

[Summer-Caitlin]

I have August ADR's for this place as part of our Honeymoon and I have arranged a diver to hold up a sign. I really hope that the meal isn't disappointing. I have heard that the chocolate wave is excellent so I am definately ordering that. The three of us aren't big on fish so we will likely stick to steak or chicken, I'm going mainly for the atmosphere.

[CampbellScot]

My family will be eating there for the first time this August...I'm actually allergic to shellfish but my step son is wild about sharks and turtles and loves aquariums.

I'm hoping the non seafood food will be good.

sorry you didn't have a good experience on your birthday! I hope it was good other than that!!!princess:

[jennifer03878]

We went to the Coral Reef last year and it was the worst experience ever. We had reservations but still had to wait 2 1/2 HOURS!!! By the time we got our table we were on short nerves. The food was just OK but not much of a choice. My son is a very picky eater and absolutly hated his meal. The worst part was we didn't get the DDP (we were smart and got it this trip) so our tab came to $150+ for the 3 of us. Never again!!!! The only positive thing was we saw Tom Bergeron (DWTS and AFHV fame), who happens to hail from our state of New Hampshire. He was wonderful (I was wearing my UNH Hockey T-Shirt and he came right up to me asking me if I was from NH.. turns out my mother worked with him when he was working at our local radio station way back in the early 80's)

I would stay far away from this resturant if you can!

[ppiew]

Think I need to tell you about a GOOD experience just to balance the load a bit. We haven't eaten at CR for 4 or 5 years because of terrible experiences, but decided to bite the bullet and give it a another attempt this time.

We had lunch there about 2 weeks ago and it was superb in every way! The restaurant was cleaned up (a lot!), our server was prompt, courteous, attentive. The food was excellent! I can't remember what all we had, but I do remember the Lobster Salad which was truly memorable! At first I though it looked small, but then I noticed 2 full claws underneath it all. No filling stuff here - it was really a delight! Hubby had the steak which was better than either the Yachtsman's or Le Cellier and GD had the chicken and potatoes which she loved. The chocolate wave was shared for dessert and was very good - not the best (still love the Valhrona Lava Cake they used to have at the FF). The experience was good and we WILL go back. So sorry you had such a lousy encounter as ours was the opposite.

[YCFAN]

I've always enjoyed the Coral Reef but I will relate an experience we had last July. Both my niece and myself ordered the mahi mahi and when they were served she was talking about how good hers was and I wasn't feeling exactly the same about mine. Then I noticed that hers looked different and I realized that mine did not have any of the sauce on it. I called over the waitress and she commented that they are always forgetting to do that! She took mine away and came back with a dish that looked exactly like my niece's and this time it was excellent.