The Non-Foodie Food Report-Deluxe Style 5/22-6/1(Final Thoughts)

[pinkxray]

The Cast:

Me-
I love Disney and I love food. I am more of a chain restaurant kind of girl than fine dining though. When I read reviews and people say the food rivals TGIFridays or Olive Garden I know I will like it. I basically like anything that is bad for you and hate 98% of vegetables and not a big fish fan. Love breakfast foods, pizza, and my favorite meal ever is chicken parm. with garlic bread with diet coke. I was on a mission to try new things on this trip. I ended up getting a cold the second day of the trip that lasted most of the trip which made me stick to things I knew and eating less than I would have if I was 100%. It also made me miss so many of the yummy snacks I was wanting to try and get vitamin water or a drink with my snack credits.

DH- Ugh. Not a fun person to dine with. Picky. Picky .Picky. Eats pretty much the same menu as 5 year old DD. Only eats when hungry. No eating just to enjoy it or b/c it’s there. Goes to a buffet and eats like one piece of fried chicken and some fries. Favorite foods: Pizza, burger from Wendy’s, lasagna.

DD 5- Typical kid, loves chicken nuggets, pizza, and ice cream.

This is DD’s first trip and we are celebrating the fact that I finally graduated college. We originally had the regular dining plan booked. I have been in radiography school for the last 2 years and although had dreamed of the deluxe plan couldn’t bring myself to do it not knowing when I would finally have a job. Well, I found out the second to last day of clinical I got a job in one of the hospital I did my rotations in. Yay! So I called and upgraded to deluxe. Even though it was only a few days out I got most of my choices. I was messing with my ADR’s about 36 hours before we left and was able to get Ohana dinner on arrival night which was awesome since I had been trying for months to squeeze it in.

I was surprised that around 10 days out I was able to book HDDR, WCC, and Yachtsman. I ended up dropping those though. Once we were down to about 5 or 6 days there was really nothing open, but I did get 50’s prime time café 5 days out when DH decided he needed to attend SWW at the last minute.

I admit I slacked when it came to food porn. DH and DD refused to let me take pictures of their food and the 1st two days I just wasn’t thinking about it. Kudos to those who are able to take pictures of everything, it is a lot harder than it looks!

 

[pinkxray]

Here is our line-up:

Breakfast:
OHANA with Lilo and Stitch(pg. 1 post 12)
Boma(pg 2 post 23)
Crystal Palace(PG 3, POST 43)
Tuskerhouse –Donald’s Safari Breakfast
Counter service @ POR and POFQ
Gasparilla Games @ GF
Lunch:
Sci-Fi
50’s Prime Time
Riverside Mill at POR
Cosmic Ray’s (PG 3, POST 43)
CS at Blizzard Beach
Pizzafari
Dinner:
Ohana (pg. 1, post 3)
Le Cellier (Page 2 Post 18)
Mama Melrose
CRT (PG 3, POST 43)
Turf Club @ SSR (cancelled)
Chef Mickey
Grand Floridian Cafe(pg 2, post 26)
We also stayed offsite for 4 days and had a few meals offsite

 

[pinkxray]

May 22
Our first meal on the Deluxe Dining plan? Sonics

Yes, Sonics Drive –in. Dh insisted we go straight from MCO to Sonics. We don’t have any in CT and we were obsessed with Sonics while we lived in NC for a few years. Instead of heading to POR to check in and try out their food court we headed to International Drive. We placed our order and were excited to have Sonics after about a 5-6 year absence. It was okay, not as good as we remembered. Plus, they gave us tater tots instead of fries. I didn’t see anything about automatically getting tots so that was a bit disappointing. We definitely won’t a special trip for Sonics anymore but would pick it if staying around one.

Once we checked in at POR we headed to the food court for our refillable mugs. I loved having the mugs and would definitely pay OOP for them if we had the basic plan.

We were finally ready to hit EPCOT were we used 2 snack credits for Dasani waters. I really wanted to head to Sunshine Seasons to try the strawberry shortcake but decided to save my appetite for Ohana’s.

Finally, it was time to head to Ohana’s! We had an ADR for 8:30 and arrived a little early. We were seated after only a few minutes. We met our cousin and got our welcome bread and were told about what to expect.
DH had a Sprite, DD had the pomegranate lemonade which she didn’t like, and I had the famous Lapu Lapu along with a diet coke.

A little strong for me, but very yummy later in the night when some of the ice melted. [/COLOR]

I didn't really take pictures of the food. There are so many pictures out there and they all look the same. There was the salad which was pretty good. I dislike lettuce and actually enjoyed it with the honey lime dressing.
Next, were the wings and the pork dumplings. The wings were fantastic! Soon, came the vegetables and the noodles. The broccoli and peas were okay, they were still just vegetables. I loved the noodles. I could have made a whole meal of just the noodles and wings.

Next, came the meats. First up was the marinated sirloin steak. This was the favorite of DH and I. It was soooo good. It was perfectly cooked and the flavor was incredible.
Too bad they brought the steak first. The rest couldn't compare. The shrimp was okay to me. The pork loin was gross. The turkey was okay, but it was really good dipped in the sauces. I think the mustard one was especially good with the turkey since it gave it a little spice.

Soon, it was time for dessert. The reviews of the bread pudding were one of the reasons I wanted to try Ohana's so bad. It lived up to every single expectation I had and then some. I was the best dessert of the trip by far. The combination of the best vanilla ice cream ever and that yummy caramel sauce was perfection. Thankfully DH didn't want any and it was all mine!

DD got a bowl of the same yummy vanilla ice cream all for herself. She scarfed it down even after having eaten all her fries and chicken nuggets she had ordered. (No, she would not try any of the regular food served)

Just a little note: We were up around 4:30 on this morning and DH was a little mad I made the ADR for 8:30 (he doesn't get the fact that getting any ADR at Ohana 2 days out is amazing) and wasn't happy. I have to say that dinner and dessert were totally worth hearing his complaining all night and the next few days about I had messed up the planning for that night.

 

[pinkxray]

Oops. Pictures are kind of big. I will resize the next ones, I promise.

 

[adsrtw]

You are off to a good start! Can't wait to read more.

 

[Pooh&OurHunny]

Joining in and can't wait for more...
Your daughter is very cute.

 

[angelsmith52]

You are off to a good start! Can't wait to hear about the rest of it!

 

[pinkxray]

You are off to a good start! Can't wait to read more.

Thanks for joining in. I loved reading all the dining reviews in preparation for our trip and really wanted to give a little something back.

Joining in and can't wait for more...
Your daughter is very cute.

Thank you and welcome!

 

[pinkxray]

You are off to a good start! Can't wait to hear about the rest of it!

Thank you!

 

[jagmom]

Can't wait to hear more!

 

[pinkxray]

Can't wait to hear more!

Thanks for joining in.

 

[pinkxray]

(Just a note: everytime I try to resize my pictures in photobucket internet explorer shuts down on me, so for now we'll have to suffer with huge pictures of food-sorry)

Day 2-May 23

After our yummy dinner at Ohana we headed out for our first character breakfast. We had a 7:30am ADR at .............................................................................................................................

Yes. Ohana again. As I mentioned the dinner was a last minute add on. If it were a few months out I would have moved this breakfast to another day but it was too late to change everything around.

We arrived a little early and since they open at 7:30 we had to wait a little bit. A little after 7:30 they started taking the family pictures (which we skipped) and letting people in. They called our name and lead us to the exact same table we had the night before. The previous night I didn't love the table location and was hoping we would have a different table, but it worked out perfect b/c it was the first table where the characters came out and they came straight to DD first which she loved.

First, they bring you Stitch's crazy juice which is very good. (I believe it is also served at Boma and Tuskerhouse but with a different name) and coffee.
Next, they bring you a pineapple bread and cinnamon bread. I remember trying a little piece of each just to try them but can't really rememeber them too well. They were okay but I didn't want to fill up on bread.

Before the breakfast platter comes out they bring you a plate of fresh fruit which was very good. As you will see once I start taking pictures later in the trip I loved the strawberries and pineapple in Disney. They were so ripe and probably the most perfect tasting fruit I have had.

Finally, they bring the breakfast skillet. There are eggs, sausage, bacon, biscuits, and potatoes. Your server also brings around Mickey waffles.

Everything was great. I don't like biscuits so I didn't try them but DH enjoyed them. I wasn't a huge fan of the sausage. They are very plump and kind of reminded me of a hot dog but with sausage flavoring. I prefer the flat patties but they were okay if you like that type of sausage.

Since we were the first table the characters hit we were done pretty quickly. I think we were out of there by 8:05-8:10 which was great. (There was no rush and our server told us to take our time bit we wanted to head back to the hotel for a bit before hitting Blizzard Beach.)

We all loved Ohana for breakfast and it is a must do on our next trip.




We spent our morning at Blizzard Beach and shared two hot dog meals. We got 2 counter service meals that each included a hot dog, a bag of doritos, a large drink and a huge chocolate chip cookie. It was a lot of food and now I see how easy it would be to do the quick service dining plan. I know some people complain about the wheat buns but I didn't really notice too much of a difference. The bun did start to crumple on DD when she was almost done with her hot dog but they were okay.

 

[chocolateMinnie]

Subscribing, great reviews so far. We liked Ohanas for dinner but loved breakfast on the whole - DS says it's a must for the juice alone.

 

[adsrtw]

Very cool on the perfect table location! So neat! My kids aren't Stitch fans, so we would probably pass, but it looks really yummy.

 

[pinkxray]

Subscribing, great reviews so far. We liked Ohanas for dinner but loved breakfast on the whole - DS says it's a must for the juice alone.

Thanks! We loved the breakfast too. I loved the dinner but felt bad about the amount of food going to waste. DD didn't eat anything besides her chicken nuggets and DH and I could barely make a dent in everything. I would love to go back but only if DH somehows grows a bigger appetite or we had more people with us.
Breakfast was great. I would say even if we decide to do the quick service plan we will pay OOP for this breakfast.
I love the juice too. And the coffee.

Very cool on the perfect table location! So neat! My kids aren't Stitch fans, so we would probably pass, but it looks really yummy.

It was so cool seeing the characters coming out the door and then heading right to our table.
DD loves Stitch and Pluto so she was in heaven. I think we would go back even when she gets over Stitch. DD was pretty shy the first 2-3 days when meeting characters and they were all great about stopping for the pictures and giving her a kiss, but moved along once they saw she only really wanted the picture.

 

[darthtatty]

Fab reviews, i love Ohanas dinner. i cant wait to try breakfast next time.x

I like big pics, more food to drool over

 

[PixieDustandEeyore]

Mmm food looks good!

 

[pinkxray]

Next up is Le Cellier:

For some reason I barely took any picture here. It is pretty dark and since everyone is so close I felt bad about using the flash.

This was the night I first started to feel the cold I would have most of the trip. I knew when I booked the DXDP DH doesn't eat much but I figured whenever he didn't want his appetizer I would order something I have never tried like mussels and my safe appetizer choice would be something I knew I would like. On this night my throat was starting to feel sore and my head was congested so all my good intentions of trying new things went out the window for this trip. I orginally planned to get the choc. matini but settled on a diet coke. All the yummy adult beverages I planned to try went on the back burner too. Oh well, next trip maybe.


DH had a sprite and the mushroom filet.
He enjoyed it. I tried a bite and was glad I chose my meal, but it was very good.

I had the New York Strip and mashed potatoes. It was very good. Cooked to medium just like I wanted and there was just the normal strip of fat along the side that was easy to remove. The potatoes are soooooo good. I know I have seen a recipe thread here. Does anyone have the link? I would love to try to make these.

DD had a kids pizza which for some reason she didn't like. She has rarely meet a pizza she didn't like so this was surprising. I don't think she ate much here but did enjoy her vanilla milkshake.

DD with her vanilla milkshake



We ordered dessert to go. DH didn't want one so I got two choices. I knew for months I would get the choc. mousse and the choc. whiskey cake. The waiter came over with the dessert menu and started to make his recommendations which were the my two choices. As soon as he said them I told him we'll take those and to wrap them up. He looked at DH as if he had some say in the matter.

We were were supposed to be going straight back to POR so I figured the mousse would fine, but we ended up staying for a few more hours to do pick a pearl. By the time we got back it had completely melted

I tried the cake the next day and it was very yummy, nothing outstanding though.

While waiting for them to put my pearl in the setting we headed back to France to get this:

Grey Goose Slush
Very yummy, I don't really drink much and like drinks that aren't too strong
This was perfect for me and was great for my sore throat

 

[pinkxray]

Fab reviews, i love Ohanas dinner. i cant wait to try breakfast next time.x

I like big pics, more food to drool over

I loved them both. I don't think I have ever read of anyone not liking the breakfast.

The food does like good big, doesn't it.

Mmm food looks good!

Yum. Everything was very good. I don't think I had anything I didn't like. Oh wait. There were a couple CS items I had I couldn't eat. But we'll get there later.

 

[gilsan]

The Cast:
This is DD’s first trip and we are celebrating the fact that I finally graduated college. We originally had the regular dining plan booked. I have been in radiography school for the last 2 years and although had dreamed of the deluxe plan couldn’t bring myself to do it not knowing when I would finally have a job. Well, I found out the second to last day of clinical I got a job in one of the hospital I did my rotations in. Yay! So I called and upgraded to deluxe. Even though it was only a few days out I got most of my choices. I was messing with my ADR’s about 36 hours before we left and was able to get Ohana dinner on arrival night which was awesome since I had been trying for months to squeeze it in.

I am enjoying your reviews.

Congratulations on graduating and getting a job! I am a Nuclear Medicine Technologist and I am always happy to see other medical radiation technologists