The not so live version of dining w/ Disers, in Castles & on Safari! The Wrap! 2/26

Ok so now I'm sitting here with a big goofy grin on MY face because I'm giggling about Barbs reaction!
Well your meal looks good but too bad you didn't order the queso fundido. I'm bad for being talked into ordering things other people liked! Next time ;)

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The atmosphere is definitely worth the reservation. You CAN order an avocado margarita I'm told by the manager at the La Cave Tequila Bar. You can either order one to go and bring it with you or order it from the restaurant and someone can fetch it. They still have them available so that's the good news. :thumbsup2

Great! Maybe I'll stick to my original plan then. Watch by the time I get back there in May, they won't be making them anywhere. Btw, are the drinks all that they're hyped up to be?
 

Note: Barb’s live dining thread note about the avocado margarita fiasco was hilarious. In case anyone missed it, here’s what she wrote:
As I was sitting in church this morning, I received this text from our live reporter, Brenda, regarding her investigation into the case of the missing avocado margarita.

She said, "Glad I came by the tequila bar because...They no longer sell the avocado margarita in the restaurants (La Hacienda or SAI) but they DO sell them still at the tequila bar! Whew!"

Upon reading Brenda's update (sorry I just couldn't help but look), I nearly blurted out "Praise the Lord"!!! :cool1: But being Presbyterian, that probably would have been frowned upon ;), so I celebrated in silence for the remainder of the church service...but with a big goofy grin on my face."




Heehee! Guilty as charged! :lmao: Then I had another scare when recently another reporter sent a La Cava menu pic and the avocado margarita was missing. :eek: She was told that they had temporarily removed it from the menu during the F & W Festival. What's up with that?!?! :confused3 I think they still made her one though and said it would be back on the menu after the festival. Since today concludes the F & W festival, I'm anxiously awaiting a live update from La Cava that includes a menu pic. I NEED to see it in writing! ;) :laughing:
 
I almost had heart failure, I was looking forward to trying the avocado margarita! Thank goodness he didn't know what he was talking about! We have never had a meal there, but I'm thinking it looks pretty good! May have to add it!
 


I much preferred the tostadas de tinga at San Angel. The taco trio at La Hacienda was good but the chicken tostadas were far better in my opinion.

We've been to La Hacienda 3 times and Em has consistently liked what she has ordered. It's been a mixed review for my choices but then again the shrimp tacos were not at all to my liking the first time we went so it is all relative.

I don't think you'll go wrong with your dinner choice at La Hacienda. (Even though I just told you that I preferred my San Angel Inn choice! :goodvibes)

I know that I would love the appetizer at San Angel. I'll check the menus again and see which one my DH would like better. Or maybe we can work in a lunch at San Angel during our December trip and save La Hacienda for March. :)
 
The coffee margarita looks so good. I have to check out the menu. LOL
We ate there at La Hacienda and he meal was just awful. Vinny said he will never go back again. I kind of feel the same way. The food just tasted like it was all old.
 
Ah yes, I remember the 'disappearing avocado margarita 2013' news flash only too well
I had to get myself signed off work for emotional turmoil ;)
 


Nice review of your meal at La Hacienda, Brenda. As you know, I don't eat Mexican, but I told Mary to book it if the girls want to eat there in June. I'm thinking I could eat that pork rib eye without a problem.

Love your "after dinner" photo.
 
I was also not a big fan of my margarita at La Hacienda! What a bummer for a Mexican restaurant!
The filling and sauce in the gordito looks good, but even from the photo you can tell the cakes are dry. Not good! Queso too cheesy?! It is really, really hard to order something once a waiter tells you he doesn't recommend it. I can't even describe the feeling-- even if you KNOW you'd enjoy it, I'd feel so weird/guilty being like "Ehhh, I'll have it even though you say it's bad." Definitely try it next time, though-- it looks amazing in all of the pictures I've seen!!
 
Gosh, isn't that just the worst when you are swayed by waiters suggestions and regret it? Oh well. What can ya do? :upsidedow I hope your strawberry marg was still enjoyable. The avocado margarita drama is cracking me up. Hopefully they still have the margaritas of legend by the time I make it over there. I keep saying "next time" but I can never seem to spend enough time in Epcot! :confused3
 
At least you got a seat by the window, right? I'm glad you guys got to enjoy the show, even if dinner was a bit eh. Some of the stuff looked super yummy.
 
Ok so now I'm sitting here with a big goofy grin on MY face because I'm giggling about Barbs reaction!
Well your meal looks good but too bad you didn't order the queso fundido. I'm bad for being talked into ordering things other people liked! Next time ;)

Sent from my iPad using DISBoards

Glad you enjoyed that hilarious moment Wendy! And definitely I'm not asking for opinions next time. ;)

Great! Maybe I'll stick to my original plan then. Watch by the time I get back there in May, they won't be making them anywhere. Btw, are the drinks all that they're hyped up to be?

That's so me. You have plenty of time to decide, change your mind, and then change it back! :p

I've only had the strawberry (just ok, not strawberry enough) and avocado (uhhh not sure how to describe this one other than fruity strange) margaritas. Not sure I categorize them as amazing or anything.

Heehee! Guilty as charged! :lmao: Then I had another scare when recently another reporter sent a La Cava menu pic and the avocado margarita was missing. :eek: She was told that they had temporarily removed it from the menu during the F & W Festival. What's up with that?!?! :confused3 I think they still made her one though and said it would be back on the menu after the festival. Since today concludes the F & W festival, I'm anxiously awaiting a live update from La Cava that includes a menu pic. I NEED to see it in writing! ;) :laughing:

That was one of the best Dining Review quotes - ever!! :rotfl2:

Seriously, they need to stop messing with the margarita choices. Don't they know we have live reporter reporting back to the Dis community?

I almost had heart failure, I was looking forward to trying the avocado margarita! Thank goodness he didn't know what he was talking about! We have never had a meal there, but I'm thinking it looks pretty good! May have to add it!

Definitely add it to your dining line up Jacquie. The good news is that avocado margarita should still be there for your next trip. :)

I know that I would love the appetizer at San Angel. I'll check the menus again and see which one my DH would like better. Or maybe we can work in a lunch at San Angel during our December trip and save La Hacienda for March. :)

Oh so hard to decide huh? I'll be interested to see what you end up doing! It's still hard for me to decide between the two even with favoring the app at SAI.

The coffee margarita looks so good. I have to check out the menu. LOL
We ate there at La Hacienda and he meal was just awful. Vinny said he will never go back again. I kind of feel the same way. The food just tasted like it was all old.

I didn't even notice that coffee margarita. Very interesting! Next they'll come up with a hibiscus margarita. Oh wait, don't they have that somewhere??

Oh no! No bueno. As a matter of fact, I did not like my first meal there. The shrimp in the shrimp tacos did not taste fresh and I didn't like the sauce or the breading. Em wanted to return so that's what we did.

Ah yes, I remember the 'disappearing avocado margarita 2013' news flash only too well
I had to get myself signed off work for emotional turmoil ;)

Ha ha! That's too funny my little cucumber margarita friend! You do have a masters in margaritas so I expect to see one or more next trip!

Nice review of your meal at La Hacienda, Brenda. As you know, I don't eat Mexican, but I told Mary to book it if the girls want to eat there in June. I'm thinking I could eat that pork rib eye without a problem.

Love your "after dinner" photo.

That's very nice of you to have Mary book this for your group even though you don't like Mexican food. You should be able to order the pork without the sauce or on the side as well and that should make it less "Mexican". I hope you enjoy it.

I was also not a big fan of my margarita at La Hacienda! What a bummer for a Mexican restaurant!
The filling and sauce in the gordito looks good, but even from the photo you can tell the cakes are dry. Not good! Queso too cheesy?! It is really, really hard to order something once a waiter tells you he doesn't recommend it. I can't even describe the feeling-- even if you KNOW you'd enjoy it, I'd feel so weird/guilty being like "Ehhh, I'll have it even though you say it's bad." Definitely try it next time, though-- it looks amazing in all of the pictures I've seen!!

Definitely less ice and more strawberry mix would have been better. Getting brain freeze after 2 sips is no fun!

Seriously, too cheesy queso app. That's a reverse oxymoron?? :confused3 Exactly, you get that moment that you would basically be saying I don't care what you think I'll order it anyway. :rotfl2:

Gosh, isn't that just the worst when you are swayed by waiters suggestions and regret it? Oh well. What can ya do? :upsidedow I hope your strawberry marg was still enjoyable. The avocado margarita drama is cracking me up. Hopefully they still have the margaritas of legend by the time I make it over there. I keep saying "next time" but I can never seem to spend enough time in Epcot! :confused3

The margarita drama was hilarious once I knew what was going on. At the time I was just thinking oh well, let's go with another flavor. I can relate to your "next time" theory. I took me 6 trips to Disney before I ordered one. :)

At least you got a seat by the window, right? I'm glad you guys got to enjoy the show, even if dinner was a bit eh. Some of the stuff looked super yummy.

Right! The seat was great for Illuminations. At least for most of Illuminations. :) Heck, margaritas makes things better. ;)
 



Note: Barb’s live dining thread note about the avocado margarita fiasco was hilarious. In case anyone missed it, here’s what she wrote:
As I was sitting in church this morning, I received this text from our live reporter, Brenda, regarding her investigation into the case of the missing avocado margarita.

She said, "Glad I came by the tequila bar because...They no longer sell the avocado margarita in the restaurants (La Hacienda or SAI) but they DO sell them still at the tequila bar! Whew!"

Upon reading Brenda's update (sorry I just couldn't help but look), I nearly blurted out "Praise the Lord"!!! :cool1: But being Presbyterian, that probably would have been frowned upon ;), so I celebrated in silence for the remainder of the church service...but with a big goofy grin on my face."




As a Pentecostal pastor myself, I'd welcome a few shouts out of "Praise the Lord" during the Sunday morning service. This past Sunday was a little more "livelier" than most though; I'm hoping it was not a result of them also reading Barb's thread. :rotfl2:

(Oh, and when we do finally get the opportunity to meet, we'll talk about reading text messages during church service). :rotfl::rotfl2:
 
:laughing:
As a Pentecostal pastor myself, I'd welcome a few shouts out of "Praise the Lord" during the Sunday morning service. This past Sunday was a little more "livelier" than most though; I'm hoping it was not a result of them also reading Barb's thread. :rotfl2:

(Oh, and when we do finally get the opportunity to meet, we'll talk about reading text messages during church service). :rotfl::rotfl2:

Ha ha! Just for the record, my phone is definitely off during church.... I'm not one of those people! :rotfl2:

Every so often my hubby will get playful with the pastor and shout out "preach!" (Assembly of God congregation so completely acceptable.) :laughing:

Sounds like you have some interesting stories to tell.
 
Day 8: Fri. August 23, 2013 CL Breakfast


Honestly, this is hardly worth wasting a post to report about our breakfast... but since I'm too lazy to update my dining index, here goes. That and it is a prelude to our lunch plans.

Our original plan was to head to Epcot bright and early for EMH and eat at Sunshine Seasons. However, we had a major change of plans the day before when we accepted an invitation to meet up with someone we met several years ago during our first girl trip to WDW. Before the afternoon was through you will see where the title to my TR was birthed!

With this change of plans, it was actually a good thing that there was the CL lounge as a quick and convenient breakfast option. Today they had all the same stuff as every other morning (boiled eggs, oatmeal, danishes, bagels, fruit, cereal, yogurt, and juices) I apparently didnt take more than a couple of photos since we were trying to head out early for an extra special meet up.
I went for the raisin bagel and the blueberry Danish. Em had the ever delicious Froot Loops and a banana. Nothing special to tell here folks so it is hardly worth its own post.

Just a few photos:

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Hot beverages:
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Cold beverages:
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My choices:
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The CL Cast Members gave us bottles of water for the day. Nice touch.

Here's our heading out photo:
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Lets move right on to lunch! Plaza Restaurant

 
Ahhh, bummer that you weren't thrilled with the waiter's recommendation! I have a weird personality trait (mainly, I simply need everyone to love me at all times!) that tends to prevent me from recommending food to people unless I really know their tastes... I always feel TERRIBLE if someone didn't like something I loved.

By the picture alone, I would have guessed that your gordita was amazing, but I adore Mexican food so unless it has seafood in it I'm probably going to love it.
 
Ahhh, bummer that you weren't thrilled with the waiter's recommendation! I have a weird personality trait (mainly, I simply need everyone to love me at all times!) that tends to prevent me from recommending food to people unless I really know their tastes... I always feel TERRIBLE if someone didn't like something I loved.

By the picture alone, I would have guessed that your gordita was amazing, but I adore Mexican food so unless it has seafood in it I'm probably going to love it.

The gorditas really did look awesome. Maybe gorditas are supposed to be dry the way they were. :confused3

I get what you are saying about recommendations which makes it interesting that in writing a dining review sometimes you are asked do you prefer a or b. I usually say "a" but "b" was ok. ha ha! :rotfl2: You may related to the saying if it comes from the sea it's not for me. ;)
 
Day 8: Fri. August 23, 2013 Plaza Restaurant Lunch

PlazaSign-2.jpg


Let me just warn you now that lunch was a blur... Not because I'm old and forgetful, there is that, but we were dining with some special people. Then there was the fact that we had an interruption that messed up our plans for the afternoon. But I'll get to that in a moment.

This will be a little more than a dining review so if you want to focus only on the food heres a condensed version: I had a burger, Em tried something new, cheesesteak if you must know, all was good, we passed on dessert, thats a first, then the land rejoiced as we went off to our special tour!

So back to my tale....We had been invited by the retired MK Grand Marshal Host Cast Member, Dean, to have lunch with him and his wife at Plaza Restaurant. He was in the park early that morning to film a promo for his book that he had written about his experience working on Main Street for 14 years selecting the Parade Grand Marshals. It was just coincidental that this gentleman, who is a FB friend, had seen something that I posted so knew I was at WDW. He called me and invited Em and I to meet up and to have lunch with him and his wife.

We had been hanging out with him and his wife most of the morning so when we parted ways for about an hour and then rejoined them for lunch we had no idea that he had arranged a wonderful surprise.

Once we were seated and drink orders placed it was time for some photos!

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With that out of the way, we placed our orders. Em wasnt in the mood to share a burger so she did her own thing which happened to be the cheesesteak sandwich with chips while I had the cheeseburger with fries. Anyone who has followed my DRs know that I believe the fries at Plaza Restaurant are the absolute BEST at WDW! There, now you know my standard.

Dean and his wife ordered a Rueben sandwich with chips and the strawberry salad, respectively. I mention this only because he allowed me to take a photo of his food before they dug in. See? No one's food is safe around me.

While we were waiting for the food to arrive, the head of Media at MK came over to our table and greeted Dean. They were not only former colleagues but he is THE GUY that all media requests go through for the park. They had been working together early that morning for media. He casually said, that thing you asked about earlier is a go. Hmmm whatever could he mean? Since we dont read minds someone had to explain it to us. He said that we had been given permission to tour the Dream Suite inside the castle. What? Did he just say that we were going to be INSIDE the DREAM SUITE of the Cinderellas castle??? THAT CANT BE.

Euphoria, utter joy and excitement occurred all within seconds of that announcement!! And then the food arrived...

You'll have to pop over to my TR to read more about the tour and photos. This is a complete teaser since I'm only on Day 5 of my TR but there's no way to sync these up better - unless I go out of order in my DR and the OCD in me can't do that.

So about that food. I can't say that I remember much about lunch after that news. I know that I didn't seem to actually look at what I was photographing since my burger photo is out of focus. But I do have my iphone photo which is only slightly better so I'll share that one.

Angus Chuck Cheeseburger: Cheddar cheese topped burger on a four-dusted Kaiser roll ($13.99)​
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This time I was able to order my burger exactly how I wanted it without having to consider Em's tastes since it was ALL MINE! That meant cheddar instead of Swiss cheese and red onion instead of grilled onion. As always, this was delicious! And the fries were awesome too so that made me happy... or was there a way to be happier than we already were? They are always so fresh, hot, and delicious. I've never been disappointed in their fries.

Cheese Steak Sandwich: Shaved Beef Grilled with Onions, Mushrooms, Red Peppers, and White American Cheese on a Hoagie Roll ($12.99)​
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Em liked this enough that she didnt miss the burger. She actually preferred the chips to the fries so they must have been good. Sorry, that may leave you wishing for more commentary but I've got nothing.

And bonus content.. .
Grilled Reuben: Thinly sliced Corn Beef on Grilled Marble Rye with Sauerkraut, Swiss and Thousand Island Dressing ($10.99)
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Chicken Strawberry Salad: Fresh Garden Greens, Grilled Chicken Breast, and Gorgonzola, tossed in a Zinfandel Vinaigrette Dressing ($14.99)
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All I can tell you about these selections is that the salad was a huge favorite over the sandwich. They actually split the salad.

We all passed on dessert, a first for us actually, since we had some things that we wanted to get done before our Dream Suite Tour.
Using TiW, it saved $12.78.

If you are interested in reading more about the tour, pop over here if you are not already following along.

Oh, and the Mayor came by to say hi and give hugs and smooches
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Next Up: Shula's Steakhouse

 
Wow!!! I'm not sure what else to say but wow! I assumed you and Em lucked into the castle suite during a tour, completely did see a private special favor tour coming. Almost makes me consider getting Facebook! Lol okay well you need the "friends" to go w/ hooks ups! Lol I have to admit/confess in all my trips to Dis I've never noticed or apparently considered hitting the plaza. I'm not even sure where it is! (Sad) I maybe rectifying that as I was looking for another sot down at MK and it sounds perfect for lunch. I'll leave off where I should have at the beginning: WOW!!!
 
I can't wait to see all the pictures from your tour! That is so incredible. You had me convinced from your other DRs to try The Plaza this trip, but unfortunately I couldn't convince Rob. Hopefully next trip I will get to try those yummy looking fries!
 

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