First time DDP, Long time eater

[JustCor]

I on vacation and have been gorging myself on food and using the DDP for the first time. As of today, right now, I'm half way through my trip, but I can't sleep, so I figured I'd start my first dining reviews in this forum. To be fair, I've been keeping tabs on my food in my Live Trip Report and adding more details in my Daily wrap-ups, but I've been skipping some of the finer details of the food. I think I'll fill in those details here. Some of it may be rehash, but hopefully I'll be able to add more information. And so it begins!

 

[JustCor]

Bill and Min's Dockside Diner - Barbecue Pulled Pork Mac and Cheese

This was my first meal on this trip and it was planned out in my head from the get go. My favorite meal anywhere in the parks is the Pot Roast Mac and Cheese at Friar's Nook in Magic Kingdom. It's my go to for any mac and cheese dish. Until I had stumbled across a random review, I had no idea that DHS had something similar. When I found out, I knew I had to give it a try.

So, what's in it? Mac and cheese (of course), barbecue pulled pork, fried onion straws, and barbecue sauce. It's a fairly sizable portion for just under ten bucks. While I do have the dining plan on this trip, I paid for this out of pocket.

It's... ok. The actual mac and cheese part of it is fine. It's got a creamy sauce that's very similar to the mac and cheese served at Friar's Nook, though the cheese sauce has a slight grit to it. Powdered cheese? Perhaps. The pulled pork is average and slightly wet. If you've had the kind of pulled pork that comes in a plastic tub that can be heated up in the microwave, then you'll be familiar with the taste and texture of this pork. It tastes virtually identical. There's a fairly decent amount of pork mixed in, which is nice. A little higher quality in the meat would do wonders to bring this dish up to a higher level. The fried onion straws are also run of the mill, every day stuff that you can find in your supermarket. It's the same stuff that's been used for decades to top green bean casseroles around the world. On this day, they tasted a little stale and long in the tooth. Some of the straws had a good amount of flavor, and in those bites, things really started to come together well. Other bites had more stale, plastic-y tasting straws that may have needed to be tossed. Finally, there was a drizzling of barbecue sauce that was far too sweet for this creation. It had a very high sugar content that needed a smokey element to balance it out. Unfortunately, that smokey element was missing from this sauce. A little more spice would have done a world of difference as well.

I had high hopes for this mac and cheese dish. I had hoped I would find a companion piece to the Friar's Nook variety that would give DHS a much needed something to get me more interested in that park. Unfortunately, the lower quality of the components left it lacking. It's not horrible, mind you, but there are much better foods out in the parks to spend the money on.

 

[JustCor]

Refreshment Port - Croissant Donut

What started as a stop for a bottle of water turned into a tasty treat. The Croissant Donut is a fairly sizeable treat covered in cinnamon and sugar. It can be purchased plain or with soft serve ice cream. I went with the plain variety. What a pleasant surprise this was! Visibly, it looks like it might be overcooked and slightly hard. It has the appearance of a dense cake donut. Looks can definitely be deceiving. This donut was incredibly light and fluffy, with the layers of the croissant visible when you bite into it. The donut is so soft, like fresh bread. It compresses down easily when you bite into it, and then has a very satisfying chewy texture. The sugar and cinnamon are the perfect compliment in flavor to the dough itself. Each bite tasted better than the previous bite. The taste and texture combination had me wanting to take another bite, and then another bite, and then one more bite until it was sadly gone. I gave a long hard thought of getting another one just to enjoy the sensation again. It's slightly pricey, clocking in around $4 ($6 and change with soft serve), but it was worth it. I used the dining plan for this, which cost me a snack credit.

 

[JustCor]

Chefs de France

My first TS credit for my DDP was used at Chefs de France. The DDP allows for a choice from the Prix Fixe menu, which includes a soup or salad, an entree, and a dessert, or picking an entree and dessert off the regular menu. I chose the entree and dessert option.

The meal started off with a baguette served in a paper bag. The bread was nice and warm, with the paper keeping in the heat. The crust of the bread was VERY tough. I used a serrated knife to cut it, but ended up having to tear the bread apart when cutting it was putting my hands at risk. The insides were hot and fluffy, but the tough crust made it difficult to eat. Cutting off pieces was impossible. I was at greater risk of cutting myself than cutting through the bread. I ended up tearing off bits of it and spreading the butter on those pieces. I only ate half of it.

Grilled Tenderloin, Au Gratin Potatoes, Green Beans

Where do I begin? Let's start with the sides. Bland would be the most apt description. The potatoes had no flavor. While I could see that there was some kind of cheese inside of it, I could barely taste it. It was all just texture, and not a particularly pleasing texture. It was somewhere between mush and hard mush. Adding some salt and pepper to the potatoes had little impact. It was just bland. The green beans also had no flavor. I don't know if they were seasoned at any point in the cooking process, but I sure couldn't find a hint of taste in them. The texture was fine, with a decent snap and no limp beans in the mix, but it was let down by the lack of anything that resembled flavors. Again I added some salt and pepper to give it something, and it helped a little bit. The gravy (salty bland) helped a little bit, but in the end they were just forgettable. And what of the Grilled Tenderloin? It was ok. I ordered the meat cooked to Medium Rare and they nailed it. Unfortunately, the quality of the beef was questionable. I cut into the tenderloin to check its level of doneness and thought it was cooked well done at first. It was brown/grey all the way through. When I looked, though, I could see the variation in color and texture. This was low quality meat that sat in a fridge or freezer for too long. Any red/pink coloring that may have once existed was long gone. It was a sad looking piece of meat. To its credit, the flavor wasn't that bad, but, again, there was very little seasoning going on. You can get by with minimal seasoning on an good cut of meat. The natural flavors, especially when properly aged, give the meat fantastic depth. This meat lacked all of that. It was just another bland item with texture.

Chocolate Mousse with pound cake

Let's start with the pound cake and get that out of the way quickly: it was bad. Very dry and crumbly with no flavor. One bite was more than enough. On to the Mousse. It was perfection! It was creamy and light. The flavor was balanced perfectly. This could have easily been too rich and too decadent. It was neither. Instead, it was just perfect. The white chocolate shavings added a nice contrast in flavor as well as a variation in texture. I ate it all incredibly quickly then started scraping the sides of the cup to get as much of what remained as possible. I would have loved to have had a fork or a knife to really get as much of the mousse off the sides of the cup as possible, but they were both cleared away at the conclusion of the dinner. Still, that mousse was fantastic. It was almost good enough to make me forget the rest of the meal. Almost.

While the food was mostly bland, the service was excellent. Coralie was a very professional and attentive waitress. She did a fantastic job. The food in no way diminishes the quality of her service.

 

[JustCor]

Bacon and Truffle Oil Mac and Cheese Hot Dog

I didn't read the menu correctly on this item. I had it in my head the whole time that it was another mac and cheese dish, similar to the previous pulled pork affair. I had completely missed the hot dog part. No matter, I can manage this, no problem.

This hot dog faced a similar problem as the pulled pork mac: it sounds good, in theory at least, but the components let it down. Everything about this near $10 hot dog is made with lower quality items. The hot dog is on par with Oscar Meyer product. It's missing the bolder flavors of a more natural hot dog or sausage. The meat has been ground down into a paste and then extruded into a hotdog shape. The texture is akin to any Oscar Meyer hot dog you have ever had in your life because it probably is one. The mac and cheese is low grade stuff you'd find in a kids meal at a quick service counter. It's on the dry side and lacks any flavor. The bacon is not bad, but this could use more of it. The bun was cold and a little dense. Not terrible, mind you, but not the caliber of a good hot dog bun by any stretch. And then there's the truffle oil. I think. I may or may not have tasted it. If it was there, it was so incredibly faint as to not be noticed. The only reason I think I may have tasted it is because I was looking for it. But it may have just been my imagination for as much impact as it had in flavor. It wasn't bad, but very mediocre. Small tweaks in the individual components would greatly increase the flavor profile. I higher quality hot dog made with beef would do wonders in improving the flavor. Replacing the dried out cheapo mac and cheese with the same stuff from Friar's Nook would be amazing. The creamier, more flowing cheese from that would also sit better on this hot dog, making it more enjoyable to eat, even if a fork and knife had to be used. Heck, even a decent bun would do a world of good. I would also just skip the truffle oil entirely. It's far too easy to use too much of it. Too much truffle oil is obnoxiously overpowering. It drowns out everything else. Just skip it. For how little it was used on this dog, it'll probably not be missed. Used the money saved on the truffle oil to put into higher quality ingredients elsewhere.

 

[JustCor]

Cape May Cafe

Located in Beach Club, Cape May had a smaller, but delicious buffet selection. There is a fair amount of seafood offered, with certain dishes that are rotated out on various days of the week. The breakfast offers a character dining experience. I chose dinner. To say I ate well is a complete understatement.

Plate 1: Hand carved strip loin, mashed potatoes, steamed clams, paella, and fried clam strips.

So much good food on one plate! The strip loin was cooked to my liking, somewhere around a medium rare. It was incredibly juicy and flavorful. The meat has a mixture of seasonings that had been cooked into a nice, savory crust. The seasonings also imparted a very nice flavor to the meat without being overpowering. It was so good I kept going back for more. The potatoes were also excellent. It was a terrific mix of creamy and chunky, with a peppery flavor. As I would find out, these needed no gravy to add flavor. They were very good on their own. The steamed clams weren't anything too special. They had a bit of flavor but were otherwise forgettable. It tasted like they had a buttery flavor added to them. Not bad in any kind of way, just slightly bland. The paella was way overly salty. It had a good mix of clams, shrimp, and sausage to give it a variety of texture, but the salt was overpowering. It was the one thing on the plate that I couldn't finish. The fried clams weren't bad, just a little generic. I dipped them in cocktail sauce, so flavor wasn't much of an issue, but like their steamed brethren, they didn't really stand out. Overall, a pretty tasty first plate.

Plate 2: My next plate was all peel and eat shrimp. I tore right into it without taking a photo. I didn't realize this until there were about three shrimp left. Oops, I'll have to make up for that one!

Plate 3: More of my favorites. The peel and eat shrimp were nicely seasoned and, thankfully, quite plentiful. It was one of the spots that people were crowded around on each trip. They were a good sized shrimp, and surprisingly uniform across the board. They've been deveined, which I truly appreciate. They were excellent, as a plate and a half can attest to. There isn't much more that needs to be said about the strip steak. It's still delicious. I will add that I missed the creamy horseradish sauce on the first trip, but noticed it on this plate. It was the perfect complement to the meat. Just enough of a kick to add a new dynamic to the meat, but not overly hot, as some horseradish sauces can be. It was excellent! The corn bread was soft and tasted pretty good. It was on the sweeter side of the corn bread spectrum, with a texture that was closer in consistency to cake rather than the more crumbly and dryer nature of cornbread that I'm accustomed to. I liked it though. I think I would have preferred the more crumbly variety though.

Plate 4: A recreation. I tried to get as close to my meal at Chefs de France for an honest comparison. In theory, the "buffet blandness" should be easily trumped by a restaurant specializing in these items. That's not the case here. Right off the bat, everything is seasoned in a superior manner here. There is flavor abound, especially in these items. In truth, I didn't have much of any intentions to eat green beans, especially at a buffet. It can be cheap filler. However, these were amazing! They had an incredibly fresh snap to them, almost as if they were fresh *gasp*! They had a light citrus zing to them as well, probably because they were seasoned at some point in the cooking process. I did, in all fairness, add just a dash of salt and pepper, but they were nearly perfect on their own. It's amazing what seasoning food can do to their flavor. The meat was superior, hands down. It wasn't even close. The exterior crust added to the natural flavor of the meat. Visually, it was far more appealing, with a bright pink center and a fading gradient into browns. I know color isn't a flavor, but the first thing you do for any dish is eat it with your eyes, and my eyes found this to be delicious. The potatoes were also vastly superior to the au gratin variety I had at Chefs. The texture of the mashed potatoes was actual mash, not mush. The salt and pepper made them very tasty. What wasn't so hot was the gravy. Chefs wins in this arena, I suppose. I scraped off the bits of potato that had gravy on it. It really was not good. It had powdered generic brown gravy written all over it. That's a skip, all day. Still, it's interesting to see how a bit of seasoning can be so important, and how buffet food can actually be really good and not a generic and bland mess.

Dessert plate 1: Boston creme cake, caramel flan, pistachio cheesecake, red velvet cupcake, and some kind of lemon cake. I got every item on the dessert bar except the flourless chocolate cake and some other kind of chocolate concoction. These were all amazing. The Boston creme cake was moist and delicious, with a wonderful creme layer. It was very tasty. The flan was fantastic. It was a little denser than I'm used to flan being, but it tasted so good. The caramel hit is subtle, but really comes in at the end. The fruit on top was fresh and vibrant. It was so delicious. And speaking of delicious, pistachio cheesecake, where have you been all of my life? Honestly? So amazing. So creamy and delectable. The chocolate cookie crust was the perfect complement to the silky smooth pistachio cheese cake filling. Amazing! The red velvet cupcake was pretty good, though after the pistachio cheesecake, I think I might have been let down that it wasn't superb. The lemon cake was very tart. It had a very familiar taste to it that I couldn't quite place, though some kind of drink came to mind. It was not bad, but nothing I'd want to try again. It was a little too tart for my palette.

Dessert plate 2: Can you tell which ones I really liked? I had to get a few more pistachio cheesecake pieces to make sure the first, second, or third one wasn't a fluke. Nope, no fluke. Still delicious and amazing. The flan was also just as good the second time around. I want more of both, like right now.

As you can see by my overload of food, I really enjoyed Cape May Cafe. There was so much more food that I just didn't have the room to try. Their anti-pasto salad looked amazing and was almost gone every time I went back up to get some. There was some fantastic bruscetta that had the longest line on each trip. There were a few other shrimp and meat dishes that also drew large lines. In a way, I'm happy that I didn't get to try it. It gives me an excellent excuse to go back and eat there again. I also want to go on a Tuesday so that I can try their fried calamari. I love fried calamari, more than shrimp, and I'm a big shrimp fan. And of course, I need more pistachio cheesecake in my life. So delicious.

 

[emmabemmainc]

Wonderful reviews and pictures so far!

 

[nco91590]

I think I'm going back to Disney JUST for the cronuts.

 

[Vernie822]

Wow, your Cape May meal looks great. It's somewhere I've never really thought about going, since I'm not really a big buffet person. But I think I might have to try it.

 

[Iowamomof4]

Where did the mac & cheese hot dog come from?

Great report so far!

 

[JustCor]

Boma

I've eaten at Boma before and enjoy it quite a bit. This time was no exception.

Plate 1 (clockwise from top left): Biscuits and sausage gravy, sausage, scrambled eggs, corned beef hash, banana bread. I'll go in that order for the sake of simplicity. The biscuits and gravy were... different. They were good, mind you, but the flavor was not what I was expecting. The seasoning was a mix of some unfamiliar flavors. I think I picked up a hint of curry, some cardamom, and maybe a little cumin. It was not your standard biscuits and gravy. It's just different. It's a little too different for me. I ate most of it, but didn't go back for more. I'm far too in love with good old fashioned southern style sausage gravy. The sausage links were good. They were a good sized and cooked appropriately. The food is turned over quickly enough that they don't sit out and get dry under the heat lamp and hot trays, which is always good. Standard fare here, nothing out of the ordinary. I love the scrambled eggs here. Scrambled eggs are way too easy to ruin. They could be the cheap, powder variety that never tastes right and seems to be sitting in a layer of water all of the time. They could be way over cooked and dried out. It's easy for them to be disgusting. I think that's why I love the eggs at Boma. They're always cooked just right. They're moist and delicious. They tip toe the fine line between perfectly done and ruined and never cross over. I think other people feel the same way. From the time I started at one end of the buffet and made my way to the other, the scrambled eggs were turned over twice. These things do not have any time to sit out and get overly dry. They're truly an underappreciated gem. The corned beef hash, on the other hand, was inedible. There are a fair amount of green pepper chunks and onions in the mix. That's the only thing you could taste. It tasted like nothing more than peppers. Gross. One bite was more than enough. The banana bread was pretty good. It was fresh and had a solid flavor. It was a little on the rich side, so one piece was more than enough. Not a bad first plate.

Plate 2: Plain bagel with cream cheese and smoked salmon, bacon, scrambled eggs with ham and cheese, some kind of cured meats. My family is from New York, and I've lived there for a few years. When I see smoked salmon, I immediately think of bagels and cream cheese going with it. So, I headed back to the selection of bagels and found a soft one, loaded it up with a schmear of cream cheese and then headed back to the meat and cheese table to pick some fine pieces of smoked salmon to top the whole thing off. It really hit the spot, as it usually does. This is one of those things that I could eat for breakfast and be satisfied through lunch. In hindsight, it might have been a little better to give the bagel a light toast, but I wasn't too keen on waiting in line to use the toaster, so I passed on it. Still, it was tasty all the same and worth the bit of time combining it all together. The bacon was a little underwhelming. It was the cheaper kind, very thin, and slightly off in flavor. Two pieces was enough. Again, the eggs are the star of the show. In addition to the perfectly cooked eggs themselves, the ham and cheese add a really nice and tasty flavor to the mix. The ham and eggs are complimenting the eggs, rather than hiding the flavor, as some other additions tend to do. I missed these the first time through because they were replacing the tray. Like the regular scrambled eggs, these have a quick turnover and keep things fresh. The cured meats were good as well. They had a nice smokey, salty taste that went well with the rest of the breakfast. And yes, that is ketchup in the top left of the picture. I like my eggs with ketchup. I'm one of those people.

After this plate, I was pretty full. Something about Boma fills me up quickly. The juice they serve is awesome and I easily put down quite a few cups. The coffee wasn't so great. It tasted like it had been filtered through an ashtray. Still, I managed to drink three cups of it, so make what you will of that.

 

[JustCor]

Wow, your Cape May meal looks great. It's somewhere I've never really thought about going, since I'm not really a big buffet person. But I think I might have to try it.

It really was surprisingly good. My impressions of most dinner buffets are that of very dry meats, overcooked sides, and general blandness across the board. It was excellent to be proven wrong. I really enjoyed everything I ate and would have loved to try more stuff, but I just ran out of room. Not that I didn't try to eat more.

Where did the mac & cheese hot dog come from?

Great report so far!

The mac and cheese hot dog is located at Fairfax Fare at Hollywood Studios, right across from Tower of Terror. It's sitting right next to an ice cream shop that's on the corner of the path that goes from Tower of Terror over to Rockin' Roller Coaster. Thanks for reading along!

 

[JustCor]

Wonderful reviews and pictures so far!

Thank you! I've got a few more places to eat to add to the list!

I think I'm going back to Disney JUST for the cronuts.

I literally dreamt about them last night. I have one more snack credit on the dining plan that I'm saving just for that cronut. I can feel the chewiness and taste the sugar and cinnamon even now.

 

[rlduvall]

Wonderful reviews. Your insomnia has given us fabulous reading material.

 

[JustCor]

Wonderful reviews. Your insomnia has given us fabulous reading material.

Thank you! I'm glad you're enjoying it!

 

[nco91590]

Thank you! I've got a few more places to eat to add to the list!

I literally dreamt about them last night. I have one more snack credit on the dining plan that I'm saving just for that cronut. I can feel the chewiness and taste the sugar and cinnamon even now.

I didn't even try one until our last day we were there. It was by far the best snack I had at Disney. Definitely the best snack in Epcot (WS included!)

 

[vettegirl]

Fantastic reviews!!!

 

[JustCor]

Fantastic reviews!!!

Thank you!

 

[JustCor]

Refreshment Port

After running around MK all day, I headed back to Epcot to get something to eat. I was dehydrated and tired and nothing looked appetizing because of that. So, I went back to Refreshment Port to get a cronut. My appetite quickly perked up, so I got some regular food to go with it.

Chicken nuggets and french fries. Eight pieces of chicken came in this order, and they were a fair size for each piece. Unfortunately, they were your standard, run of the mill style nuggets that are relatively flavorless and a popular choice for picky kids. It seemed a safe bet for my questionable appetite. The crust on the chicken was on the harder side and the meat was pretty dry. The sweet and sour sauce that came with it (that red stuff in the black container) was wretched. It was so disgusting. Half a bit and I was finished with that stuff for the rest of my life. I had two packets of BBQ sauce as backup, and used those for the rest of the chicken that I ate. It's cheap bbq sauce that tastes like the generic stuff that comes in a bottle. The artificial smoke flavoring is a bit abrasive and it's cloyingly sweet, but it works with the bland chicken pieces. The fries were actually pretty good. They were crispy, hot, and pretty tasty. I thought they were pretty darn good. So, too, did the duck and the squirrel that had camped out by me in hopes of snagging some food. The squirrel made out like a bandit, getting food from me and a girl with a kid. The duck stuck by me, not realizing that he had a much better chance with the kid who was practically throwing food at all of the animals. But that's neither here nor there. I ended up eating half of the food and giving some of the fries to the squirrel and duck before tossing the rest. It was cronut time! And this time I took more pictures!

With a closer shot, you can really see all of the layers in the donut. They easily peel apart and let you pick at the donut if you choose to do so. Me, I just dive right in and take big bites.

This shot gives you a little better idea of how light and fluffy the interior of the cronut happens to be. It's very airy and soft in texture, and the layers add a very nice depth to it. Each bite allows for the cinnamon and sugar to get pushed into a layer below it, adding more flavor. Even after allowing it to sit for a while as I ate the bland chicken, the cronut stayed soft and slightly warm. It was just as delightful to eat this second time as it was the first time. It's incredibly messy. It's amazing how much that sugar and cinnamon just binds to your skin and refuses to come off. A quick trip to the bathroom afterwards to was my hands was the only way to remove that sugary glaze. In the end, I wish I just went with two cronuts rather than futzing around with some mediocre chicken and fries. Lesson learned.

 

[Vernie822]

I need that cronut ASAP! :O

The nuggets, I can live without. When they're fresh and hot they're fine but I can totally see where they were a miss with the crusty exterior. Bleh.