What we ate May 15 to 19--no photos

[drcmk]

We are usually too hungry to remember to take photographs. Sorry about that. I traveled with my husband and teenage daughters. I'll post a day or so at a time.

Day One--Friday

Pepper Market

We came here for a quick lunch after we checked in to our rooms. It was not crowded at all, even though it was lunch time. The dining room was pretty and clean. We did not have to wait long for attention from a CM or for our food. The meals that we ordered were a Chef Salad, Chicken Fingers meal, grilled chicken sandwich and a Turkey Club Sandwich. The food was fine, I can’t say more than that. Nothing terrible, nothing special.


Sleepy Hollow

Even though I wasn’t hungry, one of my goals was to have the Sweet and Spicy Chicken Waffle Sandwich. I got to the window right after the afternoon parade and there was no line. I saw a long line later in the day. The food was served very hot and I did not mind waiting a few minutes for the freshly made sandwich. It was huge and delicious. Also super messy. We tried to eat with a knife and fork, but it was still messy. My daughter and husband shared it with me. The waffle was crispy and mildly sweet, the chicken was spicy, hot and crunchy, the broccoli slaw added a cold crunch and the maple syrup was a perfect accompaniment. This was one of my favorite foods from our trip. I just wish we were hungry enough to try other varieties. I’m trying to figure out how to make it at home.


Plaza Restaurant

I had a 7:25 ADR at the Plaza, but my kids were hungry so I asked if they could take us at 6:30, and they were able to sit us within about ten minutes. Our server was friendly and welcoming. Actually we found that all of the TS food servers were the most pleasant and helpful CMs we met during our vacation. We ordered the tuna salad sandwich (my daughter liked the multi grain croissant), the beef brisket onion burger, the turkey club and a plain burger. Everything was very good and portions were large. We liked the chips, fries and broccoli slaw. Since we were on vacation, we ordered dessert, a banana split (one of the best we’ve ever had), a brownie sundae and a milkshake. Everyone was happy. The Plaza was a great way to have a cool, sit down break with food that wasn’t super-expensive.

 

[PRomano]

Thanks for the reviews. I might have to add the Plaza for our next trip.
My son and I tried one waffle sandwich on the last trip, we might have to try a different one this trip.

 

[drcmk]

Day Two--Saturday


Tusker House

I did not plan this meal. When I was planning the trip, my husband said that he wanted to eat mostly at CS places to keep costs down. But once we arrived, he changed his mind and said it was much nicer to have a sit down meal. I wanted to have lunch at Flame Tree BBQ on our AK day, but it was still under renovation. Since my kids don’t really like Asian food, I didn’t see any good options for us and wasn’t quite sure what we would do. For some reason, my whole family decided that they were famished at about 10:40 am and they wanted to sit down in a nice restaurant. I checked my MDE app and saw that there was an 11:00 ADR available for Tusker house. We had never eaten here and were specifically not interested in buffets or character meals for this trip, BUT, it was close and we were hungry. As it turned out, we were thrilled with our choice. We arrived and sat down shortly before 11:00 so the buffet still had all of the breakfast foods available. My family was excited to have a hot breakfast (no one told me that that was a priority as I was planing the trip!). I can’t mention everything we ate (we ate a lot) but the selection was huge and we liked everything we ate. After about fifteen minutes, the lunch options were presented and they were also delicious. We especially liked the roasted meats. This was among the best buffet meals we have ever had. It was fun to try new things, but there was also an excellent selection of familiar foods for breakfast and lunch. The desserts were probably the weak part of the meal, but we ate so much food we did not even want dessert. As I said, we weren’t really interested in characters, but as they came by, one of use took a quick photo with each one and the characters were fine with moving on quickly and not interacting much. Our server, again, was very friendly and pleasant. Just this morning as we were taking a morning walk my husband told me he would walk faster if he were walking to Tusker House.


Mama Melrose

I made a dinner ADR as Mama Melrose because we had enjoyed this restaurant before and because I wanted to be in HS for Star Wars weekend to have a spot to escape the anticipated Star Wars crowds. When we checked in (about ten minutes early) the CM told me that they were running 30 minutes behind the reservation time. We perused the gift shops nearby and tried to kill some time playing games at Pizza Planet (but every game we wanted to play was broken), but that didn’t amuse us for long. Fortunately, my beeper buzzed just six minutes after our ADR time, so I’m glad I didn’t wander far from the restaurant. Our server was again fabulous. We ate the mozzarella and tomato salad, Penne alla Vodka, Chicken Campanelle, Penne and meatballs and grilled vegetable flatbread. The portions were huge and everything was delicious. The Chicken Campalle was probably the best item, but it was all good. My daughter (age 17) was intrigued by the children's menu placemat (Guardians of the Galaxy theme) and the server was kind enough to bring her two of them.

 

[drcmk]

Day Three--Sunday

Las Ventanas

Once again, I had no dinner plan for this day. We spent the day at the Kennedy Space Center and I wasn’t sure what time we’d get home. My family again wanted a TS meal and they wanted it fast. We saw that there were no ADRs available at Las Ventanas, but I figured it couldn’t hurt to ask in person and eat at Pepper Market if there was no availability. Surprisingly the restaurant was nearly empty (it was about 6:45 pm). All of the servers and the hostess were tremendously welcoming. We would happily return to this relaxed restaurant.

 

[TeresaNJ]

Enjoying your review, even without photos!

 

[drcmk]

Day Four--Monday

Cantina de San Angel

I’ve been looking forward to returning her for years, literally. It has been my favorite CS meal for maybe decades. I was a bit disappointed to see that the menu has changed since my last visit (2009). But the food was still very good. We ordered Tacos de Barbacoa, Nachos, Chicken Fingers kids meal (my less adventurous eater) and Guacamole and chips. I planned to love it all and I did. I’m not Mexican, so I freely admit that this food might not be authentic. But it made me happy. The nachos were pretty spicy and chock full of jalapenos. I ate all of the jalapenos, since no one else really likes them and I might have had reason to regret that later. But I’d do it again. The kids meal was pretty large—just two fingers, but a small water, plenty of chips and a nice size bag of grapes (Fruit!? On vacation?!) I’ll add that I love sitting under the pavilion by the water to eat. We ate right at lunch time, but were served pretty quickly and found a table easily. My only beef (besides the tacos, ha ha) was that some diners were intentionally feeding bits of their chips to the birds, which made them much too bold and hard to avoid. This, of course, is bad for the birds and the people who do not want to eat with birds.


La Cava

I promised myself a margarita and based on recommendations from here got an avocado margarita. I didn’t really like it. That’s what I get for being adventurous. It wasn’t particularly strong, I didn’t get tipsy at all. At first I didn’t really taste the avocado, maybe I never tasted the avocado, but by time I reached the bottom third the thickness of the avocado puree was making me a bit queasy. Not that I stopped drinking it or anything. This was my only real food disappointment of the trip. That probably means I should make myself a regular margarita tonight at home to make up for it. Good idea.


Via Napoli

I wasn’t sure if I was going to keep this ADR up until a day before. We had Italian food at Mama Melrose just two days before and we eat Italian and pizza at home fairly often. But it has such wonderful reviews and we all liked the idea of having a planned sit down meal to look forward to. So I kept it. I’m glad I did, my youngest daughter said this was the best meal of the trip (and before the trip her only request was to get pizza from Pizza Planet!). We ordered 3 appetizers (Peperoni Arrostiti, Mozzarella Caprese, Family Style House Salad) and a large Margherita pizza (my kids aren’t that adventurous with their pizza). We went with the smaller pizza so we’d have room for dessert. The food was all wonderful. Servers were also excellent. For dessert we had Zeppoli di Caterina and Tiramisu. The Zeppoli were fabulous, somehow the whipped cream was extra thick. My kids make their own Tiramisu at home and judged this one the best that they’ve ever had in a restaurant (of course not as good as their homemade).


Les Halles Boulangerie

For some reason, my husband encouraged the kids to share a dessert at Via Napoli so that they could also have dessert at the French bakery. They obliged. At the bakery we had Chocolate Mousse, Raspberry Mousse Cake, an Éclair and a Croissant. No one had any complaints. Everyone kept saying the food was too rich to finish, but nothing was left over! Definitely a worthwhile splurge.

 

[kastoney]

Thanks for your reviews.

one of my goals was to have the Sweet and Spicy Chicken Waffle Sandwich.

This is one of my favorite disney sandwiches. So glad you enjoyed it. I always think its a bit of a hidden treat as few very people tend to be there. Which of course is just fine by me.

The Plaza was a great way to have a cool, sit down break with food that wasn’t super-expensive.

We love the plaza too for the exact same reasons. For not much more than counter service it is definitely a step up.

I can’t mention everything we ate (we ate a lot) but the selection was huge and we liked everything we ate. After about fifteen minutes, the lunch options were presented and they were also delicious.

I'm with you, I'm not a big character meal fan but Tusker House is the one I've found that I actually like. And without knowing it you did one of my favorite things, the late breakfast meal that you can finish with lunch. So glad you all enjoyed this.

I promised myself a margarita and based on recommendations from here got an avocado margarita. I didn’t really like it.

Bummer, I love the avocado margarita (so much so I've figured out how to make them at home) but they are clearly not for everyone.

But it has such wonderful reviews and we all liked the idea of having a planned sit down meal to look forward to. So I kept it. I’m glad I did,

We love the Via Napoli pizza too. Its a must do for us almost every trip.

 

[xlsm]

I love the spicy chicken waffle sandwich!! Unfortunately, I had to make do with bites from my husband's because I ordered the prosciutto one and it was not awesome. The nutella with fruit waffle is also very good, and that one is easy to recreate at home!! In fact, I recreated it less than a week after returning from our trip last summer, LOL!

I'm so excited to finally try Tusker House this time around!

Great reviews even without pictures

 

[vettegirl]

Thanks for sharing

 

[drcmk]

Thank you. I had not read anywhere that you could get both breakfast and lunch if you time it right at Tusker House. It was an exciting surprise. I would definitely do that again.

 

[drcmk]

Day Five-Tuesday

Be Our Guest

Our last meal was lunch at Be Our Guest. I was so excited to eat here. Just approaching the castle is thrilling. We did pre-order our food and everything was super easy. We breezed right in to the dining rooms. I love, love, love the carts that bring the food out. They look right out of the movie and the embedded electronic tablets on the side are clever. All of the dining rooms, and the halls and even the bathrooms are beautiful, really perfect. Our food arrived very quickly and the order was exactly right. We had a braised pork (my husband wants to find the recipe to make this at home, he loved it), two roast beef sandwiches and a croque monsieur. The Croque Monsieur was the least interesting, it looked kind of boring. The pork was a big hit. The roast beef was really delicious, too, although I didn’t taste the horseradish. My daughter got her sandwich plain and that was no problem with the pre-order. We had dessert, of course. We had one orange éclair, one triple chocolate cupcake and two strawberry cream cheese cupcakes. Everything was good. The strawberry cupcakes were the best. I would very happily eat here again. It was a nice civilized counter service meal made super easy by pre-ordering.

 

[jesswindsor]

Thanks for posting!!!

 

[Eastern]

Thanks for posting, very helpful.