$1000 Disney Dining: The endless review!

[1000thhappyhaunt]

Part 1

Day 1, Dec 11: Lunch Artist's Palette(A-) Arrived at Saratoga Springs and checked in around 11:30am. Since we had no ADR for our arrival lunch and didn't want to wait to eat in the MK, we decided to try it. We were very pleased, although we were very hungry after getting a 7:40am flight out of Buffalo. All the kids had eaten thus far today was about 1/2 a muffin each and juice on the plane... but I can't blame them, the airport muffins were terrible, wet and sticky and gross. Myself and my DH had only had about 2 gallons of coffee each and so were very hungry... and very jazzed... and had slight cases of gutrot, too. I ordered the Roasted Vegetable Sandwich which was amazing on warm grilled multigrain bread with a sundried tomato spread which was delish. DD10 and DS8 split the Turkey and Brie and my DH had the Beef and Bleu. I tried a little bite of each and decided the best was the Beef and Bleu although all three were wonderful. Earl of Sandwich calibre. We all enjoyed the fresh homemade potato chips that came with the sandwiches, too. My DS4 got the Uncrustable with grapes and Mickey crackers. The kids split 2 chocolate milks and DH and myself had a Coke and Diet Coke. I ended up going back to the order area to get another Uncrustable because my DD decided that she wasn't crazy about the Turkey and Brie and was given the new kid's meal FREE by the CM at the counter who had taken her order and insisted on replacing it at no charge. That was a nice and "magical" way to start our vacation!!! It was a huge amount of food and I could only eat 1/2 of my sandwich so my DH ended up with his sandwich, half of mine and about 1/2 of my DD's portion of the Turkey and Brie which he deemed too good to leave. He was stuffed. I would definitely eat lunch at AP again.

Dinner at 'Ohana(A-) This is our traditional Arrival Day Dinner. However, the kids had all been awake since 5:45am and were very tired by dinner. Our ADR was for 7:30pm and we arrived about and hour early straight from MK to try and get in earlier if we could. While we waited in the Tambu Lounge my husband and I had a beer each which really just served to make us tired as well. My DS8 fell asleep in his chair waiting and we all debated going back to the hotel and skipping this dinner. But... I could not get another ADR for 'Ohana at any other reasonable time during the whole time we were to be at WDW, our DS4 had napped in the afternoon and my DD10 and DH wanted to stay, too, SO we decided to stay. My DS moved from being asleep in his chair in the lounge to being asleep on two chairs at the back of our table by the window (great view!) and didn't budge during the whole meal. Happily, our server didn't charge us for him. The other two enjoyed the hoopla that goes along with dinner at 'Ohana and participated fully. I have some great photos of the two of them... sadly, no Calvin!!!! ( I must note here that some of the enjoyment of this dinner was spoiled by my guilt at deciding to stay and have Calvin both sleep through the whole thing and miss out on one of his favourites)... however, on to the food. We were brought wonton chips and three different dips out along with salad. I sampled a bit of all the dips and decided the peanut sauce was the best, followed by the green one then the reddish one. Sorry, can't remember their names. The salad was really fresh and crisp and tasty but I only had a bite as I was saving my appetite for the shrimp and steak. The shrimp and wings came next and were very good however a few shrimp were definitely overcooked. But... they were still pretty big. The wings were great and sticky and messy as usual and the sesame seeds were a nice new addition to their flavour. Only had one of them, though. My DH was pleased and so was DS4 who loves them as well. Then came the steak, turkey, pork and sausage. The steak was cooked perfectly, red and juicy. The turkey was too dry to eat. The pork was perfect as well. The sausage was too undercooked and fatty for our taste. The potatoes were absolutely wonderfull and everyone liked them and the veggies were good too. We left some of the veggies though as everyone was too full from everything else. My husband decided he would take all the kids out to the car while I paid the bill as now he was full and suffering from guilt about Calvin, too. ( and I made him, ha, ha!) So off they went and left me all alone at the table... I said NO to dessert. I was MUCH too full, and asked for just the bill. Well, our server brought the bill quickly along with the Pineapple, coconut, banana bread pudding with warm bananas foster sauce and vanilla ice cream. Well... just a little bite, I decided, to say I tried everything. OHMIGOSH... I ended up eating half of the thing and then waddling off to the car with a cramp from my silly decision to take the stairs down and not the elevator. That was the best dessert I have ever had in my life! But take note... that I'm not much of a dessert person. Plus, I left that meal uncomfortably full! We decided that 'Ohanas should be saved for another day if we have an early morning flight in. It's just too good an experience to be so tired for.

Day 2, Dec 12: Lunch at Alfredo's(A) We decided to give this a try despite many mixed reviews. We had had a good sleep and the kids had an early breakfast at Artist's Palette again (Mickey waffles for DS4, 1/2 bagel each for the other two and chocolate milks... all good), packed up our stuff and moved to our new WDW home at the Beach Club Villas, checked in, sorta unpacked and RAN for EPCOT. We decided to see if we could get a walk-in to Alfredo's in the Italian Pavillion. Yeah... they took us around 12:30pm and seated us right away. DH and myself split a half carafe of the Chianti and the kids had some assortment of chocolate milk and Cokes. Our server brought us a basket of warm sourdoughish rolls and a big slab of real butter. We asked for olive oil mixed with balsamic and fresh ground pepper for the rolls for ourselves but the kids were happy with plain butter. My DD10 and myself split the fettucine alfredo, of course, and it was very delish. It was just like this wonderful stuff we get near our home, in Niagara-on-the-Lake, at a wonderful Italian Restaurant called The Gate House. Same fresh, I believe, egg-noodles and same consistency and flavour. Very rich, though, and we were both full and glad we shared an order. DS had the kids spagetti and meatballs which he though were super and DH and DS4 shared the pizza with proscuitto and portabella mushrooms. He was less than impressed with the mushrooms and felt they were more like canned than fresh but liked the pizza all the same. We were too full for dessert. Our table was nice, we were in a corner and not crowded at all but it looked like some of the others were. Our server was a lovely older gentleman and very nice. We were very pleased with this meal and decided that we would try to shift our ADRs later in the week and see if we could get in for dinner, too. Well, it was mostly mine and Beth's idea. We really wanted to have the alfredo again! OK... straight from lunch to Mission Space! EEEEEK.

Dinner at Cape May Cafe(B) We had a 7:30pm ADR at Cape May Cafe and were seated within minutes of arriving at about 7:25pm. Cape May is a must-do for my DH and DS8... they are big chowder lovers. They both add many extra clams to their bowls and make a very thick, stewlike (and somewhat disgusting looking) creation which they seem to like. Basically, my DH ate three such bowls and a tiny plate of steak and salad after that. My DS8 ate two such bowls and decided that he thought he might "choke" but was very pleased with the experience, nonetheless. Nothing more for him. I had a mixed leaf salad, some yummy fresh ripe grape tomates, tried the potato salad, and the broccoli one. Had some steak and mashed redskin potatoes, a chicken finger from the kids' buffet and some salmon. It was all pretty good... nothing outstanding except the little tomatoes... but that may be because in Canada in the winter we cannot get a tomato that tastes like a tomato, anywhere. The dessert buffet was smaller and not as good as I remembered from our last trip in May '05 and all I tried was the Oreo Bonbon and a tiny little keylime tart which was yummy. All in all... pretty good dinner... kind of grossed out by watching my two Chowder Lovers pig out!!!! We WILL be back next trip in May '06, undoubtedly. Clams beware.

To be continued on this thread...(yeah... 7 more days of eating to come...sorry!)

 

[LIFERBABE]

Enjoying your review!!

Im happy to see you enjoyed Artist Palette also. I love their Chicken Caesar Salad.

Cant wait to read more!

 

[Rafikifan]

I'm enjoying your reviews also. Thank you!

 

[Meezers]

Great review! Really like the grading scale!

 

[agotta]

Yummy! Everything sounded great! I can't wait to get back to O'hana. DH and I originally left it out of our ADR's but then said how can we skip it!

 

[sunny04]

Your reviews are great, but Yikes! Just thinking about going on MS after eating a big meal makes me feel sick!

 

[swankybeth]

Enjoying your reviews and looking forward to more!

 

[tubachick]

I Love the Review so far. I agree with so many of your "grades" cant wait for more.

 

[OurDogCisco]

Great review! Can't wait to hear the rest...

Tina

 

[sweetpeakaris]

Enjoyed your review, can't wait to read the rest. Thanks for sharing!

 

[Dustmouse]

Keep it coming...we're anxiously awaiting the next installment!

 

[1000thhappyhaunt]

Part 2

Day 3, Dec 13: Character Breakfast at Cape May Cafe(B) This meal was greatly anticipated by both myself and my DS4. He is totally excited to meet characters. In that respect, the breakfast did not disappoint. Minnie was there in her bathing suit and short/shirt cover-up, Chip (and/or Dale) was there... I know, I know, Chip has the nose like a chocolate chip! And Goofy was there, too along with Pluto. The best part was that it was a really mellow character experience compared to Chef Mickey's. I liked that. Too early to be all revved up and swinging napkins and celebrating... if you know what I mean. Yeah, give me that crappy Disney coffee and plenty of it! I'll hold my nose and try not to taste it... BUT I need coffee in the morning. The best thing was Pluto trying to dig up a bone all around our table (my DS4 was in absolute histerics at that!) and Minnie's AWESOME chubby blue high-heels with starfish on them. (I'm a shoe girl!) Anyway, great character interaction (the best we've had at Disney so far), not rushed and a pretty quiet place to eat breakfast. I tried the scrambled eggs, bacon, really yummy potatoes with onions and peppers, breakfast pizza and the bread pudding. The food was fine, tasty enough but not that hot. The scrambled eggs really had potential for yum because they were pretty creamy and fluffy... but kinda cold. It ruined them. The fruit, however, was quite outstanding and I had plenty of the blueberry and raspberry mix. My DH was liking the sausage gravy poured over his potatoes instead of the biscuits. Wanted to try the grits as I have never had the chance to before... yes, it's a sheltered life we lead up North. However, I hit maximum density before I got around to them. Lets see... what did the kids eat?????? Hummmmm... oh yeah, DONUTS, donuts and more donuts. It was gross. But we were on vacation and well, what the heck. But I did force feed them o.j. and a blueberry each before we left. Those were the most expensive donuts, ever. Actually, I saw my DD10 eat part of a bagel, too. Would I do it again? Ehhh, yes... but only because the character interaction was worth it... and Minnie's shoes DID rock.

Lunch was a little different for us this day. We split up into two groups. I took DD10 to tea in the Garden View at the Grand Floridian(A) while the "men" chowed down on one of those honkin' turkey legs and pretzels in Frontierland. Can't speak to the quality of the turkey but what I can tell you is that I called my husband during their caveman-like food bonding extravaganza and he actually dropped his phone on the pavement because his hands were so greasy. Just heard "Can't talk, eating, call me later!". The boys DID enjoy. The ladies, however, had finer things on their minds. We chatted and sipped and daintily(?) ate tiny little tea sandwiches, scones and cream and the biggest, tastiest, freshest bowl of strawberries and whipped cream I have ever been served. I was impressed with the tea which was the Irish Breakfast. The service was lovely, the room was lovely, our server couldn't have been nicer and more accomodating and the food was very tasty. My sandwiches included a chicken salad, a cucumber and watercress, a shrimp salad, egg salad and the outstanding one... pear with gorgonzola cheese, all on different breads including a marble rye which was particularily good. Beth's sandwiches were supposed to be tuna, ham and cheese and peanut butter and jelly on white bread but I told our server that "Tuna makes her gag." After Beth replied that I wasn't being proper and dainty enough, I corrected my mistake with, "Sorry, I mean tuna makes her hurl." But... she got TWO peanut butter and jelly and one ham and cheese instead of the tuna. She also got to pick two pastries from a three-tiered tray for her dessert. I tried to convince her to pick the pastry swan which I wanted to try but she went for a chocolate strawberry and a chocolate eclair instead. I was allowed a bite of the eclair and it was ok... should have had the swan, I say. Well, we had a great Mother-Daughter lunch and decided that we enjoyed it so much that we would make it a Disney family tradition. The boys were fine with that... they decided to make the turkey legs a tradition too.

Dinner was at Pecos Bill's(B-) in the MK because we had tickets to MVMCP that night. It was our first time at Pecos Bill's and it was pretty good. However, that was only due to the topping bar. The burger itself lacked flavour. It was bland, even with cheese and bacon on it. The three kids and myself split two double bacon cheese burgers and fries between us... topped differently, of course. And my DH had a cheeseburger and fry meal to himself. I put lettuce, tomatoes, pickles, fried onions and sauted mushrooms, ketchup and mayo on mine. It was fine but not great. What I really enjoyed, however, was dipping the fries in the little pot of hot cheese sauce from the topping bar. THAT was good. My DS8, the burger fiend, polished his off really quickly and deemed it "great"... so maybe I'm wrong. Oh yeah, the pickles are pretty good, too. We had cokes, diet coke and sprite, I think, to drink. Very full... no dessert. I felt like I spent the whole day eating this day. Which is not a BAD thing. I just felt like it took a lot of time away from other activites and rides. At MVMCP we had hot chocolate(A-) and a bite of one of the terrible cookies(D-) they were nice enough to hand out for free. But, ewwww, it was a bad cookie. A SnickerDON'Tle.

That's it for today, more to come tomorrow. Thanks for stayin' with me.

 

[3princesses4us]

Love your reviews! You sound a lot like me!

 

[FutureAshleyDukes]

thanks for the review!

 

[Minniespal]

Enjoyed reading your reviews ~ Thanx for sharing.

 

[timandlesley]

Enjoying your reviews. Loved the O'Hana's review, we'll be going there for the first time this trip - can't wait!!

Lesley

 

[1000thhappyhaunt]

Part 3

Day 4, Dec 14: Breakfast was Poptarts and juice for the kids in our villa at the Beach Club... and Starbucks coffee(A++) for me and DH. We bring our favourite coffee and lots of it when we travel. It used to be that the only thing I HAD to bring was my own pillow when I travelled... I even brought it to Italy and Greece when I was in high school. NOW... I can sleep anywhere, on anything, even with three kids piled on top of me... but I MUST have half-decent coffee! Disney really suffers in this respect, sadly. But I digress, again. Can you tell it's a pet peeve of mine? Anyway, on to the lunch review. (I did warn you that this was going to be long, after all). So lunch was at Mitsukoshi Teppanyaki Dining Room at the Japan Pavillion(A). This is our DD10's must-do for every trip to Disney. Sadly, it is not one of the restaurants included in the DDE program. But we think it's worth it anyway. My DH calls this our "Magically expensive lunch". So we checked in around 1:00pm for our 1:20pm ADR and found that our "table" was ready and we actually had the CMs wait for us while DS4 explored the wonder of ANOTHER bathroom at Disney. I swear that it's his favourite part of the trip. Not so much my DH's. This time there were no poor unfortunate souls at our "table" to inflict ourselves upon... I mean, share our dining experience with. The hostess takes our order: three cokes and two Kirin(?) beers, and brings us hot towels to wipe our hands with. DS4 decides to wash his face, neck and hair as well. DH grabbed the towel back before he cleaned his shoes. We then placed our orders with the hostess. Three Donald's Favourites(chicken, rice and vegetables), one chicken dinner(me) and one scallop dinner(DH). The beer was very good. So good, in fact, that we decided to indulge ourselves and have another during the meal. Our chef then showed up and my DS4 freaked. The chef was wearing a black eye-patch on his right eye. "A PIRATE, a pirate, a pirate is cooking our food!" yells Tommy. He is currently obsessed with Pirates and such because of his passion for Dora the Explorer and Pirates of the Carribean. He managed to cover his right eye with his hand and bellow "ARRRGGGGGHHH!"... before I quietly explained that he was not being so polite. Our pirate chef did not seem to mind. This is one meal that keeps the kids entertained. Calvin loves the fact that the chef makes as much noise as Mommy when he cooks... not as much mess, though. They love the steaming onion volcano and his skill with the knives. DH loves that he can enjoy his 2 beer in peace without Calvin's endless barrage of questions about everything and how it works and how many miles, exactly, are we from the sun? We start our meal with a small dish of seasoned seaweed... I think? Don't know what it is but it was really tasty in a picklish sort of way. Kids thought not so much. So DH had four bowls of greenish stuff. We each got bowls of sticky rice and two dipping sauces. One was ginger and one was mustard sauce. The mustard sauce is SO good, not that the ginger one isn't because I always pour it on my rice... but the mustard sauce is SO good. We also had rice noodles mixed with veggies and stir fried bean sprouts. Our chef divided up everything and finished with a sprinkling of sesame seeds to whomever wanted them. I love sesame seeds so I wanted lots. We thanked our pirate and he disappeared to let us eat as my son Tommy whispered a final "arrrggghhh!". The food was wonderful, as always. I dip the chicken in the mustard sauce and that is so yummy. My DH was really looking happy with his scallops so I said, "Honey, how are the scallops? Are the scallops good? Do the delicious looking scallops taste delicious, my Beloved?" At that point he got my subtle hint and grudgingly offered me one to taste. Calvin perked up and looked at the scallops but didn't bother to ask for one. My DH would gladly give up his life for any one of the three... but don't ask for anything off of that man's plate! In fact, the kids plowed through their food so fast that we feared that they would be into ours, for sure. (Well, mine) We decided to try and curb their appetites. In our desperation, DH and I each fed each other a bite of food with our chopsticks, demonstrating our romantic sides and our dexterity with chopsticks. Success! All three were embarrassed and slightly grossed out. Calvin asked if we could please not do that in public. He felt it was inappropriate... and how far are we from Mars, exactly? Well, we ate everything and three extra bowls of sticky rice, too. Our magically expensive lunch totalled $79.19. Then... straight to Mission Space, again.

Snack late afternoon was ice cream for the kids and a frozen Margarita for myself and DH, the Combo one(B+) for me and the Mango one for DH(B-). We gave each other a sip to try to the dismay of Calvin who thought we might kiss, too. He took off and hid under a huge sombrero. How heavy, exactly, did we think the sombrero was?

Dinner was at Marrakesh Restaurant(B+) at the Moroccan Pavillion. My husband has been to Morocco before and loves the food. I just wish we could actually sit on the floor and eat with our fingers. Well, the kids did manage to eat with their hands. Our server was decent enough but not overly friendly... he seemed to be Mr. Efficient Man, though, so we got everything we needed and wanted... a little too quickly for me. We were in and out very quickly... I like that at breakfast and lunch but not so much at dinner. DH and I shared (again to the dismay of DS8) a bowl of the good Harira soup which tasted strongly and pleasantly of lamb and tomatoes. It is quite thick so one bowl does it for us. DH had the combo called A Night in Casablanca which had a generous serving of the most tender, flavourful roast lamb that we have had at Disney before, an ok chicken kebob (nothing to write home about), a taste of the wonderfully flakey and rich seafood bastilla which is covered in a tasty green sauce which is SO YUM and really good rice. I was allowed to try all of his dinner because I gave him more than half of mine. I got the delicious Lemon Chicken which was cooked perfectly and tender and juicy with large cloves of roasted garlic, olives and little tiny slivers of the tastiest preserved lemon that you can imagine. I substituted vegetable couscous for the rice it usually comes with and was in heaven. The flavour combinations in this dish are great when it comes perfectly done and not overcooked! I swear I got almost an entire chicken for this meal. I gave more than half it to DH and some of the couscous, too. The kids had two chicken tender meals which were too dry and the fries were kinda cool and one hamburger meal which was fine according to the expert, Calvin. He did ask the server for pickles which came in a bowl and was enough to feed an army. Our table was not in the greatest location to view the entertainment, however. When the belly dancer came on, I was treated to the back of DH's head for a good chunk of our dinner as he managed to eat turned completely around in his seat. "Honey, she's way better looking than the dancer was last time! I mean, WOW... she's really hot... look at those stomach muscles... I mean... I mean... she's OK. But YOU'RE MUCH prettier! Want a kiss, honey? No????" DH gave me the huge cheesy grin. I pretended to be annoyed which amused the three smallest members of our dinner party. Too full for dessert... and I was a little concerned about my post-dinner stomach puff! Good meal, fine service, ok table, good entertainment. Especially when DS4 decided to go and belly dance, too. He and about 6 cute little girls were "helping" the belly dancer. To my and my DH's amusement he was the best dancer of the bunch. Well, DH says that if the hockey thing doesn't work out for him.......

To be continued sometime today... stay tuned.

 

[Thumper's Tara]

I love it! Thanks for the great review. I can't wait to read more. Calvin sounds priceless. I love the 20 questions!

Again, thanks for the review - you have covered some of my choices for my trip! I can't wait to see if you hit any others!

Cheers.
TT

 

[mlg32]

Your family sounds like so much fun! Great reviews!!!

 

[1000thhappyhaunt]

Part 4

Day 5, Dec 15: Breakfast was FAST for the kids and in our room as usual. Poptarts and coffee(A++)... we had to get to the Grand Floridian for the Pirate (ARRRGGGGHHH!) Cruise for the 3 kids by 9:15am. We made it and sent them off on their voyage of discovery. But not before Tommy had a voyage of discovery in the washroom beside the Grand Floridian Cafe. This duty fell to me as DH was attempting to park the car and I was attempting to get them to the dock on time. Calvin was stressed and frustrated with the pitstop and tried to convince his 4 year old brother to "hold it" for the next 2 1/2 hours. I convinced Calvin that this was BAD advice as he and Beth would be stuck with him, alone, without us, for the next little while. "Okay... fine... he can go. And how heavy do you think that Gingerbread House in the Lobby is, exactly? How much ginger, exactly, do you think they put in it?"... this time I had the answer thanks to the menu printed beside it...35lbs of spices, my dear little Calvin! So we got our little pirates checked in, suited up with lifejackets and pirate Mickey ears and waved, with giddy glee, good-bye from the dock. Ohmigosh... we're alone at Disney!!!!! What, wondered DH and myself, should we do????? Well, the obvious answer was EAT... since we've been together 15 years by now. Eat ALONE and SLOWLY and only have to cut our own food and nobody else's. Ah. So we headed off to our 9:45am ADR at the Grand Floridian Cafe where, again, we were seated promptly. We had a nice window seat overlooking the back garden area towards the pool. The table were nice, the room itself was very pretty and the servers had cute little Victorianish outfits on. The hostess gave us menus and we decided to take pictures of ourselves alone at the table. Giggling. The older couple beside us gave us a few strange looks. Our server showed up shortly and he was a large older gentleman who seemed to be actually freshly wet from the shower or else a tremendous sweater. The rivulets of sweat (water???) pouring down his face were a tiny bit alarming considering it was December and slightly coolish out, still. Anyways, we decided to order coffee(brave DH) and the yummy Irish Breakfast tea for me that I had sampled during the Mother/Daughter Tea Outing. I decided on the Eggs Benedict with a substitution of breakfast potatoes for the asparagus it's usually served with. DH decided on the Smoked Salmon and Bagel Platter after quite the lengthy deliberation. I forgot to mention that there was wonderfully bright green, crisp and perfectly seasoned asparagus at the Cape May Cafe Character Breakfast the other morning. Don't know why I forgot that because it was standout. Our food came out quite quickly, brought to our table by Sweaty Server Man. My Eggs Benny were really good. The yolks were hot and still runny, the Hollandaise sauce was buttery and tasted homemade, the bacon was Canadian, eh! and the english muffins had a good texture and flavour and were lightly toasted. It was SO YUM. However, the breakfast potatoes mixed with onion bits had been sitting for too long in the warmer and were kind of soggy and chewy. Kind of YUCK. Too bad because they had potential had they been freshly made. Skip those. Should have ordered the asparagus... serves me right for being high maintenance. But the eggs were great... I ate really slowly to make them last longer. DH's platter was HUGE... and it was actually considered an appetizer on the menu. While the bagel was the standard, not-a-bagel-bagel, the accompaniments were great. Lots of smoked salmon, capers, thinly sliced red onion, cream cheese assortment and fresh, delicious red tomatoes. He was happy... so happy he pronounced that the coffee was not as bad as usual. I was too scared to try it, though. We made this meal last and he stayed to pay the bill while I ran off to take photos. I take a lot of pictures on vacations. 1st visit to this particular restaurant... but we'll be back.

Sorry this is so short but I must run and make dinner (sigh!)... more to come.