6-7 to 6-14: DDP reviews from Disney - Artist Point and Cosmic Rays added.

skyfire1982

Mouseketeer
Joined
Mar 31, 2006
Typing up this review makes me sad, since we had a great time and probably won't get to go back for another year or so. :sad1: That said, here we go.

Intro: Going on the trip was myself (23 and female) and my brother (18 and um, obviously, male). Last time we were there was about 10 years ago and on a shoestring budget (thanks Mom, for ramen on a hot pot in a motel!) so now that I had money to pay for some better meals - DDP it is. In fact, I think the sole reason why my brother didn't complain too much about me dragging him was the food - he looked rather bored everytime I mentioned the trip. It's free for him (I paid) and good food - you'd think he could have faked SOME enthusiasm to make me feel better. Anyways, we're very novice amateur foodies, so I think I stared more at table service menus than I did at ride touring plans. Again, Steven was less than brimming with excitement, so all of the planning fell to me. Luckily, we share similar tastes, so I knew he'd be okay with my choices.

Indecisive: When I got back, I looked at my very first ADR list and laughed. And laughed. Well, we had good intentions. Chef Mickeys breakfast got replaced in favor of Crystal Palace breakfast which got ditched for Artist Point dinner. Liberty Tree Tavern kicked out for Coral Reef which in return ended up being Citricos. Oh well. Maybe next time. I'd still like to try CP and LTT eventually.

And now, the food.

Wednesday June 7, 2006 6:10 ADR - Le Cellier Dinner : I'd seen a couple of bad reviews right before leaving, so I was nervous. I even though about cancelling, but I couldn't think of anything to replace this. I'm glad I went though, although our favorites were not the ones usually drooled upon by this board.

Steven: Canadian cheddar cheese soup, Le Cellier mushroom filet, raspberry sorbet, Cappucino freeze
Me: Prince Edward Island mussels, Le Cellier mushroom filet, maple creme brulee, frozen berry daiquiri (non alcoholic)

We arrived right at 6:10 after running through Epcot from Test Track and were seated almost immediately. We waited for probably only 3-4 minutes at most. Things started off well - friendly hostess, friendly server, looked over the menu, debated a little, put in our order. We were asked if we were on the dining plan right away. Said yes, friendly smile, and a quick run down of what we were allowed on the dining plan. Breadsticks arrived promptly. My brother likes bread, so he ate away. He seemed to like all three. I'm not a big breadstick fan, but I do like pretzels, so I stuck with the pretzel bread. It was good. Not fantastic, seemed a little overly buttery, but still warm and good.

Appetizers arrived very quickly. The much hyped cheese soup was a disappointment in that we could taste the beer - and we're not beer fans. I tried a sip of the soup - that was enough for me. My brother did drink most of his soup, but I could tell he wasn't completely happy with it. (He just likes soup. He'll drink anything if you dump it into a soup). However, my mussels were FANTASTIC. I cannot say enough good things about them. I got a huge plate of them - and that was good, since my brother abandoned his soup and I shared with him. The menu describes them as "Prince Edward Island Mussels served chowder style, with Applewood smoked bacon and potatoes $9.99." It's not a bowl of clam chowder soup (which was kind of the impression I had). It's more of a thicker sauce covering the mussels. Mussels themselves were excellent. No fishy taste, nice and tender. Bacon and potatoes gave the sauce such a nice flavor. Steven and I were scraping up the bottom of our plates to get all the last bits of sauce. Mmmmmm.

Oh yes, drinks. We were able to order the non alcoholic specialty drinks off the menu with the dining plan. Not sure why Steven ordered the cappucino freeze - he's normally not a coffee drinker. I tried some, wasn't bad, but I'm not a coffee drinker either. My berry drink was excellent. :) Steven kept trying to steal some, so I think he liked it too.

Main dish. We both got the mushroom filet. We were both a little less than impressed by it. It was beautifully presented. It was nicely cooked. The taste was a bit strong for both of us. The mushroom risotto was good, but a bit bitter, and there was a sauce on the filet that neither of us were fans of. I think it was the herb beurre blanc, but I'm not sure. I thought it was blue cheese at first, until I went back and realized nothing like that was mentioned on the menu. Whatever it was, it was too strong for us. We ate most of it, but if we were to order it again, I'd ask for the steak plain (since it was wonderful) and to leave off whatever that sauce was. As it was, a bite of the risotto at the same time as a bite of the steak mixed well.

Desserts: The maple creme brulee was a bit way too sweet for me. I think we both preferred my brother's raspberry sorbet. I also wasn't a fan of the cinnamon whipped cream, but then again, I don't like cinnamon at all (except in moderation with apple pie).

Payment: Paid quickly and easily with the dining plan. I did leave some extra tip for our server since she was very good and I was impressed with how fast service moved. I kept all our receipts, but not with me at work, so if someone wanted to know how much it cost, let me know and I'll go home and edit this post.

Overall: Definetly not as bad as I've heard it was. I would come again, but try new things. I would definetly order the berry freeze and the mussels again. I would walk all the way to Florida from Chicago for the mussels. Unfortuantely, I saw them listed on our receipt as Seasonal Appetizers, so I don't know how long they'll be on the menu for.

Thursday, June 8 2006 - Pepper Market lunch: Not overly thrilled with reviews for MGM counter services, we left for CSR. I thought about stopping at Beaches and Cream, but the lure of our hotel room won out. Quick stop at PM for lunch. After a bit of confusion about how things worked, we grabbed food.

Steven: Fettucini with wild mushroom sauce, creme brulee, cherry coke.
Me: Market Nachos, flan, orange soda.

I want to put in a special notice for the sweet but scary old lady who was manning the bakery counter. When she saw us sizing up our options (which were all gorgeous to look at), she sidled up next to us and gave the best one liner of our trip. Welcome to my house ... of calories. I think it scared us then, but we continually laughed about it for the rest of our trip. She was so sweet, but she just looked so creepy when she was cackling about the calories of the desserts.

We took our food to go, swiped our cards, and struggled back to our hotel room. CSR is big and we had a 5 minute walk to our room in hot, humid, weather. But we prefer eating in privacy rather than in the dining room, so back to our room it was. Nachos were very nice. I could have used some extra cheese, but there was plenty of food. Lots of chips, meat, guacamole, cheese, tomatoes, lettuce, sour cream, and I left the beans off. Steven's pasta wasn't bad, but it was bland and could have used some salt. It was just some mushroom sauce put over pasta, nothing special. We were too full for dessert, so we stuck them in the fridge. Steven ended up eating both of them over the next few days and he liked them both. (I was still too full).

Overall: I would come here again, but the food is pricey. Good use of a counter service meal though.

June 8. 2006 5:30 ADR Mama Melrose Fantasmic: Eh. Yeah, that about sums it up. This review will probably be much shorter than the rest just because there's not much to talk about. I will say that in their defense, I was coming down with a cold and a sore throat, so that may have contributed to my less than rosy outlook (although my brother was perfectly healthy and wasn't impressed either). We arrived on time and were seated within a few minutes. Menus were plunked down and we ordered. We were on the fantasmic dining package, so the salad and a choice of flatbread were included.

Mixed Greens - balsamic vinaigrette and gorgonzola cheese
Grilled Chicken Flatbread with sun-dried tomato pesto, pancetta, asiago cheese and fresh chives
Wood-Grilled Salmon basted with sun-dried tomato pesto over roasted vegetables - Steven
Spaghetti Fra Diavolo with clams, calamari, mussels and shrimp, tossed in a spicy Marinara sauce - Me
Spumoni Gelato

Service was unimpressive. Our waitress looked unthrilled the entire night. It wasn't as speedy as Le Cellier, but it wasn't a majorly long wait either. No smiling faces - well, I take that back. The hostesses were friendly. I asked for no cheese on the salad since I'm not a fan of gorgonzola. It came with cheese on the salad. So I skipped the salad - and the bread as well. Nothing excited me about it, although brother-who-eats-lots-of-bread ate it (big surprise). The flatbread was pretty decent - tasted like a fancy pizza. My throat was feeling pretty cruddy about this time, so I think I ate all of the seafood off the pasta (not as good as the mussels from last night, they were tough and not as tender) and was umimpressed with the spaghetti sauce. I didn't try Steven's salmon. It looked okay and I think that was his verdict as well. By dessert time, he was stuffed so we both ordered the gelato - a light dessert for him, and I just wanted ice cream for my throat. The gelato was nice - cool and creamy and a nice pistachio flavor.

Payment: When I mentioned we were on the dining plan, it almost looked like our waitress rolled her eyes a little before reverting back to her bored face. Signed for our meal and left - no extra tip.

Overall: Nothing to complain about, but nothing to rave about. We probably would not return. For MGM day next time, I think I'd try 50's Prime Time next time. At least we got the Fantasmic reserved seating. Far left seating, but it was closer to the exit.

Friday, June 9 - Yakitori House Lunch: We went bright and early for lunch in an almost deserted World Showcase. Didn't save us any time though, as the CM's behind the counter had some kind of cash register chaos. We waited for almost 5 minutes as three CM's wandered around banging at cash registers, pulling out bags of change and bills, and just looking completely confused. We finally managed to order.

Me: Tonosama Combination - teriyaki chicken thigh, sukiyaki beef, mixed vegetable tempura with shrimp and steamed rice, chestnut cake, iced green tea
Steven: Shrimp Tempura Udon, chestnut cake, iced green tea

My combo platter was good. Sukiyaki was nice and sweet and the chicken was tender (although the sauce was a bit tart). I ignored the vegetable tempura which looked soggy, and the shrimp was a tiny random piece on top of the tempura. Oh well, I hadn't ordered it for the tempura. I didn't try Steven's udon but it looked very nice - two big pieces of shrimp tempura. We both were too full for the chestnut cake. The iced green tea could have used some flavor. It tasted like cold bland tea - I was slightly itching to add some sugar or lemon in, but it was cold and that was the most important thing!

Overall: Good food, we'd come here again.

June 9. 2006, 6:00 ADR - Les Chefs De France: Walked right up, sat down for a minute, and walked on in. I love being a small party of two. No waits! We had a very nice waiter with a heavy French accent - I think his name was Tom? Would need to check my receipts. Awesome guy. We got our menus and put in drink orders right away for 2 Oranginas (fizzy orange juice drink). Not on the dining plan, but we love those, so we paid extra for them. And off Tom (fine, we'll call him Tom for now, I'll edit the post if his name is different) went. And went. And went. A couple next to us got seated, got drinks, got bread, and ordered. Finally, Tom reappeared with two Oranginas, opened them, and poured them for us. We were starting to wonder where he went. Must have had a trouble finding them, since we had no problems with the service the rest of the meal.

Me: Escargot, Canard confit a l'orange, pommes Lyonnaise, creme brulee
Steven: Lobster bisque, Canard confit a l'orange, pommes Lyonnaise, sorbet.

Appetizers: The escargot was okay. Very oily and the parsley didn't seem to lend much to the flavor. I was glad I tried it though. Steven liked his soup - I tried a bit and it seemed similar to cream of tomato, but nicer and sweeter than tomato soup usually is.

Entree: We LOVED the duck. We're Chinese, so we see plenty of duck in Chinese cuisine, and we've expanded our love of duck to order it in any restaurant. The duck here was fabulous. We saw a plate of it being delivered as we walked in, and it looked gorgeous. There were a couple pieces of nicely sliced duck breast - very juicy and tender - and a duck leg. I preferred the duck breast to the leg (the leg wasn't as juicy as the breast) and the orange sauce was a little too sweet, but still very good. The potatoes were delicious - mushy, but with an excellent flavor. Steven agreed.

Dessert: Don't remember anything special about the sorbet. I'll have to check the receipts. I think it was raspberry again - nice, cool, and light. The creme brulee I had was apparently new - there was a red fruit gelee on the bottom that I think was raspberry (the menu just said "red fruit.") Tom specifically came by and asked how the creme brulee with the fruit gelee was, since he said it was new and the chefs wanted to know so they would know if they should revert back to the old style or not. I have no idea what the old style was, but this was good, although the the brulee seemed to be a bit more watery and not as firm - maybe it was the fruit?

Payment: I don't remember if we were asked about the dining plan at the beginning or end of the meal. I know Tom asked for our card as soon as we got dessert, since he mentioned that he would need to track down his manager to override something and it might take awhile, so he wanted to hurry it up for us. Paid with 2 TS credits with no problems, charged the oranginas to our room, and added some extra tip on for Tom.

Overall: We would definetly come here again. Tom was excellent, food was great, service was quick - with the exception of the drinks. Hopefully they can find the oranginas quicker next time. ;)

Hope some of this helps out! I'd be happy to answer any questions.

Coming later: Cosmic Rays, Artist Point, more Pepper Market, Citricos, Flame Tree BBQ, Sunshine Seasons, Earl of Sandwich, and a couple of CS repeats (EoS and CR).
 


Great reviews. Thanks for posting.

Looking forward to the next round! :goodvibes

The duck sounds wonderful!

--penny
 


Work is slow, so let's go on our Magic Kingdom day.

Saturday, June 10th, 2006 - Cosmic Rays Lunch:We wandered over from Philharmagic looking for a nice lunch. I love bbq ribs, so this choice had been preselected WAY in advance. Let's see ... Bay 1, sandwiches ... no. Bay 2, burgers ... no. Bay 3 ... chicken. No ribs? Oh, there it is, this tiny little mention of ribs tucked away under the giant sign for chicken. After a quick discussion, we decided to split the chicken and ribs combo and I sent Steven off to go save a table. It was about 12:15 and not massively crowded, but it was getting there.

Shared: Chicken and ribs combo, mashed potatoes, carrots, and an orange soda.

Well, it was more than enough for the two of us. I picked at some chicken (typical rotisserie chicken you'd find anywhere - nothing special, but still good) and split the ribs with Steven. Okay, there were three ribs, and I took two and gave him one. He got most of the chicken and I called dibs since I was older and paid. Tee hee.

We enjoyed the meal. If anyone's familiar with Boston Market, the food's quite similar - only with Disney prices. The carrots were a little on the mushy side, the mashed potatoes had good flavor, chicken was tender, and the ribs had a good sauce on them. The atmosphere was typically theme parkish - loud families, shrieky kids, and not somewhere you want to sit and dwell over your meal. We left as soon as we were done and ended up sitting and relaxing on the TTA - twice. We were waiting for our Peter Pan FP time to come about, but it was a quiet and soothing way to relax after the chaos of Cosmic Rays. Having said that, the food was good enough that we came back a few days later.

June 10, 2006 - 6:00 ADR, Artist Point: Well, I was plenty hyped up about this dinner since I read nothing but good things about AP on here. Steven had finally broken down and bought internet access, so we didn't make it out of the hotel room until 5:40. Well, rode to MK, raced off the bus for the WL boat, rode the boat, and ran off to AP. We got there 20 minutes late and the place looked fairly empty. I heard the hostesses mentioning that there were a lot of no-shows that night. They had already marked us as no shows, but since it was slow, they seated us right away. They must have been bored - there was a large group of people standing around the hostess stand chilling out, so of course they all turned around to welcome us in - couple of hostesses, a waiter with nothing to do, and a manager type in dress shirt and tie all nodding and smiling at us. It was a slightly surreal experience - I felt slightly famous. :rotfl:

Let me just say that Artist Point is beautiful. Probably the prettiest restaurant I was in all trip. I love the northwest Pacific theme though, so I loved all of Wilderness Lodge.

The meal started off well. (Uh oh, that implies that something changes, right? HAHAHA - we'll get to that later). Our waiter came over, chatted with us for awhile about menu options, and started discussing his favorite foods. We placed orders, got drinks, and ate bread. All was good.

Steven: Smoky Portobello Soup, Grilled Buffalo Sirloin Steak, Artist Point Cobbler
Me: Crispy Venison Spring Rolls, Cedar Plank Roasted Wild King Salmon, Valrhona Chocolate Truffle Cake

The appetizers were pretty decent. I mainly ordered the spring rolls because I wanted to give venison a try. They looked gorgeous - two long crispy rolls with the sauce on the side. The menu we saw different from the one at Allears - it said something like chili sauce mixed with the sweet and sour sauce. It gave the impression that the sauce wasn't premade, anyways. I asked our waiter if I could get it non spicy or with the chili sauce separate, since I don't like spicy things. He said no problem. The sauce came premixed. Oh well, I just used less sauce than usual. Anyways, I deemed the spring rolls only decent - I guess I'm used to Chinese spring rolls that come with the meat mixed in with vegetables and well chopped. This was more like a long strip of venison wrapped in the spring roll skin and fried. The meat was a little tough, but it was well fried and crispy, and I was glad I tried it, but probably would order a different appetizer next time. Steven's soup looked exactly like the pictures here on the dis, and tasted pretty decent. It had a nice thick flavor, but I think the smokiness of the portobellos added a slight bitterness to the soup that just didn't mesh with me. Steven liked it and finished off the soup.

Entrees: I had heard that if you ordered the cedar plank salmon, the waiters would make a big deal out of it and most of the restaurant would know that you ordered it. That had me slightly terrified. Don't humiliate me in public, please. My fears were unfounded, as it wasn't some giant gong going off and lights flickering and 50 waiters descending on my table to offer me a slab of fish (doesn't fit in with the upscale dining room anyways). The salmon was brought out at the same time as the rest of the food, but on a separate cedar plank. One waiter shoved the plate with the veggies and sauce on it before you, and another one took the salmon off the cedar and put it on the veggies. Hehe, cute. Steven's buffalo was sweet and tender. Our waiter described it as "imagine a steak drenched in molasses for a few days." Pretty close on the mark. I focused mainly on my salmon, though. It was incredibly juicy and tender, and the vegetables were well cooked and had a nice sauce. I wasn't massively impressed with the herb dumplings that were on the plate - nothing bad, but nothing special. It seemed like stuffing without any of the usual vegetables put in, just the bread.

It's quiet in here: Well, while we were waiting for the entrees to come out, two parties got seated near us. One party of two, and one party of 8 giggly middle aged ladies. At that time, we barely blinked. Runners came out with entrees and we ate. Party of two ordered wine. Party of 8 ordered a couple of different wines. Our waiter was with both those two tables and chatted up a storm with them (and went through his spiel on the steak soaked in molasses again). We finished eating. Waiter showed wine to table 1. We sipped drinks. Waiter showed wine to table 2. I ran dry on my ginger ale. Waiter talked about the immensely popular portobello soup with table 2. Well, it was at this point that service just crawled to a stop with our table. We're pretty easy going, so we waited. Hmm, maybe I should have been more proactive. We waited for a decent while with empty glasses and finished plates. Meanwhile, tables 1 and 2 got appetizers and more wine. Waiter finally remembered us and cleaned our plates, went for dessert menus, and got me a refill (thank you!). He looked a little put off that he had to get dessert menus though - "Would you like dessert? Oh good, we have great desserts. We have Yada, mada, hada, pada, and blah. What do you want?" Steven looked a bit blank and asked for a menu. Waiter smiled at us and didn't move. Steven looked at me and shrugged. "I can't remember all of what he just said and I want to think about my dessert." Waiter looked ready to rerecite the entire list before I gently prodded him off to get menus. He looked a little uppity about that. Some of us don't have the menus memorized though - and it's our first trip here. We're not asking you to run downstairs to WCC to get us a dessert there, just two pieces of paper. Well, you can predict the rest of the meal from there on. It look a few minutes for the dessert menus to come. It took him another while to return for our orders. It took another length of time to get the bill. And so on.

Desserts: Steven's cobbler looked pretty. The white sauce drizzled over it was a little more sour than I preferred - was it yogurt? I think Steven at this point was poking at the black raspberry ice cream wondering what was up with Disney's fascination with raspberries - third time in four days. He enjoyed it, though. My cake was a bit on the bitter side - I like really sweet milk chocolate - and the blood orange coulis was too sweet. I ended up ignoring the blood orange sauce in favor of mixing the cake with the Soarin' white puffs - meringue? Not sure what it was, but it was fluffy and tempered out the bitterness of the chocolate.

Overall: We loved the decor of the restaurant. Food was good. Waiter was good until everyone else showed up. Even Steven, who is the world's quietest, most easy going guy I know, started laughing as we left and commented that clearly, in order to get better service next time, we need to order wine. Lots of wine. Lots of different types of wine. We would return, but we'd probably prepare ourselves for a very long dinner. I don't really believe that our waiter was overworked - the restaurant was still sparsley populated at that time and wine table 1 and 2 weren't burdening him with work. (We sat right next to them so I heard all of their conversations). It just seemed like he made an extra effort to strike up small talk with them and dumped us to the bottom of his priority list in favor of the bigger tip. I don't know if it was that, or if he looked at us and went - oh, it's just young kiddies, they don't look like the type to complain if they get slow service. I suppose he was right - it wasn't horrificly bad enough that I would complain to the manager, but I'll whine about it here a little.
 
Next time you go to Artist Point, ask for Pok to be your server. You'll get the proper attention from her.
 
Great reviews, thanks for taking the time to post. I'm looking forward to readin more. I also wanted to add that it was very sweet and generous of you to take your brother with you and pay for him! :goodvibes
 
thanks for the reviews sky.... q: when you were at the Pepper Market, did you have to use a stamped card? I understand that you are on the DDP but I heard there is another card to use. Did you? TIA
 
Thanks for the reviews. I really enjoyed reading them. Sorry for your experience at Artist Point. Had a similar experience at California Grill on our last trip.
 
We must have had the same waitress at you at Mama Melrose. It took forever to get her to acknowledge us, no friendliness at all, couldn't get refills,etc-she was just completely uninterested.

I was jealous watching other tables who seemed to have servers who were doing a really good job.

I was not impressed with this restaurant. I will choose Brown Derby or H&V when we do the FDP again.
 
jrabbit - For Pepper Market, I think everyone gets the same card as you walk in. Each station stamps it indicating what you ordered (such as "BAKERY", "NACHOS", "SODA"), and you present it to the cashier after you're done eating and you're ready to leave. We had no problems with it when paying with the dining plan - cashier tallies it all up, then swipes the card and the computer accepted it.

The only problem was that using 1 card for two people was annoying. I'd have to wait for my brother to get to the front of his line with the card and get it stamped, then grab the card and walk back to the other side of the room to order my item. The second time we came, we just got two cards - one for him, one for me, and it worked fine.
 
skyfire1982 said:
Even Steven, who is the world's quietest, most easy going guy I know, started laughing as we left and commented that clearly, in order to get better service next time, we need to order wine. Lots of wine. Lots of different types of wine.... It just seemed like he made an extra effort to strike up small talk with them and dumped us to the bottom of his priority list in favor of the bigger tip. I don't know if it was that, or if he looked at us and went - oh, it's just young kiddies, they don't look like the type to complain if they get slow service. I suppose he was right - it wasn't horrificly bad enough that I would complain to the manager, but I'll whine about it here a little.

Unfortunatley, it seems that you were a casuality of the much acclaimed dining plan. I don't feel it is right, but the server obviously noticed that the tip would be much larger on the other tables because wine is not included in the DDP. Great reviews nonetheless. Our meal at Artist Pointe was great as well.
 

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