A First Time Family Review of 8 days on DDP (8/13-8/21)

[ajkoos]

So we got back from WDW on August 21 and I have been meaning to share my reviews of DDP since we got so much help from DISers while planning our trip. Of course, between school starting for the kids and work, I now find myself two weeks later getting this done...

First, a little info..our family consists of DH, me, DD (9) and DS (6) and we stayed at CSR from 8/13 to 8/21. Since we arrived two days before free dining and had the resort discount, we actually paid for DDP. (ran the numbers to change everything for us, it ended up only being like $100 difference because we would have needed park tickets for the days prior to FD.) This was also our first trip to WDW (although my husband went in the 80s and I went in the 90s) and we didn't really know what to expect.

We were on the DDP and did not upgrade either of our children to adult status. We used every single TS, CS and snack credit, sometimes sharing at CS restaurants since portions were so large and using snacks for breakfast. By doing DDP we saved about $350 on food, although we did OOP tips, and some extras (like dessert at Cali Grill to watch fireworks.)

Here's what I'll be reviewing (and sorry, no food porn pics. My DH was not about to let me start snapping photos of food):

8/13
Pepper Market (dinner, CS)
Cali Grill (dessert, OOP)

8/14
Ohana's (breakfast, TS)
Columbia Harbor House (lunch, CS)
Cosmic Ray's Starlight Cafe (lunch, CS)

8/15
Pepper Market/Rix Cafe (breakfast, snack)
Toluca Turkey Legs/Catalina Eddie's (lunch, CS)
Teppan Edo (dinner, TS)

8/16
Pepper Market (breakfast, snack)
Sunshine Season Food Fair (lunch, CS)
Le Cellier (dinner, TS)

8/17
Rix Cafe (breakfast, snack)
Cooling Hut (lunch, snack)
Fairfax Fare/Rosie's All American Cafe/Catalina Eddie's (dinner, CS)

8/18
Rix Cafe (breakfast, snack)
Yak & Yeti (lunch, CS)
Sanaa (dinner, TS)

8/19
Rix Cafe (breakfast, snack)
Main Street Bakery (lunch, CS)
Cinderella's Royal Table (dinner, 2TS)

8/20
Tangierine Cafe (lunch, CS)
Narcoossee's (dinner, 2TS)

8/21
Lotus Blossom (lunch, OOP)

SNACK LIST (will break it down, on how we used our snacks to pay for breakfast and things like Dole Whips and frozen lemonades so we wouldn't melt in the August heat.)

***sigh*** I miss WDW already....

 

[DiggleBelle]

Excited to hear about your dining adventures!

 

[ajkoos]

We had such a good time while at WDW and had a really great dining experience (except for two and you'll hear about those later...)

My DH still talks about the steak he had at Le Cellier.

 

[ajkoos]

We arrived on our WDW vacation to rain. Lots of rain. Our flight into MCO was a little late because of the rain. So instead of being adventurous for dinner, we headed to Pepper Market at our resort (CSR).

Because PM is kind of like a food court, it can be a little confusing. However, we had a great server, who showed us to our table, quickly took our drink order and then showed us where we would get kids food and the different adult food stations. They give you a paper notecard that is then stamped at each station as you get your food.

DH and me- Seafood BLT, we each got our own sandwich and I have to say with the crabmeat and shrimp in this BLT, it was quite tasty. Very filling and we were kind of suprised at how much we liked it.

DD - Kids cheese pizza, it's cheese pizza. What can you say, she ate it all but it didn't look spectacular one way or the other. It came with potato chips and a cookie and a drink.

DS - Kids pasta with marinara sauce. Also, your typical pasta with red sauce on top. It also came with a cookie and a drink. He ate it all and loved it.

Since DP comes with dessert, you're allowed to choose anything from the bakery station. So we picked up a chocolate croissant (my favs!) and a cheese danish, mainly for breakfast the next day. (we brought gallon ziploc bags with us to WDW to keep these types of items fresh for more than a day.)

Kids Pizza - $7.00
Kids Pasta - $7.50
Seafood BLTs - $9.99 each
Cold beverages for adults - $2.19 each
Bakery items - $3.99 each
Total cost: $49.88 (4 CS credits)

OOP Tip: $5.00

Here's the deal with the tip at Pepper Market. Since we were on DDP the cashier told us she couldn't add the 10 percent gratuity on to our bill. So if we wanted to leave a tip, it had to be cash, which she helped break a $20 for us. Since our server was very helpful and quick to refill drinks we were more than happy to leave her the cash tip on the table.

 

[Pooh&OurHunny]

joining in...

 

[ajkoos]

joining in...

Cool! By doing these reviews, it's making me hungry to eat at a WDW restaurant. Hope you enjoy them!

 

[ajkoos]

As this was our first time visiting WDW, we asked some friends (in addition to DISers) about how to make our trip magical for DD and DS. One of neighbors suggested booking a late reservation at Cali Grill so you could watch the fireworks at MK from the restaurant.

Excellent idea! But we didn't want to burn 2 TS per person for dessert, so we decided to OOP this one.

We got an ADR for 9 p.m. thinking that depending on how long it took to seat us and how long it took to ate, we could either see the fireworks from the restaurant or go out to their observation deck.

We arrived at 8:45 p.m. and were seated within 5 minutes. Unfortunately we did not get a window seat and were close to the open kitchen. But the window seat probably wouldn't have helped anyway because of the rain earlier in the day and the AC in Cali Grill, all of the windows were pretty fogged up anyway.

We told our waiter right away that we were just there for dessert so he wouldn't have to go through his whole spiel about specials etc...He was very attentive and we did have Mickey Mouse confetti on our table that the kids had a blast with. I have to say, we were a little disappointed with the ambiance of California Grill. Because of its size and high ceilings I thought it might be a little quieter, but it's not. It was noisy. And it's not because there were tons of kids running around, it's just a noisy restaurant where people's conversations carry.

But enough of that...On to the food!

DH - Mascarpone and Meyer Lemon Cheesecake, he said it was great. I had a bite of it and it did have that lemony taste to it. But I'm not a cheesecake fan. He also had coffee, which he said was very smooth and not too strong. (DH puts tons of cream and sugar in his coffee.)

Me - Valrhona Chocolate Cake, a glass of Clos de Paulilles Banyuls Rimage (hey, it was my first night at WDW, I chose to celebrate)
I love chocolate. The cake with its molten goodness of chocolate was fantastic. I also love cherries and this comes with a delicious scoop of Cherry-Chocolate ice cream and some cherry compote. Just not enough of the cherry compote, I had like three cherries. The wine was also sweet but not too cloying. A nice dessert wine and it was paired with this dish for good reason.

DD and DS - each had the Vanilla Bean Ice Cream with Chocolate Fudge sauce. Again, it's vanilla ice cream with fudge sauce. My kids said it was good but then only ate half of it because they were too excited for the fireworks.

Because it took a little time to get the check settled, at 9:45, I took the kids out to the observation deck to grab a spot to see the fireworks, while DH paid the bill. Since it had been raining, there were huge puddles everywhere but luckily the night had cleared up and was perfect viewing for fireworks. We saw the Summer Nightastic fireworks which were really quite amazing. Being that far away you don't get to see the detail that you do when you're at the castle itself (which we did the next night.) But the timing of it with the music (which you can hear at Cali Grill and on the deck) was impeccable.
I highly recommend this to families who have kids who might be a little scared of loud firework noises since you're far enough away to see the beauty of it without the loud bangs. Plus you get to see the whole castle with the fireworks going off all around it.

Cheesecake - $12.00
Chocolate Cake - $13.00
Kids ice cream - $5.00 each
Wine - $10.00
Coffee - $2.50

Total: $50.48 and then add tip $12.00 = $62.48 OOP

And before anyone asks...you will notice in this thread that we tip generously. My husband worked for years in the restaurant business and as a result, tips at least 20 percent since he knows how it works for servers. (Of course, if we get crappy service, he brings it down...)

 

[mpbest]

Looking forward to reading all your reviews!

 

[bluejasmine]

Looking fwd to the rest! Now I want chocolate! LOL

 

[ajkoos]

Looking fwd to the rest! Now I want chocolate! LOL

Me Too! Especially since it's been raining here in Texas pretty much all day...a warm molten chocolate cake would be really nice about now.

 

[ajkoos]

It was a bright and early morning for us on our first day at WDW. It was a Saturday morning and we had a 7:40 ADR at Ohana's, so it was the 7 a.m. breakfast bus for us!

Luckily, there was only one other family heading out for an early ADR and they too were going to Ohana's so the bus driver dropped us directly at the Poly. As we got to talking with the other family we found out that they were former Hawaii folks, just like me! I love meeting people who grew up in Hawaii (even though we're all sad we had to move to the mainland for jobs...) and we had a great time talking about what part of the islands we were from as the bus took us to Ohana's. We also knew that the food wasn't going to be local Hawaiian stuff so we wouldn't count that against the restaurant. (Breakfast in Hawaii would have scrambled eggs, spam, portuguese sausage, rice, shoyu...getting hungry...)

Anyway, on to Ohana's. We all got there super early, as in 7:20. The hostesses weren't even there yet checking people in. We ended up being the first two families checked in and sat and waited in the lounge area of the second floor of the Poly as the restaurant got ready. We got four plastic flower leis and they took a photo of us (which we ended up not buying...) We were the first ones seated at around 7:30. And as they took you to the table they picked up the pastries along the way. So as soon as we sat down we already had food and they poured the yummy tropical fruit juice immediately.

Here's what came with the family style breakfast....raisin rolls, danishes, scrambled eggs, sausage, bacon, potatoes (o'brien style), and mickey waffles. And the kids got a small fruit plate. (not enough fruit for our family...)

Our skillet came out with everything except the waffles which the staff brought out later, clearly straight from the waffle maker.

Since this was our first character meal, our kids were really excited about seeing them. Stitch was out first, then Lilo, Mickey and Pluto. We had barely started eating when the characters started coming out and posing for pictures and doing autographs. And since we were one of the first few tables in the row, we didn't get missed or anything like that.

After we finished eating, we made sure to stick around a little bit for the parade where the characters take the kids around the restaurant to the Lilo and Stitch song Hawaiian Rollercoaster Ride.

Kids meals cost - $13.99
Adult meals cost - $25.99
Total (with tax) = $85.16 (4 TS used)
Tip = $15.59

Would we do Ohana's again? Probably not for breakfast since we'd like to try it for dinner. The breakfast food was good but was your standard eggs, bacon, waffles and while my DH loves big breakfasts and wished we had done more of them on vacation, my kids aren't big breakfast eaters and didn't eat a ton of food (too excited...) So for the cost, I probably wouldn't burn a TS here.

However, having said that, it was a great way to start off our vacation. We finished eating by 8:30 and took the boat straight from the Poly to MK and surprisingly made it for Rope Drop. I do recommend Ohana's for breakfast if your kids love Lilo and Stitch like mine do and it does have the best juice at WDW.

 

[ag98]

Enjoying your food report. Thanks for taking the time to do it!

 

[ajkoos]

Our first day at Magic Kingdom and we made rope drop! We managed to go on all of the rides on the Adventureland/Frontierland/Liberty Square side of the park by noon and after an early breakfast, realized we were hungry (particularly the kids who hadn't really eaten much at breakfast.)

We headed to Columbia Harbour House and immediately saw no lines at the cash registers and empty tables everywhere. And with the Florida heat and humidity, the AC was a welcome relief.

In an attempt to appease our shrimp loving DS, we got a little creative with our CS credits. DH and I split the Anchors Aweigh sandwich and a kids meal chicken nuggets and then gave our DS the fried shrimp platter. DD got the kids mac and cheese. So that way we used 2 CS adult credits and 2 CS kids credits. Still plenty of food and everyone was full at the end of lunch.

What we thought of the food:

Anchors Aweigh - easily one of the best tuna salad sandwiches I've had. It was refreshing to eat and I felt like I was eating a healthy alternative to burgers and fries. It came with chips and my DH got the apple crisp as the dessert. The crisp was okay as it had a little too much crust and not enough apples. But definitely better than say McDonald's fried apple pie.

Fried Shrimp Platter - the shrimp were good size (about medium, like the 51-60 count in a 1 lb bag you would buy at the grocery store.) and had a light breading on it. The nice thing was to see the plate wasn't drenched in leftover oil. They actually gave us over a dozen shrimp. So my son, who also loved the french fries that came with it, ate about seven or eight shrimp and then my husband and I each had like four shrimp. We ended up counting the tails because we were impressed that it came with so many. (of course, I can't remember if it was 15 or 16 now...) I ordered the Yoplait yogurt to go with it as dessert which my daughter ate. It also came with cole slaw which was fresh and not drenched in mayonnaise (which I detest)

Kids chicken nuggets - I'd have to say they were pretty puny and pretty rubbery. Not impressed with the chicken nuggets. And it only came with four. My DS (6) eats at least 6 at fast food restaurants.

Kids mac and cheese - My DS hated it. There was a funny taste to the mac and cheese and it had this sheen on it (oil?) that didn't look good. She barely at it, instead eating my yogurt, some of our french fries, the cole slaw and the carrot sticks that came with it and I think she might have had a chicken nugget too. The rest of the time we were at WDW and there was mac and cheese on the menu, we discouraged DD and DS from getting it, reminding them of how bad it was.

Anchors Aweigh platter - $8.09
Fried Shrimp platter - $9.69
Kids Mac and Cheese - $4.99
Kids Chicken Nuggets - $4.99
Two adult drinks - $2.19 each
Apple crisp - $3.59
Yogurt - $1.99

Total cost with tax: $40.18 (4 CS)

We loved CHH. The food is different from your typical burgers fare at a theme park. And we sat upstairs at a table and it was quiet and relaxing. The condiments station with napkins and straws is also upstairs so you don't have to run back downstairs for that forgotten ketchup packet or fork. I highly recommend CHH for its adult menu. However, its kid menu is not great. Throw in a kids shrimp platter or tuna sandwich onto the kids menu and I think this would be the best CS at MK. Because of DISers, we knew what kids menus would be lacking but I didn't expect the food to be as unappetizing for the kids as it ended up being at some of the CS.

So if you're adults looking for some healthier at MK and not swarms of kids at a food court, CHH is definitely the CS to go. We would definitely go back here again.

 

[jenmc88]

Thank you for the wonderful review for Ohana's. We are going to eat there for the first time. We arrive on the 18th. I will also try the tuna sandwich when we are at the Magic Kingdom. Can hardly wait for more reviews.

 

[ajkoos]

Thank you for the wonderful review for Ohana's. We are going to eat there for the first time. We arrive on the 18th. I will also try the tuna sandwich when we are at the Magic Kingdom. Can hardly wait for more reviews.

We definitely enjoyed the character breakfast at Ohana's and I know for my kids it set the magical tone for our vacation.

And being from Hawaii, I have to say the themeing at the Poly and Ohana's made me feel very tropical and almost like I was dining at a hotel back home.

Hope you enjoy it while you're there on the 18th!

 

[ajkoos]

Since we were using half of our TS credits on CRT and Narcoosee's later in the trip, we knew we would be eating CS for dinner a couple of nights early on in our vacation. But as we had done the half of MK that we wanted to by lunch, we went back to the hotel, took a nice swim in the pool before heading back to MK for dinner and my *favorite* Main Street Electrical Parade.

We headed over to Cosmic Ray's because we knew it would have a good variety of food choices for everyone. We got there around 6:30 and it was already packed with people eating. I sent my DH and DS off to find a table to sit at while DD and I got the food since we were all getting items from the Chicken station.

The food portions here are very large and it was easy enough for me to share an adult combo meal with DD. So we ended up only ordering 2 adult CS and 1 kids CS meal.

1/2 Chicken and BBQ Rib combination - DH and I both ordered this and it was plenty of food. He got his with Mashed potatoes while I ordered one with french fries since I split it with DD (she had the ribs, I had the chicken). It also came with fresh green beans, which I was impressed to see were not out of a can but actually fresh (drenched in butter and garlic, so not really healthy but still not out of a can!) This was a lot of food. It comes with essentially a drumstick, thigh and breast of chicken and four ribs. Even my DH was full on all of the food and shared a rib with me so I could try it. The chicken was not dry and the rib meat fell right off the bone. This was substantial enough for dinner and we knew we would not be hungry for sometime.

Kids Chicken Nuggets - My DS decided he wanted nuggets for dinner since he didn't eat any of his nuggets for lunch and he ate all of them. They looked pretty much like the other chicken nuggets at Columbia Harbour House, which were just okay. He did however, eat all of his grapes and the carrot sticks (and some of my fries), and I was glad to see the healthy options on the menu for kids.

We got a brownie and Carrot Cake for dessert and they were just okay. The brownie was a prepackaged one and the carrot cake had lots of icing on it and while the cake was moist, it was an average carrot cake.

Combo chicken and rib platter: $13.99
Kids chicken nuggets: $4.99
Two adult drinks: $2.19 each
Brownie: $2.39
Carrot Cake: $3.59

Total Cost with tax: $46.15 (3 CS credits)

We were able to sit indoors but this is your typical food court feel with tables and chairs crammed in every where. Since we got all of our food at one station, we didn't really have to battle a lot of lines as I noticed the hamburger line was pretty substantial when we were there. We were very happy with the quality of the combo plate and felt it was definitely worthy of a CS credit for dinner. It might even be too much food for lunch as you would just want to go back to your hotel room and take a nap after eating all that BBQ!

We also used our first snack credit of our trip at MK that evening. Since we had to sit and wait starting at 7:30 p.m. for the Electrical Parade, my DH got popcorn at cart on Main Street. Cost: $3.47

 

[DLo]

enjoying your reviews. thanks for taking the time to post (pics or not)

 

[ajkoos]

enjoying your reviews. thanks for taking the time to post (pics or not)

Thanks! I was really tempted to get pics but everytime my DH saw me heading for the camera bag, I got this look like "please don't embarrass me in this fine dining establishment..."

I know the reviews are a little wordy, I guess that's partly habit since I write for a living.

 

[ajkoos]

I'm not really sure if I would count this as breakfast since we basically grabbed stuff and ate sitting in line waiting for DHS to open on Sunday morning. We got to the park super early that day because it was the last day of TSM and because we wanted to surprise DS with Jedi Training Academy (which meant standing in line so we could be in the first show...and we made it!)

So that morning, I ran in to Pepper Market and grabbed a cheese danish and a blueberry muffin and since they don't sell drinks, I walked over to Rix Cafe and picked up a juice box, milk and a Minute Maid Cranberry Apple. We already had a chocolate croissant and a danish from the first night we ate at Pepper Market so everybody got a pastry.

In a matter of three minutes, I burned through 5 snack credits.

The pastries were good but not fantastic. But for my kids, they were more than enough and they never finished all of their pastry (more for me!) They were also fresh each day because PM does have its own bakery on site. It's not Main Street Bakery good but enough for a quick morning bite to eat.

Danish, Muffin - $4.25
Juice Box - $2.99
Milk - $1.29
MM Cranapple - $2.99

Total cost (with tax) = $16.81 (5 snack credits used)

 

[Guatemommy]

Perfect report for me! Love the way you write.

We leave in October and will have the DP. It is also my DD's first trip. It will be the first 'real" vaca to WDW for us as past trips have always been just 2 or 3 days commando style, staying off-premises, so I am taking plenty of notes!!!!