All This Food & Wine & Only 3lbs gained? - Jiko - Updated 10/18

[Dis_Yoda]

Who: Dis_Yoda & Mr. Dis_Yoda.
When: October 4th to 12th
Why: F&W Festival

October 4th, 2013
Contempo Cafe
The Wave

October 5th, 2013
Run Disney Snack Box
F&W Booths Part 1
Tokyo Dining
L'Artisan des Glaces
Taste, Shake & Indulge Like The French
Artist Point

October 6th, 2013
Yak & Yeti
Dawa Bar
Cove Bar
California Grill

October 7th, 2013
Plaza Ice Cream Shoppe
Yachtsman

October 8th, 2013
F&W Booths Part 2
Le Cellier Signature Adventures in Dining
Citricos Educated Guess Wine Dinner

October 9th, 2013
Splitsville
AMC Fork & Dine

October 10th, 2013
Contempo Cafe
F&W Booths Part 3
Flying Fish Signature Adventures in Dining

October 11th, 2013
Kitchen Memories w/ Art Smith
Jiko

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[Dis_Yoda]

Contempo Cafe

Our first lunch of the trip was at Contempo Cafe.

We began with dessert first.

Root Beer Float Cupcake

We split this & still didn't eat much more than half. It was a root beer cake w/ vanilla frosting & malted milk balls. Did remind us of a root beer float like the name implies. It was good but probably not the best thing to eat for the very first food one has all day.

Boring drinks!

Chicken Caesar Salad

Pepperoni Flatbread

Both of us liked our entrees fine enough. Nothing exciting but filling.

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The Wave

We arrived right on time for our 6:20pm reservation and headed to a table near the server station in the back part of the room.

Menu

We debated on what we were going to order as we waited for our Coke Zeros to arrive.

I decided on the appetizer for the side part rather than the protein.

Scallops w/ Cheddar Risotto

I got this for the risotto. It was a great risotto - better than what Le Cellier puts out with their steak. The scallops, on the other hand, were overcooked. Ramsey would have thrown them back. I'm super picky about scallops to begin with so I knew going in, I probably wasn't going to like that part of the dish.

My husband passed on getting his own appetizer as he stole some of my risotto.

Beef Tenderloin

My husband went with steak. He loved it!

Daily Grilled Sustainable Fish - Swordfish

I went with the grilled swordfish w/ fingerling potatoes. The fish was perfectly cooked but a bit under seasoned for me but some more salt & pepper made it better.

We debated on dessert.

But decided against it!


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[Dis_Yoda]

Run Disney Snack Box

We ran the 5k during our trip. They gave out a snack pack at the end of the race along with some fruit.

Snack Pack Given @ End

Insides of said pack

We threw out the hummus dip as neither of us enjoy hummus. The rest of the pack is in our kitchenette for snacks as needed. My husband enjoyed his mini protein bar that day & bought more of them today while we were at the grocery store for home. We enjoyed all our snacks throughout the week.

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[Dis_Yoda]

F&W Booths Part 1

The first booth was Desserts & Champagne

We had Chocolate Orange Cupcake, Hazelnut Chocolate Cheesecake & Frozen S'mores

The cupcake didn't have much flavor to it. The cheesecake tasted more like chunky peanut butter than Chocolate Hazelnut & the Frozen S'mores felt more like a chocolate shake with a funky topping. Mostly a miss at this booth for us. At least there are 29 more booths for us to try out!

Our next stop was Brazil for Crispy Pork Belly

It was like a thick piece of crispy bacon with the fat that has been caramelized.
One of our favorite dishes of the festival

Our next booth to stop at was Mexico

I got to enjoy the Shrimp Taco w/ Purple Cabbage. My husband enjoyed the Tace de Rib-Eye w/ Salsa de Chipotle

We split the Sangria

Germany

My husband wanted the Apple Strudel w/ Werther's Original Karamel & Vanilla Sauce

While he was enjoying that, I decided to head next door to the Brewer's Collection to get the beer that made my husband have a gross face during our drive back from HHN.

Schofferhofer Grapefruit

I got the smallest serving of it as we still had lunch & the Grand Marnier event to deal with this afternoon.

The beer was ok. Absolutely no aftertaste to it.

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[Dis_Yoda]

Tokyo Dining

We arrived early for our ADR but there was no need for them. It was 75% empty.

Chicken Teriyaki

My husband's selection was the lunch special. It came with Miso Soup & Rice as well. He really enjoyed it as the chicken was well cooked. The serving size is also huge!

I went with the Assorted Tempura Appetizer & a Shrimp Tempura Roll

The roll was really fresh. The appetizer was small but it was just enough food for what we needed.

Tokyo Dining had not been on our restaurant rotation list in a while. Its going to return into our rotation during some of our trips, mostly switching off with Chefs de France for our EPCOT lunch.



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[Dis_Yoda]

L'Artisan des Glaces

As if we haven't eaten enough that afternoon, we headed to my husband's favorite new snack place from July.

Single Scoop of Mint Chocolate Chip in a Cone

My husband didn't change what he got last time. In fact, he was wearing that same shirt for our first visit in our July trip too.

Chocolate Macaron Sandwich

I went with the Macaron Sandwich. Loved it! The ice cream melted into the sandwich that it felt more like normal macaron filling than gelato.​

 

[Dis_Yoda]

Taste, Shake & Indulge Like The French

Letting me know to go upstairs!

Once we reached the landing, we were greeted and shown to our table by the window.

I liked how this time around, each party was seated by themselves. While in 2010, we met a lovely couple & enjoyed ourselves, we've had other times at other events, we weren't so lucky with table mates.

MMMMM, shots of liquor!

Cookie, Chocolate, Mint, Lemon, Dried Orange Rind

Here we have the interactive part of the presentation

Now with added Mimosa!

The event started about 15 minutes late as they were waiting for people to show up that had reserved the event. Eric started talking around then and thanked us for coming.

The representative from Grand Marnier began her talk about the history of the company and the history of cocktails being an American tradition until we scared all the bartenders away during prohibition. She was very interactive.

After our history lesson, we began to taste our Grand Marnier shots. When asking what the initial shot tasted like, my husband joked to me, stating "purple." She picked up on that & stated maybe he needs to be checked by a doctor

After our tastings of the 4 samples, we got to make our Smash cocktail. We smashed our lemon & mint leaves. Poured in our Grand Marnier & some ice. Gave it a shake & strained it into a glass.

The servers came out to show us how to make a Crepe Suzette.

Shortly after our presentation, we were served a Crepe Suzette along with a Grand Marnier Tart.

We couldn't eat that much of our desserts. What we did get to taste, we really enjoyed. Eating that much earlier around the world along with lunch had caught up to us.

Overall, this event is still a great value for our $65pp.

We picked up our goody bags & headed back to the resort.

Contents of goody bag​

 

[Dis_Yoda]

Artist Point


We checked in and were immediately directed to our table. Like Tokyo Dining, it was about 75% empty in the place.

Upon review of the menu, none of the entrees really stood out to me & I went with multiple appetizers.

Mixed Field Greens Salad

It was refreshing. The ice wine vinaigrette provided a flavor profile that was different than I would have thought it would have tasted like. It lacked the 'seasonal' fruit as the only fruit was the 2 sections of figs.

Whiskey Glaze Confit Natural Bacon

How can you go wrong with Bacon? The puree also worked well with the dish. The blitz was eh but no one is really ordering this dish for the blitz.

Crispy Chicken Breast

He liked his chicken. It was seasoned nicely.

We decided to share a dessert.

Flourless Chocolate Hazelnut Cake w/ Candied Bacon Brittle

I ate the brittle. It tasted like salted smoky caramel. The cake was kinda bland.



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[Dis_Yoda]

Yak & Yeti

We checked in about 5 minutes prior to our ADR but had to wait 15 minutes to be seated as they only had 1 person seating people. As it wasn't long after opening, there was a backlog of people trying to be sat!

I started with a chilled apple sake.

It tasted more like flat cider than sake to me but still enjoyable!

My husband had his diet coke.

My husband went with:

Crispy Honey Chicken

He loved his chicken. It was a switch up from his normal Beef & Broccoli he gets here so it enjoyed having something different.

I continued my meal made of appetizers I've been doing this trip.

Wonton Soup

I seriously crave their Wonton Soup.

Potstickers

I used to like these a lot more. Even for being 'pan seared' they were really soggy. If I had ordered them steamed that is one thing, but I didn't.

I also got

Side of Chicken Fried Rice

This was a case of my eyes being larger than my stomach. I ate some so it wouldn't be wasted but I didn't need it.

Overall our meal was excellent. It will continue to be our choice for lunch at Animal Kingdom!

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[Dis_Yoda]

Dawa Bar

Lost in Africa

It was a refreshing fruity cocktail with lots of rum! Perfect for the hot day in the park.
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Cove Bar

Moscato Colada

My husband's choice.

Island Moonshine

My choice.

Both were refreshing choices for a hot afternoon!

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[Dis_Yoda]

California Grill

We checked in about 15 minutes early to our ADR & were shown to the elevator to get up to the top.

Love how they are trying to enforce the dress code!

Our server greeted us quickly & handed us their updated menu. If you've seen copies of their new menu online - its exactly the same.

I had a glass of Chenin Blanc from South Africa as I figured it would work with the shrimp dishes I was having. The wine didn't end up showing up until after I was served my first dish.

I started with an old favorite of mine -

Rock Shrimp Salad

I love the wasabi cream & soy reduction with those vegetables and small fried shrimp.

Jumbo Prawns w/ Lemon from Wood Fired Oven

I went with this appetizer as my main meal. It was two huge prawns. Lacked a bit on seasoning until I squeezed some of the lemon on top.

Filet w/ Tomato Risotto
My husband's choice for the evening. His steak was cooked to his liking along with a risotto that was perfectly cooked.

I will note that our server disappeared after picking up my cleaned off appetizer plate. I saw a poor runner holding our two entrees dishes either looking for our server or trying to figure out what table to go to. I raised my hand as I figured not many other two tops would order what we did for our main meals. He dropped it off and disappeared. It wasn't until we were finished with our entrees that our server appeared again.

We already knew what desserts we were getting prior to arriving upon reviews of the menu.

Sundae Sampler

The caramel one to the left was my husband's favorite. Followed by a distant coke float (the coke seemed flat) and a far distant strawberry basil. He said that one tasted like deodorant. (When he's tried deodorant before - I haven't a clue)

Warm Banana Fritters w/ 3 Dipping Sauces

These were great, especially with the caramel sauce.

We paid our bill and headed back downstairs. While it was a great meal food wise, they still have some work to do with the service. I had a 2nd meal planned there for Friday but I adjusted our plans to Jiko instead.

My husband, unsatisfied with his dessert, wanted something else.

We headed to Contempo Cafe to look at the desserts they had.

Halloween Celebration Cake

Cake with a whole lot of sprinkle & vanilla frosting.

He thought it was kinda bland & wished he saved the calories.

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[Dis_Yoda]

Plaza Ice Cream Shop

I'm going to skip over our boring lunch at Pecos Bills. I had a Taco Salad while my husband had a side of fries. See, boring?

Ice Cream Sundae w/ Mint Chocolate Chip Ice Cream

My husband loves his ice cream. Since he skipped having a real lunch, he had this instead for his lunch. Ice cream was no where as good as France's but it kept him happy.

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[Dis_Yoda]

Yachtsman

We checked in 20 minutes early for our ADR & had no problem being seated within 5 minutes.

Mmmm, raw aging steaks

We were placed at a two top towards the middle of the restaurant & quickly greeted by our server. She was super friendly & took our drink orders. My husband got a cider while I had a Smoked Turkey.

Wild Turkey Bourbon & other tasty ingredients

We debated on what we were going to have for dinner. My husband wanted both the filet and the chicken. I was debating between the filet or the hanger steak. I ended up going towards the filet with an add-on promising him I would give him some of the steak.

Caesar Salad

My husband started with the salad. Normally he isn't a fan when they add 'strange' things to a caesar but he had no problem with the prosciutto or egg that was added. They worked really well together & he cleaned his plate outside of the croutons. (Why waste stomach space on dried bread when you have sourdough or onion rolls?)

Crispy Chicken w/ Tater Tots

Another hit with my husband.

8 Oz Filet w/ Add On Shrimp Skewer, Cabernet Wine Reduction, Creole Butter, White Cheddar Twice Baked Potato

My selection. That creole butter was fantastic with the right amount of spice that it worked well with both the filet and the shrimp. The shrimp were cooked just right. The steak was cooked exactly the way I like it & could be cut with a fork it was so tender. I was nice enough to share part of my steak with my husband like I promised but only because I had promised. The only chicken he gave me though was a piece of his chicken skin.

I thought the tiny sword they used for the shrimp was adorable as well, except when my husband then skewered my potato as a joke.

We decided on getting dessert as well. We didn't share our selections with each other.

Yachtsman Gelato Sundae

My husband loves strawberry ice cream that doesn't have chunks of strawberry on it. This made him a very happy person. He said calling it a sundae was a stretch - it was more just Neapolitan ice cream with a little whipped cream. Either way, it didn't matter to him.

Chocolate Peanut Cake w/ Salted Caramel Gelato

The salted caramel gelato was perfection. The spongy peanut butter under the ice cream tasted exactly like a reese's peanut butter cup. The cake was great as well. The chocolate covered pretzels inside really worked well to help the balance between too much peanut flavor and too much chocolate flavor.

Our server was on point this entire service as well. This was easily our best meal of the trip outside of our special events. Yachtsman had been off our 'must do' list based on the last time we went there in 2010 but this meal has turned it back onto the must do.

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[Dis_Yoda]

F&W Booths Part 2

Festival Center

Drinking Chocolate

It tasted like a melted candy bar. I'm glad I had someone to split it with as it was super rich.

Ireland

Kerrygold Cheese Selection: Reserve Cheddar, Dubliner with Irish Stout, Skellig

I love this yearly tradition of Irish Cheese. My husband and I enjoyed the nibbles prior to our next F&W Special Event

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[Dis_Yoda]

Le Cellier Signature Adventures in Dining

There was a large crowd in the lobby but we shortly made our way to the desk, gave our names & handed a champagne flute of a beer along with a passed appetizer.

While we enjoyed our beer, I was sadden to see one party checking in with a baby. This is one of the higher tier events of the festival & am shocked someone would have the audacity to do that. The baby did scream for a bit but luckily once everyone was seated (and making sure we were sat far away from said kid) I didn't hear it.

Once lead to the main dining room, there weren't assigned seats. My husband and I went towards an 8 top towards the kitchen.

Place Setting

Menu

This is when we discovered this was actually a beer event instead of the wine the Signature Adventures in Dining usually are. My husband was thrilled as he had wanted to do something with Beer again but the beer events didn't fit in our schedules. I'll try anything once. There were 3 ladies at my table that wouldn't drink beer but the manager was more than happy to give them wine pairings for their meals if they passed on drinking the beer.

They had the beer sommelier begin talking about the brand and the history of beer and how beer pairings are way older than wine pairings since beer has been around for a long time and used to be people's drink of choice with their bread. It was also discussed how his beers & belgium beers in general aren't filtered which gives them more depth to their flavor.

They brought out the initial beer & first course.

The beer had a hint of cherry in it. If you remember back in my Wave review, I'm really picky about scallops. Lucky for me, this scallop was perfectly cooked with spices that worked with the beer on the outside. Even my husband enjoyed his & he is more picky than me when it comes to scallops.

Our next course was pork belly with grits paired with the beer. These weren't your every day grits but ones with tons of flavor and texture. The pork belly was rich and cooked just enough to be fork tender.

Our main course was with the devil's brew and wagyu beef short ribs.

The beef was slow cooked with the beer and fell apart in your mouth as they should. In the back was more of the meat that was braised for a long time that melted like butter in your mouth. Lucky for me, one of the ladies that didn't drink beer was accidentally served a glass of the beer for this course & I was able to take her glass once I finished mine.

They brought out some of the bottles of the beers we had that weren't from a keg including the beer was were given in the flute at check in.

Beginning Beer

Entree Beer

Dessert Beer

Talking about beer some more & the pictures they use

Dessert was a play on adult Milk & Cookies

That macaron was one of the best I've had. The beer float was um a little flat. In fact the pretzel ice cream was the only thing in this entire meal I didn't love. It had been frozen in nitrogen and took a while to be edible but it also was extremely salty. When melted into the beer, it tasted fine.

We were given the beer glass that our last beer was in along with the maple leaf napkin ring our menu was placed in & shown those helping with the event.

Main Chef

His Staff

Lovely servers

The event was a great success & well worth the $90. I also loved how the restaurant was 100% focused on this meal as the other half of the restaurant wasn't open to the public so this event was the only thing going on. I also now have found 5 more beers I would easily pick to drink when given the option.
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[Dis_Yoda]

Citricos Educated Guess Wine Dinner

I had found out about these wine dinners through an email blast that a friend forwarded.

We were sat in the small private room with 7 other guests plus 2 gentlemen from the company that sells the wines.

Menu!

Having such a small group allows for the conversation to flow a lot better. Tons of jokes were being made from the wine salesmen as he was a great story teller. Educated Guess is a winery made by a person that put everything he owned to start this winery & took leftover acres as some of the main vineyards where he could get them before he was able to produce his wine. This gives him lower than average overhead costs.

Our amuse bouche:

Fried Squash Blossom filled with squash, homemade ricotta, mozzarella

I haven't had square blossoms before & I was pleasantly surprised how good they were. The filling was great as well.

Escargot w/ Sparkling Butter Drizzle & Roasted Garlic

I'm still not personally a fan of escargot but I at least tried it again. (First time was at a French Regional Lunch) The butter was sparkling due to the champagne in it. From what I ate with the sauce from the puff pastry was really bright.

Duck Rillette, Cranberry Gastrique

This was like duck meat butter. You spread it on the toast point and uh so good. The only complaint across the table is we didn't have enough bread for all that lovely meat. Luckily we still had the bread in the baskets on the table so we just placed it on the 9 Grain Bread or Olive Bread instead.

Gorgonzola Creme Brûlée w/ Gathered Mushrooms

This was my first time having a savory creme brûlée. It also had mushrooms with the dish and as part of the brûlée. It was a rich dish that held up to the Cabernet really well.

We then were served a sorbet to clear our palettes for the main course.

Colorado Lamb Chop, Sunchoke & Root Vegetable Gratin

The lamb was cooked exactly how I enjoy it. The gratin was nothing special but then again, what gratins are?

Lemon Panna Cotta

It was sweet but not too sweet. A great way to end the meal.

This meal was totally worth it. Anytime your glass ran empty, they refilled it, unlike our Le Cellier lunch earlier in the day. The service was on point and the dishes matched the wines really well.
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[Dis_Yoda]

Splitsville

Our plan was to bowl but we decided to eat a full lunch first at Splitsville as we had time to kill anyway. There was no wait to be seated & were placed in a booth along the wall.

I had remembered to bring back my squeeze bottle from our visit in July so I could get drinks for the normal cost but end up with more drink in it for the same price.

Rum Runner!

Their drinks aren't cheap on the liquor pours either!

We started with a wonderful bar food appetizer -

Loaded Fries

Crispy Fries, Cheese, Bacon, Scallions, Ranch Drizzle. Where can you go wrong when you want bad for you food?

My husband wanted a sandwich for his meal.

Turkey Club

It was a nice sandwich along with being a huge portion.

I went with:

BBQ Pork Sandwich

The only thing I miss from Georgia is the BBQ. Naples has a severe lack of any decent BBQ in the area. While this BBQ wasn't as good as what we had in Georgia, it was better than anything I've gotten in Naples restaurants. The fries were a waste on both of our entrees because of the appetizer.

I would totally eat lunch here again before bowling. They take TIW as well so that savings was unexpected.​

 

[Dis_Yoda]

AMC Fork & Dine

The nice thing about doing a Fork & Dine showing is you have a server that will bring you your food & drinks and you have a whole menu of items to pick from. We weren't horribly hungry but it was nice to be able to pick something different than usual popcorn/candy/nacho food choices for a movie.

When ready to order, you can either press that call button. As we were initially the only ones in the place, she walked over without the call button to take our order after she saw us stop reviewing the menus.

For their drink selection, they do have a Coke Freestyle. I was able to get my Cherry Vanilla Coke Zero like I always get with those machines just like my husband got his Fruit Punch Fanta Zero he tends to pick.

My husband has a huge sweet tooth & went with the brownie sundae.

I didn't even get a bite!

I went with the appetizer sampler.

The fried cheese was good. The chips were good as was the celery being fresh. The onion rings were soggy & gross but I didn't really need to eat them anyway. The wings were only ok as they were also on the soggy side for wings. I left most of those on the plate as well.​