Any information or experience with Garden Grille?

[sgtdisney]

We had planned on doing Chef Mickey's one night on our upcoming trip, but I procrastinated and it is booked up until after 9PM which won't work for us. The CM at WDW suggested the Garden Grille which does have availability for our party at a time more acceptable for us. Does anyone have any experience with both restaurants. My 6 year old son really likes Chef Mickey's and was a little disapointed but from what I have read there is good character interaction at Garden Grille as well with Mickey.

I appreciate any comments or experiences anyone can share.

 

[Minniespal]

We ate at the Garden Grill Restaurant for the first time last summer. Restaurant is very cool because it actually moves. Food is served family style, similar to the Liberty Tree Tavern. Can't remember exactly what was served but I do remember catfish was definetly on the menu. Can't really compare it with Chef Mickey's cause both restaurants are very different. The only thing that is similar is that they both have characters. I would say if you can't get CM and your family can get to Epcot then I would give GG a try.

 

[nuke]

We just ate there last week and the food was excellent.
They bring a large skillet of food to the table with roasted chicken, flank steak, fried catfish, polenta stuffing, creamed spinach, and mixed vegetables. As well as mashed taters and gravy and really good bread and honey butter. The kids got mac and cheese and chicken strips.
The food was very good and the characters were fun. I think it was well worth the money.

 

[Miscrapper]

We ate at Chef's our first night at WDW when dd's were 6 and 9 and they LOVED IT! They definitely want to go back this year. We also ate at Garden Grill for lunch the next day - it was soooo empty. The pros of Grill are much more character interaction if it is not crowded and the food is brought to you. The food was good. I know I didn't eat catfish - I think chicken and I definitely remember corn on cob
Cons are that you miss excitement of Chef Mickey's and variety of food - we loved their buffet. DH and I consumed a lot of roast and shrimp!
I would definitely do Grill if you can't get into Chef Mickey's but I wouldn't give up on that one either!

 

[Muffy]

We ate at the garden grill in Jan and it had a different menu than posted above. We had sliced turkey, flank steak, fried cat fish, bread stuffing, grilled veggis, mashed potatoes, bread and honey butter and pumkin cheesecake. It was quite good and we will go back although the polenta stuffing sounds awful! Hope they go back to bread stuffing!

 

[Taximom]

We would like to go to the Garden Grill on our trip. Is dessert included in the price?

 

[tink2]

I don't remember for sure on the dessert, but I think it is included in the price. The food was OK the 2 times we've been- nothing to die for but nothing terrible either. The character interaction, however, is some of the best. The characters are usually Mickey, Pluto, Chip and Dale. Chip and Dale KEPT coming back and stayed for a long while each time. They both bounced my 2 1/2 DD on their lap for a long time and really played with her. In our opinion, this restaurant has some of the best character interaction!

 

[chell]

Originally posted by Taximom
We would like to go to the Garden Grill on our trip. Is dessert included in the price?

Yes, it is included. The menu there usually does have some sort of variation. I have 2 must-do restaurants at WDW and this is one of them. Last weekend my sister wanted to know if we could just hop in the car and drive down to Fl so we could eat at GG! Oh sure, it's only a 10 - 11 hour drive! I'm glad she likes it as much as I do though.

If you like home cooked food you should also like the GG.

 

[Patricia]

We have eaten at the Garden Grill twice and Chef Mickey's countless times. I love them both but I agree that they are very different. The character interaction at the Garden Grill is unsurpassed. Chip and Dale sat with us for so long, played with the kids for at least 5 mins at a time. Chip sat with my son and fed him his icecream and put some whipped cream on his nose. When I licked it off, Chip's reaction was the best. My son still talks about this and it was two years ago. It is a great place for a quiet character meal because the characters truly give one on one attention. I recommend it highly.

 

[nuke]

The waitress said it was polenta stuffing but it tasted like cornbread stuffing to me. It was very good. The desert wasn't great. It was Strawberry shortcake and I would have rather had cheesecake. The Turkey sounds better to me than the chicken also.
Do they change the menu every now and then?

 

[Gillian]

Your son is older, but we have a 2 year old and we qucikly get tired of buffets! It's a lot of work taking turns watching him. It's really nice to be served.

We enjoyed garden grille. The food was mostly good. You can get more of anything you want. I remember chicken, cat fish, flank steak, spinach of some kind, another veggie, potatoes. With dinner you get salad, with lunch you can pay extra for it (making lunch the same price as dinner, which makes sense as the salad is the only difference). Our dessert was strawberry shortcake. The kids dessert was worms & dirt, which DS loved!

All of the characters came around twice. It was a lot of fun!

 

[chell]

Originally posted by nuke
Do they change the menu every now and then?

Yes. Some items like the flank steak and the catfish don't seem to change. But the 3rd meat, the veggies and the dessert do seem to.

 

[100%Disney]

We ate at GG and CM's in Dec., we liked GG so much we went 2 times. You get much more character interaction at GG. When we did CM's it wasn't that crowded and the night we did GG it was packed with a hour wait and we still got more character interaction at GG.

 

[crs7568]

I agree that both of these restaurants are really fun for kids. We had a great server at Garden Grill who was an absolute riot! If your son is determined to eat at Chef Mickey's, I strongly encourage you to keep trying for reservations. I have learned that I can almost always get a reservation with persistence...sometimes calling back in as little as five minutes after being told that there was no availability.

 

[cindala]

We tried the GG for the first time last year and loved it! We have PS for this years trip too! The food was good, and more a more relaxed atmosphere because it was brought to you.

We also do Chef Mickey's each year, and love that too! Keep calling for PS. One may open up as you get closer to your vacation.

 

[sgtdisney]

Thanks for the replies! It sounds like the Garden Grill might be fun. I am glad to hear people had primarily good experiences there.

What we did for now was make the Garden Grill reservations for dinner and make breakfast reservations at Chef Mickey's on our last day in Orlando before we head to south Florida. I explained to him (my son) what we were doing and he was OK with it. As long as he can see Mickey, he said he was happy.