Can we talk Food & Wine Festival???

[Maistre Gracey]

I will be in WDW this October, my first time during the Food & Wine Festival.

I know absolutely nothing that goes on.
I read somewhere that there are a series of formal dinners that are very hard to get seatings for. In addition, is there anything else that the average Joe can do to participate while strolling arond World Showcase??? Is there wine stands for tasting? How about Food?

Again, I have never been during this event, so all info is appreciated! Thanx...

 

[Minniespal]

Hiya,
I can't help you with the info that you are looking for. We too are going to the Food and Wine Festival for the first time and would be interested in any info other disers could give.

 

[SuiteDisney]

This will be our first time, too. There's a pretty good write-up on Deb Will's site and lots of reviews. Here's a LINK. Looks like we can expect somewhere around 25 different booths set up around World Showcase for food and wine sampling. I also read that samplings can be charged back to your room or on a credit card, rather than having to pay cash.

 

[swankybeth]

Food and Wine is great! I got the opportunity to experience it last year while on my internship. Basically, what the previous poster said about the booths around World Showcase is correct. But there is more! There are free wine tasting seminars throughout the day as well as a free beer tasting from Sam Adams. There are cooking demonstrations from chefs from WDW restaurants as well as other restaurants around the country. Those are free as well, and held throughout the day. I am not very familiar with the winemaker dinners or any other special dinners held during Food and Wine. All I know is that there's lots of different wines and different foods as well as preferred Illuminations viewing!

 

[Beth E. (NJ)]

I went to Food and Wine two years ago and hope to go this year too. It was fun. We didn't do any of the big dinners but we did hit most of the booths at the countries. It was nice to sample all of the different foods. And we were able to request the recipes from a booth in Innoventions.

 

[caitycaity]

if you like beer, the sam adams tasting is great. the master brewer who talked to us was really informative and friendly.

 

[jiminyfan]

basically sums it up. all around the World Showcase you will find small booths representing all the countries of the showcase and many others, each will have food, Wine and now most Beer from their respective country or region. Small samples of wine and food (appetizer size) are available for $2-5 for the most part. It gives you a great opportunity to taste many types of food and wine with out spending a lot (YEA RIGHT - we usually drop $75 a night when really participating for the two of us).

There are also wine seminars (for free) both beginner and advance seminars are available, a beer class/college by Sam Adams, cooking seminars.

Reserve and Private wine dinners are extra and each year they tweak how they are done. They run $75-125 a person and are very, very nice.

It is my favorite time to visit WDW as I am a BIG wine fan. Last trip I iattended the advance seminars and had the chance to meet some very important individuals int he wine industry and learn from them.

The most important thing about wines, there is NO wrong or right!!!!! If you like it, IT is a GOOD wine. Experts can have their opinion and so can we.


Go and take your time making circles around the showcase tasting.

 

[Maistre Gracey]

Originally posted by jiminyfan
There are also wine seminars (for free) both beginner and advance seminars are available, a beer class/college by Sam Adams, cooking seminars.

All the great responses here are getting me super-psyched for this!

jiminyfan, the seminars sound fantastic. Do we need to book these ahead of time, or is it a first come first serve type of thing?

 

[ahutton]

We've been able to walk into many of the informal clases just by passing by at the right time. That was how we did the Sam Adams thing, and caitycaity was right - it was great, and I'm not a big beer fan usually but found what I do like and can enjoy. If you want to sample things with little or light crowds I suggest having a good breakfast and then sampling through the afternoon, and then pick a place for a later dinner. In the evenings I've found World Showcase gets more crowded than I like it to be. While there are certainly nights that it is fun to be there in that, I'd rather do the sampling in the afternoon.

 

[jiminyfan]

"jiminyfan, the seminars sound fantastic. Do we need to book these ahead of time, or is it a first come first serve type of thing?"

Yes, they are first come first served. They do fill up, especially the advance seminars. There is room for 50-100 max in each of them and since you get a few free glasses of wine, they usually fill up pretty fast.

I am hoping to catch one or two of the advance the days I am there, the last two days of the event. I wish I would have made my ressies a week earlier, but .....

It is a great time. I cannot wait to go.

 

[ghidorah97]

Both the wine and culinary demonstrations/seminars tend to fill up rather quickly. The nice part about the Sam Adams beer seminar is that it is an ongoing event throughout the entire Festival, so you can usually get into that rather easily.

The culinary demonstrations in particular are usually one-time only with a rotating schedule of WDW or guest chefs. When you arrive at Epcot they will have brochures available with a full schedule of all demonstrations.

The private dinners are EXTREMELY limited in seats and even harder to get reservations for. Last year, there were three different types of dinners:

1. Party for the Senses - This is a grand buffet type dinner, and the easiest of the three to get into as there is room for a few hundred guests. The Party we attended last year was fantastic as it included approximately 20 different food tasting tables and approximately 10 different wine booths. I highly recommend this event to anyone!

2. Signature Dinners - Very difficult to get into, as seating is limited to around 25-40 for each dinner. Each dinner is themed, with guest chefs preparing a 5-7 course meal. Winery representatives join you at the dinner, pairing some of their best selections with each course. We attended two last year, South African wines at Jiko, and Sonoma wines at California Grill. Each was fantastic, the Jiko dinner was out of this world. Cost for these dinners was $100 per person.

3. Reserve Dinners - As above, very difficult, seating limited to 25-30. As with the Signature Dinners, the Reserve Dinners are themed, with guest chefs and guest wineries pairing a 6-7 course meal. The major differences between the two are:
- Reserve dinner includes Reserve bottles (more limited production, typically better quality) of wine
- Reserve dinners are at the Wonders of Life VIP dining room, Signature dinners are held at specific restaurants
- Reserve dinners include VIP seating for the IllumiNations fireworks display following dinner
- Reserve dinners are $150 per person

The dinner we attended last year was the Pacific Northwest, and was simply amazing.

I still have the menus for each of these events if anyone is interested.

One last thing, I agree with the previous poster about the WS getting crowded at night. We much preferred walking the World for lunchtime to taste at the booths.

Enjoy!

 

[Krissalee]

Question! Does WDW usually announce the dates and times of the Party of the Senses, Signature Dinners, and Reserve Dinners a few days before they actually go on 'sale?' I realize that these dinners usually sell out the morning that they go on sale, but is there any advanced warning, so regular folks can try to guess-timate what would be available at the time they are there?

 

[ghidorah97]

The Party for the Senses is usually fairly easy to get into and not as important to book on the first day.

The other two, as noted, must be booked on day 1 of availability. Here's the problem - WDW doesn't make that day public knowledge (or they at least didn't last year) with the exception of members of the Disney Dining Club (can't remember the exact name, but basically it's the dining plan for Florida residents that encourages them to eat out at the park -- early notice for these dinners seems to be one of the other perks).

Last year, I simply called dining reservations almost on a daily basis trying to find out the day and lucked into finding it. That's my best recommendation for anyone interested in the dinners for this year. Wish I could be of more help, but that's what worked for me.

Happy to answer any other questions...

 

[Maistre Gracey]

Thanx for all the great replies!
I may do the calling thing, as I would love to get a dinner. We will definitley try a wine seminar, but it will be the one for beginners! The Sam Adams seminar sounds good as well.

Again, thanx to all for the great info....

 

[smfnj]

Originally posted by caitycaity
if you like beer, the sam adams tasting is great.

If you like beer, the Corsendonk and SamiClaus on tap were excellent.

steve

 

[Darian]

My DW once had a profound dislike for beer... equating beer to drinking a chilled urine sample. Not a pretty picture. THEN we went to the food and wine festival where we attended the Sam Adams beer tasting. She loved it! She was so amazed at how good it tasted, she went up to the sam adams rep who gave the presentation and told him... he was pleased.

Can't wait to go back this Oct 21-31. Now if WDW could only bring back Horizons....

Darian

 

[TDC Nala]

Nobody's mentioned the food & wine pairings at Coral Reef - last year these were on Weds, Thurs and Fri afternoons around 4 PM. The one I went to was absolutely worth the money (it cost $30). I'm planning to book three of these for this November.

 

[Maistre Gracey]

Originally posted by TDC Nala
Nobody's mentioned the food & wine pairings at Coral Reef - last year these were on Weds, Thurs and Fri afternoons around 4 PM. The one I went to was absolutely worth the money (it cost $30). I'm planning to book three of these for this November.

TDC Nala, could you tell me a little about this? I assume it's seafood, but how do you book this, how far in advance etc...

Thanx for the info....

 

[Darian]

Yes!!! TDC Nala - please do! DW was mentioning these tastings and plans on us attending one or two. We just love the coral reef. Being a "beached" scuba diver its about the closest I can get to diving....

Darian

 

[mikesmom]

Food & Wine Fest is not to be missed! True Disney for grownups. We went last year and didn't make it into any of the reserved meals, but really didn't need them at all to have a great time. We spent 2 full days there, and did not do everything we wanted. It's not really enough time, 3 days would be better, more if you were interrested in a lot of seminars.Samples all around the World Showcase were fabulous. Yes, there was a charge for each, but still, I'd rather spend $5 to taste a Cognac and find I didn't like it than to pay $50 for a bottle of it at home and then find I didn't like it. DH and I would often share a single sample to find out what we liked, then return if we really loved it.

Seminars were great fun. Walked in to most, tasting samples of 4 to 6 wines for each seminar. Those could be 4 or 5 variations from one winemaker(such as Mondavi) or perhaps 4 or 5 varietals of one type of wine (such as Champagne). We walked into most seminars easily. Pretty soon we started hanging around the area where the seminars were held. You started getting lines in the evenings, particularly on the weekend. There were also cooking demos. If you timed it right, you could leave a wine seminar and walk right next door in time for a food demo.

Eat to the Beat was great, too. Heavy on old Motown groups which was great.

By the way, it's pretty hard to beat watching Illuminations with a glass of bubbly in hand.