Carb it up! 8 days of pre- and post race food! Feb. 2014 *Complete*

[librarygeek]

Be Our Guest Lunch

For lunch we had to make a FP+ reservation for our favorite restaurant, Be Our Guest! We had an earlier lunch reservation, around 11. That was fine because we like an early lunch!


DH ordered the Tuna Nicoise Salad - Warm seared tuna steak with chilled green beans, potatoes, olives, roasted bell peppers, tomatoes, and hard boiled eggs:



If you've followed any of my other dining reviews, the chances are that you've seen this dish before. It really appeals to DH and he enjoys it. He rated it an 8 out of 10. Obviously he likes it because he got it last time too!

I had the Carved Prime Chuck Roast Beef Sandwich - served warm on a baguette with horseradish sour cream and Pomme Frites:



I got it without the horseradish sour cream because I don't like horseradish or sour cream, haha. I think it was unfortunately a little bland due to the lack of that, but it was still quite good. I just happened to enjoy the turkey sandwich I had last time better, but I'll give the roast beef a 7.5 out of 10. I imagine if you enjoy horseradish it would be really good! And the fries are good, though I still really wish that at lunch they would serve the seasoned fries that they have at dinner

For dessert we shared The Master's Cupcake- chocolate sponge cake topped with Lumiere's special grey stuff:



If you didn't know, the grey stuff is basically like a cookies and cream/oreo frosting. It's really good! I'm happy that you can now get the grey stuff at dessert with a cupcake, even if you aren't celebrating something. It used to be served on its own, but it goes much better with the chocolate cake. I give it an 8.5 out of 10.

Overall we love Be Our Guest for both lunch and dinner. It definitely blows the other counter service places out of the water in MK! We give it an 8 out of 10.

 

[elphie101]

Delicious!! I definitely want to try BOG lunch, if only for the cupcakes - I think it's so silly that the same exact cupcakes cost more during dinner! It's good to see the food was still good, even if your sandwich was a little lacking

 

[librarygeek]

Delicious!! I definitely want to try BOG lunch, if only for the cupcakes - I think it's so silly that the same exact cupcakes cost more during dinner! It's good to see the food was still good, even if your sandwich was a little lacking

Lunch is definitely good, especially if you can't get one of those dinner reservations! I love the desserts there

 

[SunnieRN]

YUMMY!! Everything looks so good with your wonderful photography!! I have read from others that the reverse root beer float is outstanding and they've also made the comment they wished they could just get a full sized one for dessert. Maybe CA grille will notice the comments and start to offer it that way. Looking forward to more.

 

[librarygeek]

Ohana

For dinner on our Magic Kingdom day we left the park to head over to the Poly for dinner at Ohana! I'd eaten here once before but DH never had. Unfortunately the monorail was down, making it a little more difficult getting to and from our reservation, but we left plenty of time and made it early anyway.



The last time I was here the service had been very slow, with a lot of time between courses. So I was settling down for a long, drawn out meal - but this time they came out very fast! We barely had enough time to finish one course before the next arrived. I really want to say we were done with this meal in under an hour. It was crazy!

We started off with the "Welcome Bread," which I think is some sort of coconut bread? Either way, I enjoy it but it sounds better than I think it tastes. It's nice but the tropical flavor is pretty subtle and I was really looking for a strong tropical flavor.



Up next was the salad. I know it was changed over a year ago, so I had tried the "new" salad last time I was there and I absolutely loved it. I don't know if they changed it back or what, but I didn't enjoy it as much this time as I had the first time. It was still decent, but last time the salad was my favorite thing that I ate! I do enjoy the (papaya?) fruit that's in there.



Up next was the plate of potstickers and honey coriander wings. These were all very tasty too. I always enjoy potstickers, and the wings were surprisingly good for me! I'm not a huge wings person, but the flavor on these was really nice. Sorry the pic is a little blurry!



Then came the veggies and noodles. This was probably my favorite part! When I was at Ohana a year ago everything was overseasoned on the veggies - way too much pepper! But it wasn't a problem this time. The noodles tasted amazing. I could've eaten just a plate of that! My favorite part of the meal.



And then came the meat skewers! I hear they've gotten rid of the chicken now? Which seems odd to me, as everyone usually likes chicken. Of course, that was followed by the pork, steak, and shrimp. It was all quite good. Sorry the pics look kind of gross - can anyone ever get a nice looking pic of the meats at Ohana?







And finally, the grand finale - the bread pudding! I always enjoy this more than I expect to, because I'm not a huge bread pudding person. But the flavors here are really good. This was actually DH's favorite part of the meal - which is saying something, as he usually isn't a huge desserts person!



Overall, I'd give this trip to Ohana an 8.5 out of 10. It's always a good meal, though a lot of food for me! I think DH really enjoyed it too.

The price was $37.99 per person. With tax and before tip, we paid $80.92.

 

[librarygeek]

YUMMY!! Everything looks so good with your wonderful photography!! I have read from others that the reverse root beer float is outstanding and they've also made the comment they wished they could just get a full sized one for dessert. Maybe CA grille will notice the comments and start to offer it that way. Looking forward to more.

Aww, thank you so much! I would love to see a full size reverse root beer float! Hopefully they'll listen! Heck, I'd even love to see it served at stands and stuff out in the parks so I could get it whenever I wanted.

 

[elphie101]

It's like you knew I was bored at work and needed something to read

I am on the edge of my seat to try Ohana on our next trip. Can I ask what the veggies were besides broccoli, if you remember/have pictures? I'm starting to worry about DF starving when we go to this meal (he won't eat most veggies except peas, corn and now zucchini, and stays away from meat on the bone and pot stickers - yes, I will admit I booked this meal mostly for me).

 

[librarygeek]

It's like you knew I was bored at work and needed something to read

I am on the edge of my seat to try Ohana on our next trip. Can I ask what the veggies were besides broccoli, if you remember/have pictures? I'm starting to worry about DF starving when we go to this meal (he won't eat most veggies except peas, corn and now zucchini, and stays away from meat on the bone and pot stickers - yes, I will admit I booked this meal mostly for me).

I think the broccoli was accompanied by a typical Asian medley sort of thing - baby corn, peas, water chestnuts, onions, maybe mushrooms? Here's a link to the last time I ate there in Feb. 2013 - if you scroll down to the veggie pic you can see some of the stuff besides broccoli a little better: http://disboards.com/showpost.php?p=47764947&postcount=15

I think they give you so much food at Ohana that as long as there are a couple of things he likes he will still be full! Especially since you can ask for more I think of almost anything. All the skewered meat wasn't on the bone, so if he eats steak and pork he could be okay. And shrimp, though I know seafood and the fact that you have to peel it yourself can be a big turn off for picky eaters!

 

[The Librarian]

Love your reviews. Salivating over the reverse root beer float. I'm going to have to investigate finding vanilla soda, since that would probably work well with many flavoured ice creams.

Congrats on completing the marathon too!

I finally booked a reservation for 'Ohana, and then they removed the chicken (and the salad) from the menu. With a family of chickens (yes- I'm punny) who will refuse half the stuff on the menu, I'm debating whether to cancel and move elsewhere.

 

[librarygeek]

Love your reviews. Salivating over the reverse root beer float. I'm going to have to investigate finding vanilla soda, since that would probably work well with many flavoured ice creams.

Congrats on completing the marathon too!

I finally booked a reservation for 'Ohana, and then they removed the chicken (and the salad) from the menu. With a family of chickens (yes- I'm punny) who will refuse half the stuff on the menu, I'm debating whether to cancel and move elsewhere.

Oooh, if I could find vanilla soda somewhere that would be awesome! Let me know if you manage to track any down

I think it's so odd they removed the chicken from Ohana. It's one of the most universally liked things. Did they get rid of the salad too?? That's sad, I really enjoyed the salad.

 

[elphie101]

I love that you posted that!! He is a huge steak eater so I'm sure DF will at the very least fill up on steak

He did well at Teppan Edo so I have my fingers crossed he'll do just fine with Ohana.

 

[SunnieRN]

I searched for vanilla soda as I was curious, but they kept leading me to cream soda, except for this site. I doubt it tastes the same, but it might be fun to try?

http://www.food.com/recipe/easy-vanilla-soda-468117

 

[librarygeek]

I love that you posted that!! He is a huge steak eater so I'm sure DF will at the very least fill up on steak

He did well at Teppan Edo so I have my fingers crossed he'll do just fine with Ohana.

The nice thing about Ohana too is that you can eat as much as you want, so he can have lots of the steak!

I searched for vanilla soda as I was curious, but they kept leading me to cream soda, except for this site. I doubt it tastes the same, but it might be fun to try?

http://www.food.com/recipe/easy-vanilla-soda-468117

Oooh, that is definitely worth a try!

 

[librarygeek]

Spice Road Table




I will first up admit that this review will be a little difficult to write - the food we had was all very good, but the portion sizes were super small and just didn't seem worth the price to us. But it was new and we wanted to try it out, so we headed here for lunch. I took a decent amount of pics since it's new and all (or was very new at the point when I ate here!) so I'll have those to share.



The seating area, out on the patio, is very nice. I love the look of it - it's well decorated and you do of course have a great view out over the lagoon. We got lunch around 11:30 and it was almost completely empty at that point.



I imagine a table right on the water would be really nice, as you get an awesome view of the Lagoon.



I decided to try the white wine flight, which has three different types of wine that you can see below. These glasses were pretty tiny.



I enjoyed them and found them all to be pretty light and pleasant. I don't think one really stood out to me as a big favorite, but they were nice.

DH had a red wine that was described as very sweet, called the "King of Hearts":



He liked it, it was very smooth, but not as sweet as he was hoping. He enjoys a really good sweet red wine. JamJar sweet shiraz that we had at Jiko is his favorite wine of all time.

For the food we shared the Tingis sampler (Lamb Slider; Harissa Chicken Roll; Moroccan Lamb Sausage):



I know I'm writing this 6 months after the trip, but I really can't remember much about this food. I know it was decent, but no flavors were overwhelmingly fantastic to stick out in my mind. Obviously small portions, but tasted good.

We also shared the spicy garlic shrimp (sauteed shrimp with dried chilis and fried garlic):



This had 6 shrimp for $10. I do remember really enjoying the flavor of this dish. It had a good level of spiciness for me. I didn't care much for the bread accompanying it though.

We probably should have ordered more food. But we had already spent $60 at this point - granted, we did get wine, but since the place was really advertising their drinks it seemed silly not to get alcohol. As you can tell from the pictures, this didn't really fill us up at all. It was good, but not outstanding enough to warrant the price for us personally.

DH rated it an 8*. As for the * , he says "not good enough to justify the price. Too expensive to get anything in acceptable quantities, so you are compelled to buy less. Which just leaves you unsatisfied." I would probably give it a 7 out of 10. I would never go back there for a meal, but knowing what I know now I might go back in the afternoon if we wanted to stick around for Illuminations but didn't feel like going back to the room for a break. It would be a nice way to relax off your feet for an hour or so, enjoy a glass of wine, and share a small plate or two. But thinking of it as a meal didn't work for me personally.

Price breakdown:

White wine flight: $12.99
King of Hearts wine: $8.99
Spicy Shrimp: $10.00
Tingis Sampler: $16.00

Price including tax: $51.10

With 18% tip: $8.64

Our bellies were so unsatisfied when we left that we had to fill them up with this:



Ice cream from France!

 

[SunnieRN]

Spice road table looks good, but I agree, not a bargain by any means. It is pretty, but what I want on their menu I can get other places for a lot less money!!

Thank you for the review as we were thinking of going there in October, but now I'll be satisfied to stick to the F&W choices instead!! :

 

[elphie101]

I thought Spice Road Table looked interesting for sure, but the fact that they don't accept TiW alone is enough to make me avoid it for the time being.

Ice cream heals all wounds and fills all bellies!

 

[librarygeek]

Spice road table looks good, but I agree, not a bargain by any means. It is pretty, but what I want on their menu I can get other places for a lot less money!!

Thank you for the review as we were thinking of going there in October, but now I'll be satisfied to stick to the F&W choices instead!! :

Yeah, I would stick with food and wine personally - you're basically getting the same portion sizes for half the price!

I thought Spice Road Table looked interesting for sure, but the fact that they don't accept TiW alone is enough to make me avoid it for the time being.

Ice cream heals all wounds and fills all bellies!

Yeah, that definitely stinks - though I've heard they're offering other discounts now, presumably because it hasn't been very popular. Yup, just looked it up: they did 30% off for annual passholders! It was only through Sept. 17th though. That actually would make it more reasonable: http://www.wdwmagic.com/dining/spic...le-at-spice-road-table-for-a-limited-time.htm

 

[NinePoundLemon]

Yum that shrimp looks good! Not very filling.....but good! I have to admit though, the ice cream picture had me drooling more than anything at Spice Road Table did. I've had the pistachio from there (which was ok, but I didn't love) and lemon (which was SO GOOD). I've officially decided that mint chocolate is next on my list!

 

[librarygeek]

Yum that shrimp looks good! Not very filling.....but good! I have to admit though, the ice cream picture had me drooling more than anything at Spice Road Table did. I've had the pistachio from there (which was ok, but I didn't love) and lemon (which was SO GOOD). I've officially decided that mint chocolate is next on my list!

It definitely tasted good! But just not enough of it. The lemon sounds really good, I'll have to try that. What I love about the mint chip they have is that it doesn't taste like your typical mint chocolate chip ice cream. It has a very fresh mint taste to it.

 

[librarygeek]

La Hacienda de San Angel



For dinner on our Epcot day, we decided to dine at La Hacienda since we hadn't tried it before. We had an 8pm reservation, so we were planning to catch Illuminations while we were there and see how the fireworks looked from inside the restaurant. We were first brought chips and salsa, which were good:



The restaurant was pretty empty, which seemed a little surprising. It was maybe half full, or a little less.

To start off with, DH and decided to share an appetizer. We ordered the Gorditas (Corn cakes, stuffed with chorizo, potatoes and arugula, topped with chipotle sauce and sour cream):



I have to be honest, when they arrived they really didn't look very appealing. But they tasted great! I don't know what it was, but the flavors all worked together really well and I enjoyed this a lot and was very glad we ordered it. DH had to pick off all the little pieces of onion, since he's not a fan, but overall I'd give the dish an 8 out of 10.

DH and I ended up both ordering the same entree (a rarity). We got the shrimp tacos (Fried shrimp, chipotle-lime aioli, cabbage, lime and salsa verde, all served over flour tortillas)



These were excellent as well. I've had a number of shrimp tacos before, but these had some strong flavors. I liked the limes on the side because squeezing some of the juice onto the tacos added a lot. I gave it an 8 out of 10.

And right after we ate Illuminations started! They pipe the music into the restaurant so you can hear everything. While the view wasn't the best ever, it was good enough to see most of the fireworks, and I have to admit that it's very relaxing to be able to sit and eat while you're watching instead of fighting for a spot outside.



Overall I'd give La Hacienda an 8.5 out of 10. The food was solid and the fireworks were an awesome bonus! We will definitely be back.

Price breakdown:

Coke - $2.99
Gorditas - $10.50
2 shrimp tacos - $47.90

Tax: $4.00
Total before tip: $65.39

Total including tax and 18% tip: $76.39