When I was a kid, all the restaurants at WDW sucked badly.
Seriously, the first dining experience that I remember being excellent was Narcoosee, in October 1994.
1994 said:
Narcoossee had the advantage of being just outside the front door of our lodge building, so it was very convenient. We started with well- prepared but undistinguished conch fritters with mustard sauce. Robbie had a Florida Sizzler (a heavy-duty drink). For dinner, I had Swordfish (they didn't have any lobster tails) and Robbie had Shrimp over Angel Hair. The fish was perfectly cooked and extremely well-presented. There was a noticeable lack of vegetables with dinner: no salad and no veggies on the dinner plate. There is no question that Narcoossee knows how to do dinner, but the question of value cannot help but being raised.
However... getting to your point, "I want to know from all of you, which restaurants have stood the test of time and still come out as top picks for your and your family?" In 2006, I reposted my 1994 trip report and made this comment to my assessment of Narcoossee in 1994:
2006 said:
Of course, Narcoossee has gone through two revolutions since then, the most recent this past February.
The point is that, in my experience, no restaurant (not just at WDW, but practically anywhere) "stands the test of time". Because they're run by humans, rather than machines, they all have ups and down over time, and more significantly, often are reborn as new restaurants, often with the same name, sometimes to positive effect, sometimes to negative effect. I think slaving ourselves to certain "top picks" because of past experiences is a negative thing - it sub-optimizes the quality of our vacation experiences. Rather, especially for folks who return to WDW over and over again, we are best served by being open-minded, and open-eyed to reviews and indications that perhaps there is a new restaurants (or an old restaurant, reborn) that should be our top pick now, and perhaps our former favorite is not quite worth the risk of another visit due to how it has changed.
We also had dinner at Artist Point that 1994 trip, but we both ordered beef, which Artist Point always had a bit of a problem with imho, so didn't consider that a great dining experience. However, the desserts were so good that, along with what we learned from other folks visiting the restaurant and posting their reviews, we did go back on subsequent trips, during which we enjoyed (first) excellent seafood entrées and (then later) excellent vegetarian entrées. Though only dinner was notable in that first visit to Artist Point, every trip to Artist Point since has been thoroughly enjoyable. Only Jiko has been great on every visit to the restaurant, but since it is a decade younger, we haven't had as many experiences there. Those two restaurants are the ones that, if we closed our minds to new experiences and/or to the chances that either restaurant could change over time, we'd go back to every visit. Instead, we do keep our minds, eyes and ears open, re-visit these restaurants some of the time, but not all of the time, because we do try other restaurants that other folks, who's reviews we trust, indicate are worthy of consideration as well.
