DCA Food & Wine Festival 2025 Superthread - Read First Post for Updates - Now Updated with Full Menus

[bcwife76]

@LKing thanks so much

 

[ShoeCello]

I know mine is going to be an unpopular opinion but I'm seriously not impressed with this year's offerings. There's only a handful that look intriguing to me and a couple of those are drinks. Oh well. Just not my year I guess.

I'm with you here - they seem to cut the number of food offerings at each of the booths (many with only one food dish), and there are very few vegetarian or vegan options.

 

[CalSea12]

I know mine is going to be an unpopular opinion but I'm seriously not impressed with this year's offerings. There's only a handful that look intriguing to me and a couple of those are drinks. Oh well. Just not my year I guess.

Def not unpopular opinion, I feel like the offerings this year are def not up to par and it just makes me even more regretting my choice of going to DL instead of DW.

 

[LKing]

Def not unpopular opinion, I feel like the offerings this year are def not up to par and it just makes me even more regretting my choice of going to DL instead of DW.

Were you coming to Disneyland specifically for F&W?

 

[rowan1813]

I'm with you here - they seem to cut the number of food offerings at each of the booths (many with only one food dish), and there are very few vegetarian or vegan options.

Yes! I realized after looking at the offerings again, there doesn't seem to be as many food items compared to drinks (especially beers and cocktails). I have lists from previous years that I want to go back and compare to see what the numbers look like.

 

[Lisa24jks]

I can't eat like I used to for medical reasons (as in I only had 2 items from Lunar New Year booths this year), so I guess that's the bright side of the picking being rather slim for Food & Wine this year. I won't have Foodie FOMO.

I'm just going to see how many times I can ride Soarin' Over California. That's the REAL draw for me.

 

[LKing]

I'm just going to see how many times I can ride Soarin' Over California. That's the REAL draw for me.

I made a reservation for 2/28 cuz I want to ride Soarin and get a clementine.

 

[evilmommie]

I can't eat like I used to for medical reasons (as in I only had 2 items from Lunar New Year booths this year), so I guess that's the bright side of the picking being rather slim for Food & Wine this year. I won't have Foodie FOMO.

I'm just going to see how many times I can ride Soarin' Over California. That's the REAL draw for me.

Soarin’ Over California is truly the best!!!

 

[rowan1813]

Alrighty folks, I went and looked at my spreadsheets (back 3 years to 2022) to see how many food items there were for the booths so see if my suspicions of there being less food compared to previous years. I'm just looking at the food booths themselves and not including the special items that are at the permanent dining locations.
This year (2025) - 14 food items
2024 - 16 food items
2023 - 24 food items
2022 - 24 items

I don't have any info past 2022 (2021 was weird due to closures and only having Touch of Disney instead of a full F&W festival) but I found this all a little interesting and thought some of you might as well.

 

[rowan1813]

Soarin’ Over California is truly the best!!!

Agreed!!! I know I'm preaching to the choir here, but this needs to be the version at DCA all the time. Let WDW have the World version.

 

[Lisa24jks]

Alrighty folks, I went and looked at my spreadsheets (back 3 years to 2022) to see how many food items there were for the booths so see if my suspicions of there being less food compared to previous years. I'm just looking at the food booths themselves and not including the special items that are at the permanent dining locations.
This year (2025) - 14 food items
2024 - 16 food items
2023 - 24 food items
2022 - 24 items

I don't have any info past 2022 (2021 was weird due to closures and only having Touch of Disney instead of a full F&W festival) but I found this all a little interesting and thought some of you might as well.

That's definitely a steep drop. But the profit margin on alcohol is much higher than food, so... I get why they would want more drink offerings than food. But skimping on the food entirely is a bummer.

 

[rowan1813]

That's definitely a steep drop. But the profit margin on alcohol is much higher than food, so... I get why they would want more drink offerings than food. But skimping on the food entirely is a bummer.

Yeah they are definitely making way more money off of alcohol: cocktails and beer, not a whole lot of wine this year either. Its all kinds of ironic since this is the Food & Wine Festival but hey, what do I know

 

[bcwife76]

Gosh that is quite the drop in offerings! It was too much to hope for that Skywalker Wines would have a presence at all this year Outside of getting it on a Disney cruise I haven't been able to find it anywhere (I'm in Canada so it's not as easy as having it shipped to me).

 

[LKing]

Yeah they are definitely making way more money off of alcohol; cocktails and beer, not a whole lot of wine this year either. Its all kinds of ironic since this is the Food & Wine Festival but hey, what do I know

I don't think there was much wine last year either.

Was it the holiday booths where they tried to have everyone scan a QR code to see the booth menus and locations? I know CM sometimes make things up, or paraphrase, or give half truths, but one CM working at a holiday booth told us that the Pixar Fest booths were so unsuccessful that management was talking about not bring back booths at all. She used that as an explanation for why they didn't have printed guides for that festival. The QR code guides didn't work and, when they did, they were difficult to navigate. Fortunately, for Lunar New Year there were plenty of printed guides.

 

[ShoeCello]

Alrighty folks, I went and looked at my spreadsheets (back 3 years to 2022) to see how many food items there were for the booths so see if my suspicions of there being less food compared to previous years. I'm just looking at the food booths themselves and not including the special items that are at the permanent dining locations.
This year (2025) - 14 food items
2024 - 16 food items
2023 - 24 food items
2022 - 24 items

I don't have any info past 2022 (2021 was weird due to closures and only having Touch of Disney instead of a full F&W festival) but I found this all a little interesting and thought some of you might as well.

Yikes, a greater than 40% decrease in foods… no wonder so many of us are disappointed in the offerings (particularly for those of us with dietary restrictions)

 

[LAS2AMS]

I don't think there was much wine last year either.

Was it the holiday booths where they tried to have everyone scan a QR code to see the booth menus and locations? I know CM sometimes make things up, or paraphrase, or give half truths, but one CM working at a holiday booth told us that the Pixar Fest booths were so unsuccessful that management was talking about not bring back booths at all. She used that as an explanation for why they didn't have printed guides for that festival. The QR code guides didn't work and, when they did, they were difficult to navigate. Fortunately, for Lunar New Year there were plenty of printed guides.

They did have printed guides for the Holiday festival . It was printed similarly as the guide map, just like the Lunar New Year. Epcot gets a small, book like guide that’s easier to folllw.

I think they had printing problems, as I saw the guides only a handful of times. Same thing was true of the Downtown Disney guides — they were fully stocked like January 5th but before that, I rarely saw them.

None of the festivals seem to be popular. The largest crowds were during the Holidays when tourists were in town (and MK blocked out). Much of the time, there’s nobody at the booths. The number have decrease but I’m surprised they’re still around.

 

[kikismom]

F&W has been super disappointing to me since 2020 which was my first time going. We flew home a few days before the world shut down. I don't drink hard alcohol or beer, last year I was disappointed in the fact there were like two booths with wine. This year there's hardly any food. I will never forget the cheese soup in a little sourdough roll from the cheese booth that isn't even there anymore. I ate it daily the two years I went before it disappeared from the booths.

 

[ej119]

Yeah they are definitely making way more money off of alcohol: cocktails and beer, not a whole lot of wine this year either. Its all kinds of ironic since this is the Food & Wine Festival but hey, what do I know

I've been complaining for a few years now that they keep diminishing the number of wine offerings (last year wine was only at one booth) that they should legitimately consider renaming the festival.

 

[LKing]

I can only add 10 pictures per post so I'm moving the April artists over here.

April 5 & 6 - Larissa Brown, Daniel Killen, Dave Perillo
April 12 & 13 - Miss Mindy, Joey Chou, Ryan Riller, Josey Tsao
April 19 & 20- John Coulter, Jasmine Becket-Griffith, Martin Hsu

Dave Perillo


Daniel Killen


Miss Mindy

Joey Chou


Ryan Riller - He illustrated The Little Mermaid Pop Up Book.


Josey Tsao - Last year her prints were more expensive than prints by other artists. She illustrated the book, People Behind the Disney Parks



Jasmine Becket-Griffith


Martin Hsu


John Coulter

 

[LKing]

Culinary Chef Demonstrations - Hollywood Studio Stage
6 pm - 6:30 pm

March 1: Duff Goldman, Charm City Cakes
March 2: Ernie Alvarado, URBANA Mexican Gastronomy

March 8: Bricia Lopez, Guelaguetza
March 9: Bricia Lopez, Guelaguetza

March 15: Jamie Gwen, Celebrity Chef, Radio Host and Cookbook Autho
March 16: Paul Cao, Burnt Crumbs

March 22: Shachi Mehra, ADYA
March 23: Claudia Sandoval, MasterChef Season 6 Winner

March 29: Dafne Mejia, Hell's Kitchen
March 30: Nicholas Echaore and Ryan Garlitos, Heritage BBQ

April 5:
5-5:30 Wing Lam, Wahoo's Fish Taco
6-6:30 Dafne Mejia, Hell's Kitchen
April 6: Shaun O'Neale, MasterChef Season 7 Winner

April 12: Stuart O'Keeffe, Celebrity Chef
April 13: Ray Hayashi, RYLA

April 19: Jet Tila, Food Network
April 20: Allan Tea, Cali Dumpling

Festival Sponsors Demonstrations
3:30 pm - 4:30 pm

March 1 & 2: Preston Gaspar, Nueske's Applewood Smoked Meats
J. Michael Melton, Impossible Foods
March 15 & 16: Mark Mackey, Ethel M Chocolates
March 22 & 23: J. Michael Melton, Impossible Foods
March 29 & 30: Chris de Mezzo, COO & Roastmaster, Joffrey's Coffee & Tea Company
April 5 & 6: National Geographic with Pablo "Popi" Garcia Borboroglu and Disneyland Resort Chef Natalie Willingham
April 12: Cooking with Tajin, Disneyland Resort Chef Daniel Romo
April 13: Cooking with Tajin, Disneyland Resort Chefs Steven Medina and Jamie Burt
April 19 & 20: Disneyland Resort Chef Harrison Butac, Disney Vacation Club