December 5-12, 2010 Dining Review

[luvmarypoppins]

It's Time for our semi annual dining review.

Just dh and I. This time we bought him an AP and got a TIW card so we could get a 20% discount on most meals, at least it pays for the tip. I like to plan our adrs well in advance.

Dec 5th - VIA NAPOLI - we had an 8:30 adr. I wanted to get out in an hour to see Illuminations. We were seated pretty promptly and then it was downhill from there. The place was really noisy. The entertainment was fun, watching them make pizzas and sing happy birthday to 3 people. Our server was slow and disappeared at times.

DH - pepperoni or sausage pizza, cant remember. Lets just say I cant remember as there was practically no meat on the pie. I tasted it. Sorry the dough was way too doughy for the crust. I guess we are NY pizza snobs.

I asked if we could have the salad. They said they would give it to us for 2 even though only dh was ordering the pizza. The salad we shared and was fresh.

Me - Eggplant parm. I think in NY we would consider this portion more of an appetizer and not a meal. It was thinly sliced. The portion was so small. Dh asked me if I was still hungry. If you have an appetite do not order this. It was fresh however. The spaghetti torta served on the side was very hard to chew. we both did not care for it.

Dessert - dh - pistachio sorbet. He said it was o.k. I didnt care for it.
Me: coppa di brutti - we both loved this!! Great.

We didnt get out of there in a hour and completely missed Illuminations!!
Overall: nice to try once, but we are going back to Tutto instead.

 

[luvmarypoppins]

Day 2 December 6, 2010

Lunch - GRAND FLORIDIAN CAFE
Knew it would be crowded here with everyone looking at the tree and gingerbread house.. There was some conference people and lots of people trying to do walk up for lunch. One guy blew his top when he heard it was a 1 1/2 hour wait for a table for 2. Same with another guy when the wait got down to an hour. He asked where the nearest counter service was.

We were seated pretty quickly, maybe less than 15 min considering the crowd. As always glad for the Adr.

We both didnt care for the soup of the day

DH - grilled shrimp appetizer, Grand Floridian Burger

Me - Strawberry salad app, orecchiette pasta with grilled chicken

I tried a bite of dh shrimp, very good, My salad was ok but the strawberries were about non existent. My pasta was great and had a slightly spicy tomato sauce. Dh finished it for me and loved it also.

The service was so slooow here. We later found out the table next to us ordered the same entrees and the runner gave our order to them as they were seated later. We had a long wait with no explanation. Not good.

Dessert - we shared the chocolate mousse (our favorite), key lime and lemon (good) mini desserts.


Dinner - The Plaza at MK This was a freezing cold night at the MK. We watched wishes, were suppose to meet up with some disers who never showed so we high tailed it to our warm adr. Our server was Fatima. She was great.

We were both glad to get the soup of the day.

DH - Tomato Bisque soup, cheeseburger
Me - Potato soup, cheesteak sand. hot tea

I didnt care for dh soup, didnt look very creamy, My soup had green onions and bacon bits on top, so good. The sandwiches were good too.

For dessert we shared the cheesecke. It was good too. It was just too cold out for ice cream.

 

[luvmarypoppins]

Day 3 Tues, December 8

Breakfast Kona Cafe It was pretty busy here and a nightmare to get to with the Ohana breakfast overflow and stroller parking etc.
I dont want to mention our servers name. Lets just say we had to wait way too long for drink refills, he disappeared alot, waited forever to get more butter and syrup and worst, he kept touching my left shoulder. While that in itself I think was inappropriate, I had cancer surgery and have had my L neck dissected and every one knows never touch my shoulder etc. I wanted to say something to him when he did that, but my mouth was always full of all that good Kona food.

Dh - pressed pot of Kona Coffee. Says its the best. Big Kahuna. He ate all of it.
Me - scrambled egg platter. I did ask for a side of blueberry pancakes. These were amazing and the blueberries were plentiful.


Dinner - SHULAS I planned this adr like 6 months ago. I promised dh he could eat here for holding my hand last year when I was in the coma and for changing my bandage 300 times. Little did I know this would also be the time of the Baseball Winter Meetings at the Dolphin.

We arrived 10 minutes late. We were probably actually in the building but got lost between finding the restraunt and dodging the million gazillion mlb people and the live broadcast from the lobby. We finally get to the podium. Hostess says,.. you are 10 minutes late and we gave your table away. Dh was pushing me in the wheelchair as I was tired. Tells us the next table will be a 1 hr. 15 min. wait at best. Tells us to go wait in lobby, um no. So we park ourselves right across from her looking at her podium. Guy makes some 1 1/2million deal standing in front of us.

Finally we are seated. So noisy in here. But did the wait pay off??? WHY YES IT DID!! and why you might ask??? Who is sitting at the table next to us but>>HANK AARON!!!!. I never thought to take a picture with my cell phone. Oldest ds was so mad at me. Now onto the dinner...

The bread was good, asked us what kind of water we wanted

Dh - shrimp appetizer, special rib eye of the night (not on the menu), lobster bisque soup

Me - crab cake (excellent), same soup (ok) and same ribeye). Peach ginger ice tea (great)

We also shared: twice baked potato. This is not even a whole potato but one long piece. Didnt care for it all that much. We also shared the creamed spinach. Good, but a little garlicky.

For dessert - we shared the chocolate souffle which was very good. I think the total bill was about $150, this is with the tiw discount and we dont drink alcohol. So it was pretty expensive but a good experience. Dh says he wants to try something else next time.

 

[luvmarypoppins]

Made a mistake with the dates, tues. was the 7th, so

Wed, Dec 8th - Le Cellier lunch. Spent alot of time getting this on the disneyworld website. But persistence pays off. Lauren was our server and she was great

Dh - shrimp and corn cake appetizer, steak sand. whiskey cake
Me - cheese soup of course!!, steak sand. and cobbler.

Soup is amazing as usual. Loved dh cake, didnt care for my cobbler all that much. Pretzel bread, lots of pretzel bread for dh. He finished my soup.

Dinner - Originally our adr was for Flying Fish, but we cancelled it at the last minute, yes we callled and just didnt want to no show,even if it was like 1/2hour away.

So we just did Tangerine Cafe - counter service. We both were not too hungry so we just shared a meatball platter and some baklava. O.K. nothing great. The sauce on the meatballs was good, not too spicy. Lots of rice.

 

[luvmarypoppins]

Thursday December 9th

Breakfast - Cape May Buffet It was pretty crowded here with the side room completely filled also. Our server was really grumpy and could barely be seen for drink refills. I did notice however she was super nice to the families with kids surrounding us.

Food was good. I loved the mickey waffles and sausage. Dh ws happy with the biscuits and gravy. Reminds him of when he used to live in Tenn. Sorry this Ny girl cant get used to this. The character interaction was good and we took pictures with dh and I.

At the end when our server gave us the check, she muttered, hve a magical day. LOL. Since we had the tiw card they automatically add 18%. She was not worth this, sorry.

Dinner - Candelight Processional Package - Chefs de France
It felt a little strange eating dinner at 4pm but we skipped lunch so we were ok. Our server was super sweet. Also I should add I called on the lst day they were taking reservations for this.

DH - french onion soup, beef tenderloin, sorbet,
Me - blue cheese salad, beef tenderloin, green beans, potatoes au gratin, creme puffs.

Added bonus: Remy was there!!
This time the salad had enough dressing on it, last time I got this there was not enough. Food was great. I dont know why dh got the sorbet when it was freezing cold out. It was mango, raspbery and coconut. It was a great presentation with huge fresh strawberries, blackberries etc.

Cant use the tiw here, which we knew, but we enjoyed our meal and think the pkg. is worth it.

 

[luvmarypoppins]

Friday December 10th

Lunch - Liberty Tree Tavern This place was actually taking walk ups. We had an adr.

DH - vegetable soup, burger and fries

Me - Pot roast

We also shared the crab/spinach? appetizer. The bread they served with it was good. Dh soup was good as was the pot roast.

They rushed the food out here too fast even when we were not finished with the app. I think they actually brought it out twice. They must have been really not busy in the kitchen.

For dessert,. We shared some chocolate cake type thing. It was terrible. It ws more like a slab of fudge. It said it also was served with fresh berries. There was 1, yup count em, 1 stawberry on top of it that was cut in half. Dont order this. Next time we will go back to the apple dessert.

Dinner - Cape May Buffet

What keeps dh happy, why crab legs and corn bread of course.

I dont remember what the soups were. We skipped them. I am not much of the seafood lover, so I sticked to the landlubber side.

I cant remember all I had but it was good. The ribs and chicken were flavored well. The desserts were o.k. I love the flan the best.

It was hard finding our server for drink refills here and our dirty plates were still on the table when we returned too.

I dont know if this is a trend at cape may, but with the same thing hpppening with our breakfast here, I wonder??

 

[luvmarypoppins]

Saturday December 10th

Beverly Sweets Dh had a candy apple and he got me a carmel one. I dont know what this was, just a snack. It was good.

Dinner - Kona Cafe

Dh - ribeye, broccolini, mashed potatoes
Me - ribeye, same

We shared the sticky wings for an appetizer. The bread was great as usual. They also bought our meal out here before we were done with the app. I think the new mentality is rush em in and get em out etc.

Dessert - dh - pineapple upside down cake. Nice presentation, served warm,
Me - banana creme brule - need I say more. Great.

I did notice the family next to us was asking about things for their special needs teen boy. They were very accomodating food wise for him.

 

[luvmarypoppins]

Sunday Dec 12th

Dh grabbed a croissant for himself and a blueberry muffin for me down from the Yacht Club lobby

Other snacks we had:
Norway Bakery - almond pretzel
Sleepy Hollow at MK - chicken rice soup . Great. It was freezing out and a strawberry funnel cake
France Bakery - Napoleon
It was really too cold to sit outside and enjoy snacks.

So all in all the food was good. Next trip in May I want to try FlyingFish and Citricos for our anniv.

 

[sophie832]

Enjoyed reading your reviews! We stayed at the YC from Dec. 2-12, but none of our ADRs were the same as yours. The only time our paths might have crossed for food was the morning of the 12th, since we were also in the YC lobby for check-out. DH and I will be eating at Kona Cafe for breakfast and Le Cellier for lunch, so I'm glad to hear you guys had good food. It seems like your trip was filled with a lot of good food, but a lot of so-so service.

 

[Ro Z]

Love your reviews! Such detail!
One thing we try to do is not let them rush us in and out! We order our apps and tell the server we are not ready to order our entrees. This helps to not be so rushed. I hate when I haven't finished the app and the meal is now plunked in front of me!
I agree with most of your reviews and you make me want to try some things I haven't tried yet!
Thanks!

 

[minniebeth]

Thanks so much for your dining review, luvmarypoppins! I hope you had a wonderful trip! I enjoyed reading your review. You reviewed a lot of places where we have ADRs for on our upcoming trip~ we are staying at the Polynesian and could not get ADRs for 'Ohana, so we will try Kona again, although we haven't had great success there previously. Everyone loves it, so we're willing to give it another try.
We are really excited to try Via Napoli, there were such great reviews of it when I made the ADRs and now, not so much. We're still going to give it a try and see what our experience is. We're NY pizza snobs too, lol, so we'll see!
We are also doing The Plaza in the MK, my DH and DS are running the 1/2 Marathon, so they just wanted something light and simple. Sounds like it will fit the bill, I'm looking forward to some ice cream there.
The place I'm most looking forward to for the upcoming trip is Citricos! Read such wonderful things about it always.

How exciting for you to be seated so close to Hank Aaron!! That's cool~ I'm sure that will be a memorable dinner for you!

Wishing you a wonderful New Year filled with many great things you deserve!

 

[The 4 "Quay"balleros]

Cool review-- we're doing CS this trip, but one day when the maniacs, I mean my kids, can sit and eat, we'll love to do a TS trip.

 

[jenjersnap]

We had an early lunch at Kona on Tues, 12/7 and had one of the worst servers we've ever had at Disney. He was mostly unseen by us after taking our order (except to assuage the unhappy couple sitting next to us), entrees took forever to come out and were ice cold so had been sitting out a long time. We were in such a hurry (we'd been there for more than 2 hours) to get our youngest down for a nap that we didn't bother to complain. I wonder if we had the same server?

 

[snappy]

Great reviews, lumarypoppins. You are so specific, it is great. How do you remember the details? You must do a journal.

I think you did very well with your choices, especially this time of year.

 

[luvmarypoppins]

Thanks so much for your dining review, luvmarypoppins! I hope you had a wonderful trip! I enjoyed reading your review. You reviewed a lot of places where we have ADRs for on our upcoming trip~ we are staying at the Polynesian and could not get ADRs for 'Ohana, so we will try Kona again, although we haven't had great success there previously. Everyone loves it, so we're willing to give it another try.
We are really excited to try Via Napoli, there were such great reviews of it when I made the ADRs and now, not so much. We're still going to give it a try and see what our experience is. We're NY pizza snobs too, lol, so we'll see!
We are also doing The Plaza in the MK, my DH and DS are running the 1/2 Marathon, so they just wanted something light and simple. Sounds like it will fit the bill, I'm looking forward to some ice cream there.
The place I'm most looking forward to for the upcoming trip is Citricos! Read such wonderful things about it always.

How exciting for you to be seated so close to Hank Aaron!! That's cool~ I'm sure that will be a memorable dinner for you!

Wishing you a wonderful New Year filled with many great things you deserve!

Thanks minniebeth. I can't wait to read your review of Citricos. Have a great trip and hope you have a great time with your family at the marathon.

 

[Pooh&OurHunny]

Thanks for the post, we ate at LeCellier for lunch Dec 8th at 12:15. It was a great lunch and we had Brandon as a server (he was wonderful). We ate at Chef De France for dinner that night.