Disney food: severly underrated?

[DisneyWorldWisher]

Honestly, I think that Disney food is kind of underrated on here and on the DIS. Maybe we just aren't picky people, but we thought every meal (except for two, one was bad, one was pretty good but not brilliant) were excellent. The Crystal Palace doesn't have the best reviews on here and has so called 'park food', but we thought the food was really really good for both dinner the first night and breakfast the last day and both were some of the best meals we have ever had.

Beaches and Cream is often called 'just average burgers' but we think they have the best burgers ANYWHERE and some of the best fries.
Excellent sundaes too.

50s Primetime was really good too...

Whispering Canyon Cafe is very underrated...I've never had meat that good! So much chicken...great potatoes...great corn...so much great meat. Great milkshakes too.

Cape May Cafe is never talked about on here, but I thought it was excellent and the only seafood I eat is shrimp! Great Macaroni and Cheese, chicken fingers, good meat...really good.

Le Cellier was the best meal I have ever eaten! If it's declining in quality...what was it like before? Didn't care for the pretzel bread or shrimp, but the pork chop was so tender...and the cream cheese mashed potatoes were so good...plus they had this delicious chocolate cake.

Concorse was bad though... but Biergarten was pretty good too...great athmosphere.

I don't understand...are we just not picky or does WDW have some of the best food anywhere? Why is it always called average?

 

[missminniemouse]

I would agree with you that Disney has some great food. We've had very few meals we didn't enjoy over the past 15 plus years and 20 plus visits. We have one nice sit down meal each day of our trips, which are typically around 10 days each. We've eaten in just about every table service restaurant on property and there are very few we would never go back to. Maybe we aren't picky eaters either. One of our favorite parts of the entire Disney experience is always the food. Not only do we enjoy the meal, but it makes us intentionally stop running our fool heads off for at least a little while each day. Our next trip is in 38 days and I'm making myself hungry just thinking about it!

 

[Cass]

I think Disney has great food too Jiko, Boma, California Grill, Artist Point, I loved my CRT breakfast and breakfastasaurus, pecos bills with the topping bar Counter service has some great choices like Tuskerhouse etc...

The only 2 meals I didn't like were Spirit of Aloha & I got served some bad chicken at PTC (but I ate there before that incident and it was great)

 

[bicker]

I think the issue is that the "bad" tends to be more strongly highlighted than the good.

 

[DisneyWorldWisher]

I think Disney has great food too Jiko, Boma, California Grill, Artist Point, I loved my CRT breakfast and breakfastasaurus, pecos bills with the topping bar Counter service has some great choices like Tuskerhouse etc...

The only 2 meals I didn't like were Spirit of Aloha & I got served some bad chicken at PTC (but I ate there before that incident and it was great)

We were talking about buffets and normal restaurants though! Not super fancy ones.

 

[CPM]

I think there is some great food, but a lot of average food too.

We eat out quite often and are in the restaurant business, so I guess we may be more picky. But, I appreciate regular old favorites too, like agreat burger. I do think B & C has great burgers.

Just returned from Sea World. Their counter service food was fantastic! They had freshly carved roast turkey sandwiches, you could also get roast beef. At another place, they had pressed Cuban sandwiches and other fresh food. I was very impressed.

 

[Mono~rail]

I really like the food at Disney. I've never had a bad meal. For the number of people that they feed each day, I think they do a good job!

My absolute favorite dish is Major Domo's Favorite Pie at CRT!

 

[Cass]

We were talking about buffets and normal restaurants though! Not super fancy ones.

since when are pecos bills, tuskerhouse and restaurantasaurus fancy?

 

[michelle1]

We also have found the food to be very good. We aren't picky about food and we don't go to WDW with food, restaurants even on our minds so perhaps our expectations are not that high. The only reason I planned out our last 2 trips was because we were on the free dining plan and that stressed me out more because I was constantly reading reviews and worrying about choosing "bad" restaurants. Our only meal that we hated the food was Chef Mickey for lunch so we figured 1 out of 9 TS isn't too bad.

 

[BlindTyldak]

Any time I head people whine about how bad the food is at Disney in general I challenge them to find me a theme park where the food is better in general. That usually shuts them right up.

The ONLY place that I have been consitantly disappointed with the food - so much so that I won't order anything but a shake and an appetizer now since it never fails, someone I go with wants to eat there - is Sci-Fi. the shake is great, but even the appetizer is just to be polite, really.

 

[golden1]

I personally think that Disney has some of the best dining experiences of any theme park anywhere. The closest we have to Disney around here is Six Flags and the food there is vile in comparison to Disney. I haven't been to WDW in six years so I can't comment on the food now but I noticed an improvement in the counter service food from 1995 through 2000 and I like the menus that I see now better than I liked the menus back then. Sure, I have had a few sub-par meals at WDW (Teppanyaki made the whole party sick) but in general I think the Disney food is above average considering the amount of people they have to feed in a day.

 

[AJA55]

Well…part of the best thing about going on vacation for us is the food. Guess we are foodies. We do go out to eat at nice restaurants a bit more than……. wellllll anyone else that we know. I’ve had meals at WDW from bad to excellent. And quite frankly all at the same place just a few years in between. My take is you can get a bad (and I do mean BAD) meal at the best of places. I thought the food was pretty poor most of the time on our first couple of trips, in the 80’s. Then most places got "good" to down right "excellent" (90’s). Last trip we had some disappointments at some of our favs. But we also found some others that were great. If I was to rate the table service restaurants for food at WDW I’d have to say they’re “good”. For counter service restaurant I’d go for “average”.

 

[mickeyluv'r]

For a park, the food at WDW is outstanding. It's even better than many of the restaurants we go to - depending (though WDw is a little more pricey)...I think the more you go, the more you expect. Once you've had a great meal at Flying Fish - esp at those prices - you expect the next meal to be just as good. Sometimes a return meal is as good, and sometimes it isn't...

I think also there are some subtlties I've noticed dining at WDW, that while some QS eateries have excellent food (AK), others really are on par with a Chili's type quality of food. I can't quite explain what is so lacking about Chili's food. It looks good at presentation, it's not great tasting, but not aweful tasting when you eat it, but it doesn't sit well afterwards.
At WDW, you are more or less stuck eating WDWfood for a week. But then, there's no way I'd spend a week living off of Six Flags' food.

My biggest concern with the food at WDW is finding inexpensive places to get fresh veggies, but that is a concern I have with most restaurants. Too often the only good vegetable offered is salad. Otherwise its fries, overcooked veggies, tiny scraps of veggies (the amount of veggies in pasta dishes- not really talking about WDW), or veggies drowned in margerine/grill grease/heavy cream sauces. (This is why we love Boma SO much!)

The thing I find a little funny are some of the WDW foods that are raised to cult status...though Mickey bars are worthy....

 

[Amy&Dan]

I think what you eat in your everyday life affects how you feel about the food you eat at WDW. If you are someone that frequently eats out at gourmet, non chain type restaurants, than the WDW eateries are likely to disappoint for the most part. Also, if you are from an area of the country that has outstanding versions of a particular ethnic food and you go to some WDW place in Epcot that serves that same food it won't seem as good as the hole in wall place you get more authentic and cheaper versions at home. But at home you won't be getting that special WDW experience either. WDW restaurants prepare food in mass quantitites sort of like Applebees, Chilis and Red Lobster do. In that they are out to feed a lot of people, with a quick turnaround. When my family eats out we often go to chains like Applebees, so when we are at WDW we aren't feeling like our meals are a comedown from what we eat at restaurants at home. Also, we are not picky. Generally if I am not cooking and cleaning up the mess I'm happy. Sure, some places I eat at (at home and at WDW) are better than others but for the most part I find myself at least satisfied. I have to laugh when someone posts: "such and such a place at WDW was the WORST meal I have ever had, etc., etc., etc.,." Bad meals at WDW? Likely to happen. Worst meal you ever ate in your whole entire life? Seems unlikely unless you've never eaten at a hospital!

 

[crisi]

Some of the food is really good, some of it is ok. I've seldom had bad food. I can think of six or seven GREAT burgers (fresh, never frozen angus beef with maytag blue cheese on a handbaked roll - steakhouse burgers where the hamburger was ground from steak) I've had - B&C doesn't hold a candle to them.

I'd rather err on the side of telling someone the B&C burger is average and have them come back and tell me how wrong I was - then they are delighted with the meal - than tell someone how wonderful it was and have them come back and say they wasted time and money on a burger than was "just ok" and they wish they wouldn't have gone out of their way for it - then they are disappointed.

The worst meal we ever had at Disney was more about disappointed expectations than about bad food. It was Boma - which at that time was the darling of the DIS - very few bad reviews, plenty of people raving about how the food was wonderful. The food wasn't bad - it was a buffet which I've since decided I'm not fond of. But given our expectations, it was very disappointing and I wish I would have booked somewhere else. We'd also saved it for our last evening, so we left WDW feeling disappointed in the trip - where if we'd had our last meal somewhere else, we'd have left on an up note.

 

[Dizneydaz]

We were there from 9-9- to 9-19 and we had great food! We only had one disappointment, and even that one the food was good. The place overall was just okay.

I've started my DDP reviews-here's the link.

http://www.disboards.com/showthread.php?p=14793184#post14793184

 

[CPM]

Any time I head people whine about how bad the food is at Disney in general I challenge them to find me a theme park where the food is better in general. That usually shuts them right up.
.

The counter service food at Sea World was a lot better than Disney's counter service food IMO, much fresher.

 

[Eeyore2003]

I think it really depends big time on where you live. Most of the people that say the food is sub par are from the larger cities in the country where there is such a variety of excellent cuisine that Disney doesn't compare. Not only that, but the "BIG" name chefs have restaurants right there where they can eat any time they want.

I would say that even though Wolfgang Puck Cafe is one of our favorites at Disney World, the lobster and fried spinach at the Wolfgang Puck's restaurant, 20 21, in Minneapolis was one of the best meals I have ever had.

So, as with anything in life, I think it's all relative. Personally, I think the food is in general excellent, and picking restaurants to eat at is one of our favorite things to plan. One thing I've learned is to include the comments here, but don't count on your tastes being the same, or your experience the same. Jiko, Boma, and Brown Derby are 3 that get rave reviews and they were the worst we've eaten at.

 

[disneyohana]

I agree. We constantly try new restaurants in the Chicagoland area to find one that is great every time. Disney is the same. Sometimes you get a great meal, other times not so great. Even the counter service restaurants IMO are very good at the parks and the hotels. I haven't had too many bad experiences with food at Disney, but then again the food is not the reason I go to Disney either so maybe I'm just having too much fun with the ambience to care.