We ate supper last night at AoA. What an amazing resort!! I had promised a poster on here that I would report back on how dining went with our son who has ASD.
The resort is beautiful!! None of the pictures do it justice. The pictures are amazing, but in person the resort is that much more incredible!!
Back to dining with ASD. Pizza is what my son chose, of course. Almost every hot food is prepared for the individual as you wait. Plan on a minimum of a 5 to 10 minute wait person. Our wait was unusual. It took about 30 minutes from the time of order to the time the last one of us had his/her food. One of the cm dropped my dh's meatball sandwich on the floor. Instead of expiditing the food ahead of others waiting it was re-ordered and placed behind the other people there. My son's pizza was getting cold, so I paid for my Surf and Turf burger and ds's pizza
I couldn't carry everything so dh helped us get to a table. And I ended up back to get the meatball sandwich. The line and pick up area was packed in that short time. I couldn't get through the people to the pick up area, so I went back in the order line and told Meagan who was taking orders that I was there to get my husband's meatball sandwich which was already ordered and I wanted to order a cheese and pesto bread. I told her twice the meatball was already ordered. She said ok, and did not communicate a single word of that to Rachel who was distributing the food.
When I got up to Rachel, she was very ticked off. Not just about my order, but that pizza's and such were being ordered and she didn't know if they were to be boxed or handed to the people and she was unable to get people's attention to ask them, she was rolling her eyes at people. She was also upset that people were telling her the number of what they were waiting for, like a #4 or #5. She said she didn't know the menu to please tell her what a #4 was, etc. She reprimanded me for not telling someone that I was waiting for an already made meatball sandwich. I told her that Meagan knew, because I informed her. So then she went and reprimanded Meagan about the wasted food, since there were now 2 meatball sandwiches, and she threw the one away. Matt the chef had suggested she get off the serving line and perhaps do something else like attend to the pizzas coming out of the oven. From here, Rachel took a deep breath and went back into character. She expidited the cheese and pesto bread, very nicely asked me if I wanted ceasar salad with the sandwich, and attended to guests.
My suggestion to Disney would be to get pagers for that particular station like they do at POFQ's one station. There was quite a bottleneck at the pick up area since pizza's take some time to bake, the pasta takes time to cook, etc. Several people were waiting at the pick up area with one or two items already cooked on their tray getting cold, waiting for a pizza. A pager would certainly help with the bottlenecking, but wouldn't help with the food orders being served separate as they were ready. Perhaps, a pager going off when the entire order at the station was ready might be in order? Communication between order and pick up needs to be improved too.
That was the bad, now on to the excellent...
I ordered the Surf and Turf burger. I was asked who my favorite character was. About 5 minutes later, a cm announced that Tinker Bell's food was ready!
Wow!!! By the time I got back to my Surf and Turf burger (about 30 minutes) it was luke warm, but I was truely immersed in flavor and texture. By far, this was THE BEST crab cake sandwich I have ever eaten!! I tasted the shrimp solo, and it was very crunchy and spicey. I tasted the crab cake separately and it was kind of plain tasting. Together in the sandwich the crab cake and shrimp created an explosion of yumminess!!! The bun totally complimented the flavor. Without a doubt, I will order this again!!
DH said his meatball sandwich was better than the meatball sandwich at POP. He said the flavor was much better.
DS enjoyed his pizza, but he loved, loved, loved the cheese and pesto bread!!
We will definately eat there again. I realize our experience was very unusual, and am sure it will be much better next time!
As for sound, my son did not need his ear phones like he does at Everything POP. We noticed the Mermaid section had a bit of an echo that the Lion King section did not.
We'll have our room window decorated for Christmas!
) However there were a few AOA things that were really cute.
. I got a REALLY good deal at Pop with the general public FD offer though so I didn't think I'd be able to switch resorts. I've called the number to see if I could possibly transfer to AoA but alas, no such luck 
was told by 3 different CMs that the LM rooms didn't qualify for this code. As I unfortunately didn't receive the dining PIN, there was nothibg left to do. It looks like it will be Pop for this trip.
