DlxDP w/ CL Kicked Our Butts! See us expand before your eyes! 1/19 All Finished!

[emmysmommy]

great review! we've never have tried artists point before, but that soup sounds good.

Definitely try it! The soup was amazing but there are other great reviews for this restaurant. I was just disappointed in my pork dish and more so in the barley side dish. BUT, the buffalo strip was good! Also, there are so many fresh fish choices that look really tasty.

Thanks for the update, I enjoyed your reviews.

You're welcome!

 

[grace&philipsmom]

So sorry to hear you didn't thoroughly enjoy Artist Point. It is one of our faves. Of course I get the buffalo!

 

[mstmp]

Subscribing I love your report!

 

[Kathy Z]

The smoky Portobello mushroom soup with roasted shiitakes and chive oil is the best soup I've ever tasted in my life! They gave me the recipe, but it is way too complicated for me to make at home. That's why Artist Point is a must do ADR for us. I totally understand your comment about restraining yourself from licking the bowl.

My dh had the planked Salmon and requested they not overcook it (a tip we had been given on the Disboards.) It was great. I think I had scallops and they were OK.

 

[emmysmommy]

Mon. August 23, 2010

Boma Breakfast Review:

We took a taxi to the Animal Kingdom Jambo House for our breakfast rez. We arrived with plenty of time to explore and take a few photos. I liked the decor of the resort which is a definite plus but I’m not a huge fan of the location that is a bus ride from everything. I wish we had taken the time to visit Kidani Village as well – perhaps next visit.

Again, we were early and were seated before our actual reservation time. The restaurant was full but there was really no one waiting to be seated. We were escorted to our table for two that was not far from the food areas.

It took a bit for our server to make an appearance but once she did we didn’t see her again – another server person took over. But we were there for the food and not for 5-star service so off we went to check out the selections.

There were some distinctly ethnic selections and sorry to say that I didn’t try any of them. I was too traditional in my selections. I should have just taken a taste but hey there is always next time.

More traditional fare:

Anyway, like I said sticking with the more typical breakfast fare I ended up with oatmeal, scrambled eggs, and breakfast potatoes on my 1st plate. Followed by my indulgent plate of pure carbs…waffle wedge, cherry Danish, pecan sticky bun, and French toast slice.

I will first list the things that were either mediocre to good:
1. eggs
2. waffle
3. oatmeal
4. potatoes

Yep, pretty much my 1st plate of food was pretty good.

The carb loading plate was not so good and I felt really deceived since it all looked really good.

As with some of the other buffets at WDW, if you selected cold cereal the server brought a small pitcher of milk. I’m not sure if it was skim milk, low fat or other.

Also, if you want a straw you must ask and they deliver a paper straw. (It’s rather like sucking on a cardboard tube.) Now, someone needs to provide a better explanation for me with the paper straw situation. I kinda understand wanting to protect the animals but what animals are roaming around the restaurant in danger of sucking on my straw? Are there wild animals there that actually graze on trash or do they feed the animals on a regular basis? Questions that may not have answers. Wow! An entire paragraph regarding paper straws!

Moving on….I thought Boma has some special juice but we were not offered any so I can’t comment on that.

The bill for 2 adults for the breakfast buffet was $40.45 before tip. We had 32 dining credits remaining.

Next Up: Pizzafari at Animal Kingdom

 

[emmysmommy]

So sorry to hear you didn't thoroughly enjoy Artist Point. It is one of our faves. Of course I get the buffalo!

Yes, the buffalo was pretty amazing! I would go back and order something other than the pork.

Subscribing I love your report!

Why thanks!

The smoky Portobello mushroom soup with roasted shiitakes and chive oil is the best soup I've ever tasted in my life! They gave me the recipe, but it is way too complicated for me to make at home. That's why Artist Point is a must do ADR for us. I totally understand your comment about restraining yourself from licking the bowl.

My dh had the planked Salmon and requested they not overcook it (a tip we had been given on the Disboards.) It was great. I think I had scallops and they were OK.

I so agree about the soup. I've seen the recipe here somewhere and I agree that it's a little too much work.

I do have to say that I booked this restaurant due to the great reviews. My opinion seems to be the minority so for anyone contemplating this place - go for it!

 

[Pooh&OurHunny]

We love eating breakfast at Boma (dinner not was ok but we prefer breakfast)
can't wait for more yummy reviews.

 

[lindsayp]

never ate at a breakfast buffet at dis would love to try crystal palace tho, get into the park a little early we've eaten at boma dinner and didn't care for it, maybe breakfast would be better

 

[mickeysgirl17]

Just found your reviews. Love them all so far including the pics...and your title is hysterical! love it. can't wait for more.

 

[Kathy Z]

I've read that at Boma breakfast you can have omelets made to order. Did you see that station?

 

[NuttyDisneyMom]

Great reviews so far...can't wait to read more

 

[emmysmommy]

It has been waaaaay tooo long since I updated....but I'm going to try to wrap this up before the dining review police drag this thing away to where it belongs!!

So last I updated, we were in Animal Kingdom and had breakfast at Boma. We didn't have an ADR for lunch so just decided to eat wherever the mood took us. Well the mood took me to Flame Tree BBQ but they were closed for renovations or such.

Good thing I'm flexible! Pizzafari looked good and it was a rainy day so I didn't feel like wondering around too much looking for food.

Now the thing that I like about Pizzafari is that you order your food and THEN they find you a table for your party. No saving a table with your camera case, your 10 year old or your rain poncho!

Pizzafari specializes in individual oven baked pizzas. Since neither of us were hungry enough to order an entire meal we decided to split a counter service meal and get an order of breadsticks. It ended up being more than enough food for the two of us.

Em wanted the cheese pizza and strawberry parfait and I wanted the Caesar salad and a breadstick. So we used a meal credit and paid cash for a side of breadsticks. I used a snack credit for a water. (30 meal credits remained on our account.) Once we had our food we were escorted to a clean, empty table.

Em liked the pizza and I thought the salad was fine. Nothing special, nothing bad, just ok. The breadsticks came with a cup of marinara and they were pretty good. I don’t recall how Em liked the strawberry parfait but I think she ate the whole thing so that tells me it must have been like the rest of the meal – ok.

So... next time I would like to try Flame Tree BBQ but for a quick meal Pizzafari was fine.

Inside the restaurant photos:

Next up: Le Cellier

 

[emmysmommy]

Dinner 8/23/10:

This was the much anticipated Le Cellier dinner I had booked at 180 days out from our arrival!!!

Once again, we arrived early for our 8:30 dinner reservation at Le Cellier. We were seated in the vacant lobby and waited a few minutes before we were called to be seated.

I am declaring here and now that this restaurant and dining experience was my hands-down favorite of the trip. I would definitely put this on my “must do” list for next time. (Although next time it will be a 2 credit meal.)

We were seated mid-dining room at a table for two. When we were seated our hostess explained that the restaurant was divided into “provinces” – we were in Quebec. I’m not sure how this matters or how you can even tell the difference between the provinces with the layout of the small restaurant but maybe it was more for them than the guest!

Our server was Lauren and she was perfection!! She introduced herself, handed us menus, explained our choices on the deluxe dining plan, and took our drink orders. The delicious bread arrived shortly with our beverages – Em ordered a red maple smoothie.

I thought I knew what to expect with the pretzel bread but gawd almighty – it was divine!!! I didn’t try any of the other flavors of breadsticks in the basket and if I had known ahead of time I would have only ordered the pretzel variety….it was delish with a nice smear of butter on it. We even asked for seconds with the bread which was a big mistake because it put a bit of a crimp in my appetite but I soldiered on!

For appetizers, I ordered the Canadian cheddar cheese soup with Moosehead beer and bacon while Em ordered the mixed field greens salad.

The soup was Ahhhh-mazing!!!! And to think that I almost ordered a cup instead of a bowl – for shame! This soup must have been made by the Canadian gods! It was so flavorful and rich with the crunchy bits of bacon as a garnish. My appetizer was the definite winner although Em enjoyed her salad which looked fresh and delicious.

We both ordered the mushroom filet cooked medium rare for our entrée. Again, WOW!!!! This was so very delicious and cooked to perfection. The mushroom risotto was awesome as well. I couldn’t eat my entire steak but it wasn’t for lack of effort.

I wasn’t going to pass on dessert knowing that they served a maple crème brulee. You know me and crème brulee – I didn’t pass up any opportunity to indulge in that creamy goodness. Both Em and I ordered this dessert. It did not disappoint!! It was yummy with an eye rolling sigh thrown in for good measure!! In honor of Em’s graduation celebration they had delivered her dessert with a chocolate “Congratulations” written on the serving dish. Such a nice, festive, touch.

Fancy version:

My version:

The bill, pre-tip, came to $112.17. We had 29 meal credits remaining.

When we were exiting the steakhouse we asked a helpful Cast Member if he would be so kind as to take our photo together. He gladly obliged. In fact, he said that he was bored so he would be our personal photographer and took a lot of photos – with different backgrounds near the restaurant. We had some goofy poses but many of them didn’t turn out well – I suppose that is why he is not a photo pass guy but a restaurant guy.

Next Up: Captains Grill - breakfast buffet

 

[tinacaplan]

Le Cellier looks so yummy. I know I am going to love the soup and that pretzel bread.

 

[emmysmommy]

Here's a short interlude for a review of one of the only times that we partook in the evening appetizers at the club level louge.

Selections:

It was late in the afternoon and we didn't have dinner reservations at Le Cellier until 8:30 so this was convenient. I grabbed a small plate of food and we went back to the room to relax.

I loved the apples and the caramel – yummy! Unfortunately for me, Em loved the apples as well and ate most of mine! The chicken skewers were ok from the one bite I had – Em wanted the rest of it so I relinquished it. I didn’t try any other hot items. The rest of my plate had a couple slices of cheese, a few olives, and a dried apricot nugget. Everything was nice and tasty!


Next up: Captains Grill breakfast - really!

 

[emmysmommy]

Le Cellier looks so yummy. I know I am going to love the soup and that pretzel bread.

For sure! Seriously, the bread and the soup would have been a "happy" meal for me!

 

[emmysmommy]

We love eating breakfast at Boma (dinner not was ok but we prefer breakfast)
can't wait for more yummy reviews.

Boma certainly had plenty of choices....as well as the most "ethnic" of the breakfasts that we ate. Sorry it took so long to get the updated reviews posted!

never ate at a breakfast buffet at dis would love to try crystal palace tho, get into the park a little early we've eaten at boma dinner and didn't care for it, maybe breakfast would be better

I've read great things about CP...and it is a character buffet. It is definitely on my list of places to eat in the future.

Just found your reviews. Love them all so far including the pics...and your title is hysterical! love it. can't wait for more.

Why thank you!

I've read that at Boma breakfast you can have omelets made to order. Did you see that station?

I don't recall seeing an omelet station otherwise I would have chosen that over the scambled eggs. But the eggs were good!

Great reviews so far...can't wait to read more

Thanks! More coming your way!

 

[amandadisney]

Just jumped in and read your reviews. Great comments and pictures! I am debating doing club level next year for my honeymoon...but I also want to do the deluxe plan. I know its going to be too much....but do you have any thoughts? Is that little extra touch worth it?

Thanks!

 

[emmysmommy]

August 24, 2010: Captain's Grill Breakfast Buffet

We made the short walk from our Beach Club Resort room over to the Yacht Club side around 9:45. I originally had an ADR for this restaurant but cancelled it. We didn't have a breakfast plan and didn't want the CL food so we showed up and were accomodated without an ADR just fine.

We did not have to wait at all to be seated – the restaurant had very few patrons. We had a choice of ordering from the menu or doing the buffet. We chose the buffet after browsing the selections that looked very good.

Some of the choices:

To be fair, there could have been something going on behind the scenes that I didn’t know about or the server could have been having a rotten day and not been feeling it but the service was way below par – and this was a place where I schlepped my own food. The food was about the same – below par. I had high expectations based on the appearance of the buffet offerings.

It took 15 minutes to get our drinks – the host even came over at one point and asked if our waitress had come by. Why yes she had but she hadn’t brought us our drinks yet. Someone else eventually delivered the drinks.

I started with some fresh fruit (grapes, pineapple, and watermelon) I also had a black cherry compote thing (I’m guessing at what it was, I’m not certain) that was very tart and not tasty. This part of the meal was good.

Next, I had scrambled eggs (good), potato hash (not so good), and a Mickey waffle or two. My 1st waffle tasted – well… odd. I couldn’t figure it out but it was like no other waffle I had tried during our trip.

Insert public service announcement here: Be very careful that you don’t confuse the butter with the cream cheese. Cream cheese = round ball shape and Butter = flat slab

My daughter asked me if I knew that I had put cream cheese on my waffle and not butter. Well, that explained that funny taste!!! I didn’t make that mistake twice.

My last plate was a total diabetic event waiting to happen. I had a serving of bread pudding which was so disappointing since I love bread pudding but this was not even good enough to take a second bite and I should know because I tried!

I tried the mini bran muffin – ick! The recipe must have included sawdust because it was so dry and tasteless.

Next I tried the cherry Danish – it sure looked good. Again, a bit of a disappointment and it really wasn’t that good.

So…. In the end I wasn’t too impressed. I would try this restaurant again and order off the menu – perhaps their specialty of the house I have not quite discovered yet!

We had to wait a while to get our check – which totaled $36.19 without tax. We had 27 meal credits remaining on our plan.

Up Next: Earl of Sandwich - DTD

 

[emmysmommy]

August 24, 2010: Earl of Sandwich - DTD

We decided that on this rainy day we would take the bus to DTD for some shopping. There was also one place that I wanted to mark off my "gotta eat there" list - Earl of Sandwich. I had read some reviews and seen some photos of some pretty amazing sandwiches. Oh My Gosh!!!!! It was so good.

After spending some time shopping, we were not terribly hungry so we decided to split a sandwich that came with a side and a drink. We ordered the Caprese sandwich that was ….I’m running out of adjectives to use…. But it was so very, very, very amazingly delicious. Just the right combination of tomato, mozzarella, basil and balsamic vinegar. The bread really made the sandwich. It was perfectly soft on the inside and a bit crusty on the outside. My daughter is not a sandwich lover but she now wants to emulate this sandwich at home.

For our side I was going to go with the fruit salad but I ended up grabbing a cupcake coronet. Mmmmmm mmmmm good!

Here's some of the other scrumptious choices:

The cost of this counter service meal was $10.62 but we used 1 dining credit so we had 26 meal credits remaining.

Next Up: Sci Fi Dine In