Here's what a little PIXIE DUST can do ....... a dining review+pics COMPLETED!!!!!

[dizneeat]

Happy Thanksgiving!!!

 

[dizneeat]

Oh my, that dinner at Sanaa looks amazing, I would eat everything you guys ordered! DH is just starting to get adventurous with his palate so maybe next year I can convince him to try it...since we are giving up on Jiko

Whats Next Whats Next

I hope Todd gets adventurous enough to give it a try next time. I would LOVE to read your comments about it!

Wow Sanaa sounds good, those short ribs look delish. Off to go check out the menu now

Those short ribs were melt in your mouth tender. Sooooooooooo good!!!

Wow - Sanaa looks fantastic
Your reviews are really great and gives me loads of ideas to visit different restaurants

I am glad my reviews are of some help to someone. I got so much help reading the dining reviews here. It's nice to give back!

Thanks for the link and another great review....Saana is now on the radar!

I loved it there too! My mouth is watering looking at your pics

It's a great place, isn't it! We will definitely go back.

Sanna looks wonderful....have to put that on the "to do" list.

PLEASE try it! It is such a wonderfully laid out restaurant, so relaxing and the servers were so friendly and nice. And the food .......... oh my!

 

[dizneeat]

Day 20, Sept 3

Lunch at Wolfgang Puck's Express

Today was Mary Ellen and Joe's and their family's last day. So we all decided to meet at Downtown Disney for lunch at Wolfgang Puck's Express.
Our favourite server recognized us in line and asked if she should get a table ready for us. Yes, please, make it a table for 8!! She really put some tables together so we could all sit together.

Yes, I am a boring person when it comes to my favourite WPE pizza! Again I opted for the Four Cheese Pesto Pizza - creamy goat cheese, mozzarella, fontina and Parmesan with Roma tomatoes, fresh basil, garlic-basil pesto sauce and sun dried tomatoes. LOOOOOOOOOOVED it as always.

Tom had the Meatball and Parmesan Pizza - Niman Ranch meatballs, fresh basil pesto, mozzarella and Parmesan cheeses, tomato-basil garlic sauce and fresh basil. Didn't hear any complaints!

Yip, Creme Brulee for dessert again! I just love this too much to NOT order it!

And for something new .........

There is a photo of all of us!

So what did we actually cost Disney?
Wolfgang Puck's Express = $ 42,70
6 CS credits = $ 108,30 (16 CS credits remain)
2 TS credits = $ 139,90 (20 TS credits remain)
Riverside Mill = $ 7,00 (22 snack credits remain)
all in all = $ 297,90
(only accounting for the things covered by the DDP!! Not covering any items purchased OOP)

Next up - Ice cream at Ghirardelli's

 

[dizneeat]

Still day 20, Sept 3

After do some more shopping we still had some time left before they all had to head back to catch the Magical Express, so we went to Downtown Disney for some ice-cream.

We were still full from lunch so we decided that instead of having a huge ice-cream sunday, we would try Vanilla ice cream in a Chocolate Dipped Waffle Bowl. Tom and I shared one and we could not finish it. The Dipped Waffle Bowl was a nice addition, but was very difficult to eat.

Then it was time to say goodbye. We took Mary Ellen and Joe back to POR and waited until the Magical Express left!

Tom and I went back to our resort, OKW, and relaxed for a while.

Next up - dinner at Kouzzina

 

[Stefy]

Oh that ice cream looks sooooo good!

 

[Calgary DISHeads]

Day 17, Aug 31

Lunch at Wolfgang Puck's Express

It was time to return to Disney today, but we wanted to do one last round of rides at UO!
So we had some breakfast of leftovers from the day before, packed up the rest of our stuff, checked out of the hotel and loaded everything into the car before we walked down to the parks one more time.

We arrived right after the parks had opened and since we planned on hitting both parks we were ready to use our Universal Express again. We went on our favourite rides and were done within an hour and 40 minutes. We checked on Rip Ride Rock it, but it was supposed to open later that morning, so we skipped it.

We thought about going over to IOA, but then the thought of checking into Old Key West won!!
So we took the boat back to the resort, walked to the car and off we went! We drove right over to Old Key West, checked in and lucked out big time, since a one bedroom villa was already waiting for us! We were on the third floor with a view of the golf course and as we should later discover a view of the Epcot fireworks and a glimpse of Wishes!

By that time we were starving and we had just received our key to free disney dining, so off we went to our preferred counter service location, Wolfgang Puck's Express. Downtown Disney was packed, but we found a spot quite close to the restaurant and got in line to order our food. We could not believe it, but the server we had before the cruise was still there and she remembered us and took REALLY good care of us!

Now, on to the food!

Tom got the Rigatoni with Chicken Alfredo - fresh artisan rigatoni tossed in Alfredo sauce and sliced all-natural roasted chicken breast, topped with fresh Grana Padano parmesan. This is always a favourite and it is a HUGE portion, lots of chicken and pasta in a creamy sauce. And even some focaccia bread to mop up any leftover sauce.

Tom's entree came with a petite Caesar Salad. Fresh crisp romaine lettuce with creamy caesar dressing and home made croutons - right what the doctor ordered!

I had been longing for another one of the Spicy Chicken Pizzas for a long time - all natural chicken, roasted red and yellow peppers, mozzarella, tomoatoes, leeks, crushed red chilis and fresh cilantro! I was in heaven.

Dessert was my favourite Creme Brulee!

And the best of all of it? It was all FREE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

So what did we actually cost Disney?
2 CS credits (22 remain) = $ 44,80
24 TS credits remain
24 snack credits remain

Next up - a very special dinner at the California Grill

We LOVE LOVE the creme brulee at WPE, last time for the WHOLE entire trip the torch was broken - heck will break loose this time if it happens

 

[disneyfav4ever]

I'm definatly going to have to eat at Sanaa again next year.

 

[tinkmom2]

A few questions for you... Is Universal only for adults or do they have kid rides too? We have never been and were considering it next time we come to WDW. Also I hear Betty Boop is there. Did you happen to get any pics of her? Wolfgang Pucks looks awesome. I will have to give that one a try!
Christine

 

[Calgary DISHeads]

A few questions for you... Is Universal only for adults or do they have kid rides too? We have never been and were considering it next time we come to WDW. Also I hear Betty Boop is there. Did you happen to get any pics of her? Wolfgang Pucks looks awesome. I will have to give that one a try!
Christine

I would say it is adult focused, but not JUST for adults. For example the Dr Suess area is kidcentric. We took our kids when they were 11 and 8, and we had an amazing time and are going back this time for 4 days but I don't think I would have taken them any younger. There are a lot of height restrictions which sets up for disappoinments. DD is a huge coaster fan and couldn't get on either Hulk or DD.

 

[dizneeat]

Oh that ice cream looks sooooo good!

We love Ghirardelli's, their hot fudge is something to dream about!

We LOVE LOVE the creme brulee at WPE, last time for the WHOLE entire trip the torch was broken - heck will break loose this time if it happens

Oh my! I hope their torch is working when we go again in February! I have "a few" visits to WPE planned ........ and I WANT MY CREME BRULEE!!!!

A few questions for you... Is Universal only for adults or do they have kid rides too? We have never been and were considering it next time we come to WDW. Also I hear Betty Boop is there. Did you happen to get any pics of her? Wolfgang Pucks looks awesome. I will have to give that one a try!
Christine

I would say it is adult focused, but not JUST for adults. For example the Dr Suess area is kidcentric. We took our kids when they were 11 and 8, and we had an amazing time and are going back this time for 4 days but I don't think I would have taken them any younger. There are a lot of height restrictions which sets up for disappoinments. DD is a huge coaster fan and couldn't get on either Hulk or DD.

Actually I think it is more themed towards older kids/teens. We have never gone with kids, but from what I remember there are just a few things that would be suitable for your younger DD.
Many of the ride have height restriction too, so I could see quite some disappointment there.
As for the characters - we don't really care about them much. When we do UO/IOA it is just for the rides.
As fare as WPE - that is suitable for all ages, ! They have really good food and their frozen yoghurt with topping (we love it paired with fresh fruit) is nice too!

 

[dizneeat]

I'm definatly going to have to eat at Sanaa again next year.

We cannot wait to go back in summer 2010! Definitely on the "to eat at" list!

 

[dizneeat]

............ and still day 20, Sept 3

Dinner at Kouzzina

Well, there is a story behind this ADR!
When we booked our ADR they were still accepting ADRs for Spoodles. We had loved it the one time we were there and were hoping to squeeze in one more meal before they closed.
Then there were reports here on the DIS that Disney had cancelled their ressies for Spoodles, so I pulled up the online ressie and low and behold mine had been cancelled as well. Tom and I discussed what to do and we decided on having dinner at the Captain's Grill. About 2 weeks later I found a message on my answering machine - from DISNEY!!! They informed me that they had to cancel Spoodles, but we were rebooked at Kouzzina for their "soft" opening in early September.
We cancelled our Captain's Grill ADR, changed the time on our Kouzzina ADR twice and googled Cat Cora and Iron Chef! No one here in Austria knows her or Iron Chef, so we tried to find out as much as possible.
So this is WHY we went to Cat Cora's Kouzzina on that very night.

Okay, where did we leave off last time.

Mary Ellen and her family had left and Tom and I headed back to our Old Key West Villa. We relaxed for quite some time before we headed over to Epcot for our dinner at Kouzzina.
We arrived a few minutes before they opened the restaurant and we were handed a buzzer and told that we could have a look outside. We went to the sweets shop next door and no sooner than we had entered the shop our buzzer went off.
A Cast Member took us to our table, a four top in the middle of the room. Our server was quick to introduce herself and explain the menu. We ordered two Diet Cokes

and a pitcher of the Sangria. The server explained that they no longer served the ice in the pitcher, but instead it was in the glasses and should we need some more, we should just tell her.

We both LOVED the Sangria!

Our server had recommended the Crisp Calamari and Lemon - Coated in Aborio Rice Flour with Spicy Yogurt and Garlic Yogurt as a starter. We shared this and it was one of our favourite starters hands down.
There were thin slices of Calamari, slightly coated in batter and really crisp. Inbetween were very thin slices of batter coated and fried lemons - this was so good. Needless to say we even picked up the smallest pieces, because we enjoyed it so much.

Next came the bread! Now, this was a rather dense European style bread which we both loved, since we hadn't had any European bread in a long time.

It was served with butter and black Hawaiian Sea Salt.

Tom tried the Oak-fired Pork T-bone - with Farmhouse Greens and Citrus-Fennel Marmalade. He had never had a Pork T-bone, so we were curious. The meat was very well seasoned and really, really nice. The Farmhouse Greens and Citrus-Fennel Marmalade were out of this world.

I had the Wood-grilled Flank Steak - with fresh Herb Salsa and Kouzzina Potatoes. The meat had been marinated in brine and was tasty and tender. But I just loved the Kouzzina Potatoes. We were both so happy with our choices and our food.

The only thing we regret was that we had ordered the Sauteed Brussels Sprouts - with Capers and Lemon, but our server completely forgot about them and never brought them out, but there is always a next time.

Time for dessert. Both of us were actually rather full, but our server "insisted" on us at least trying dessert.

We ordered the A Sweet Ending to Your Celebration . . . Baklava - Traditional Walnut and Cinnamon Pastry with Pistachio Gelato. We both found it very heavy. It actually was LOADS of nuts rolled into phillo pastry. The pistachio gelato was nice, but we both could not eat more than a few bites of the Baklava.

But we really enjoyed this - Loukoumades - Freshly Made Greek Doughnuts drizzled with Warm Honey and two dipping sauces, a vanilla based one and a berry based one.
This was SO good. The Greek Doughnuts were light and not greasy at all and dipped into the sauces they were heavenly. We did not leave any leftovers there.

All in all this was a very pleasant experience and we will definitely go back next summer, we'll just give the Baklava a miss!

After our dinner we walked over to Epcot and got on a few rides before we headed to Marocco for the preferred fireworks viewing from the "landing" dock there.
The preferred fireworks viewing is a perk that comes with the Disney.co.uk package and we had enjoyed the Epcot one the year before too.

When the fireworks had ended we slowly walked to the car and drove back to Old Key West.

So what did we actually cost Disney?
6 CS credits = $ 151 (16 CS credits remain)
Kouzzina = $ 74,30
4 TS credits = $ 139,90 (18 TS credits remain)
Riverside Mill = $ 7,00 (22 snack credits remain)
all in all = $ 372,20
(only accounting for the things covered by the DDP!! Not covering any items purchased OOP)

Next up - breakfast at Boma

 

[KatMark]

That Flank Steak looks out of this world. I keep following your eating habits, I'll have to be in Disney for two weeks just to eat at all of these new yummy places.

 

[GoofySon'sMom]

Wow, I had written off Kouzzina off as a place I didn't want to eat but that pork looks delicious!

 

[Linda67]

It's great to see a good review of Kouzzina as there have been so many bad ones. Your pictures look great

 

[iluvpluto27]

Really enjoying your reviews. You seemed to have a better meal at Kouzzina than we did, but I agree that those Loukomades were absolutely delicious.

It's funny because we did exactly the same thing as you, had dinner at Kouzzina then used our preferred viewing of illumninations. I was really impressed with the view from there, and you got some great photos.

 

[mossyflossy]

mmmm looks good, esp the donuts, but still not convinced it's for us....and thank you for posting the pic from the preferred viewing spot...we didn't make it in Oct, but hope to next Aug instead as we'll probably book thro' disney uk again....

 

[klacey1]

That calamari looks delicious, but i don't know how I feel about batter coated lemon!
Don't feel boring about ordering the Four Cheese Pesto Pizza-- it's my favorite, too!! (Although, mmm, that Meatball and Parmesan looks really good!)

 

[MickeyNicki]

Wow...that review of Kouzzina is making me regret not booking it for our last trip....it looks fantastic! And I am really having withdrawls of WPE, havent dined there in over 18 months! The last time I had it was in the St Louis airport May 08 and believe me it wasnt the same as DTD!

 

[englishrose47]

Jus found this I am eating at Kouzzinas in Feb and am a little nervous but am reading your reviews anxiously waiting to get to Kouzzinas !!