Mmm-mmm-mmm-mmm-mmm - 9 Days of Disney Dining (food report)

[Crystal_27]

Great pictures! How much adjusting did you need to do the exposure on your computer?

Well, I develop my RAW pictures using Photoshop Elements, so for each picture I typically adjust the exposure, fill light, and white balance (and sometimes the saturation and contrast). In shooting RAW, you can get up to 2 more stops of exposure, but I don't think I've ever boosted exposure that much and had a workable result - LOL. Even with my adjustments, though, each picture takes less than a minute to "develop" and I think the results are well worth the time investment.

Great reviews and pics!

Thank you so much for reading. My next update should be up tonight.

is it heavy? I looked it up. Sounds like a great camera.

Actually, Olympus dSLRs are the smallest and lightest on the market because they have a 4/3s ("cropped") sensor. Olympus developed its digital camera line from the ground up, opposed to what Canon and Nikon (et al.) did when they just used their film bodies as a starting point when they went digital. Olympus also pioneered the "live view" and "dust filter" technology that most dSLRs have now. The drawback of Olympus, though, is that because of the cameras' smaller sensors, they do not perform as well in high ISO settings (ISO 800 and 1600) as Canon and Nikon (et al.). However, since I don't typically shoot in high ISO situations, Olympus is perfect for me. Honestly, though, most cameras pretty much are on the same ground when it comes to features and options. I started out with an Olympus point-and-shoot, graduated to a dSLR, and upgraded this year to my second dSLR. I know the strengths and weaknesses of the Olympus brand and try to shoot in a way that gets the most from the camera and minimizes the weaknesses. Sorry for my novel reply (I told you photography is something I'm passionate about) - please feel free to PM me if you have any other questions.

 

[NeverBeen2DW]

well to be honest you lost me in the lingo long ago! LOL! I love taking pictures but you know a heck of a lot more than me! Just a quick question what requires a high ISO settings? and what is shooting in the raw. I would PM you but I do not know how sorry.

 

[SunnieRN]

Great reviews, beautiful pictures and gorgeous daughter!

 

[Montana Minnies]

So, after our uneaten lunch, we were very much looking forward to our dinner at Coral Reef. As a surprise for my family, I had contacted Debbi at the Coral Reef to ask for a personalized menu, and she turned around and surprised me by offering us a diver too. How fabulous, right?

Well, we were treated to the best seats in the house - right next to the tank. Also, DD's personalized menu was so adorable!

We ordered DD a special drink with a glow cube in it and we got some very good bread to munch on before our meal.

DD ordered pizza (which also came with carrot and celery sticks for an appetizer), and DH and I both got the steak.

We were eating our meal with such great anticipation of our diver and kept expecting to see him at any time. We didn't tell DD about the diver but I think she knew something was up because we kept glancing at the tank every few minutes. After dinner, she tells me that she has to go potty, so I took her, but left the camera and strict instructions on its settings for DH just in case the diver came in our absence. When we got back to the table, still no diver but we thought he was going to show up any minute becuase DH said that while DD and I were in the bathroom that our waiter came by and said "oh, you guys had a banner." When we finally saw our waiter again we ordered our desserts (ice cream sundae for DD and the chocolate wave for DH and I) and keep waiting and waiting.

About the time our desserts were arriving, the manager comes by our table and tells us that our waiter neglected to inform the diver which side of the restaurant we were sitting at, so the diver went to the wrong side of the restaurant to show our sign.

Oh, I can't begin to tell you how disappointed I was, but since the diver is a free service offered by the Coral Reef, it's not like I could actually show my disappointment. I just told the manager "that's okay, thanks anyway" and proceeded to eat my chocolate wave, which was like nectar from the Gods.

I guess the one good thing that I can take out of it was that the family on the other side who got our sign must have thought they were granted a "dream" because the sign was very general and said "Hugs and Kisses, Love, Ariel."

I have to tell you guys, though, that our waiter had an attitude about him the entire night, and it was so disheartening that our "once in a lifetime" experience didn't matter enough to him to take one minute and properly direct the diver. Jerk. It's sad, but thankfully DD didn't know what she was missing, and was having a fabulous time playing with her glow cube - LOL.

Total cost with tip (and, yes, we still tipped 18%) was $120.99. We will definitely go back to Coral Reef (despite our disappointment with the diver experience) because the food was so, so good - the steaks were perfectly cooked and were fabulous, and the chocolate wave was *so* incredible.

As always, thanks for reading!

I was interested in reading your review of the Coral Reef as we were thinking of eating there our next trip. I'm glad you enjoyed your meal. We've never eaten there before and I was curious as how the food is. I had read a review that was not too favorable, so I think we will check it out for ourselves since yours was good.
Also enjoyed your other reviews and your pictures are wonderful.

 

[iluvpluto27]

I'm a bit late jumping on board with this review, but I've just read the whole thing and I'm in awe of your pictures! They're all so good. Really enjoying your reviews, but sorry you didn't get your banner at Coral Reef.

 

[Crystal_27]

well to be honest you lost me in the lingo long ago! LOL! I love taking pictures but you know a heck of a lot more than me! Just a quick question what requires a high ISO settings? and what is shooting in the raw. I would PM you but I do not know how sorry.

I'll PM you!

Great reviews, beautiful pictures and gorgeous daughter!

Thank you so very much!!

I was interested in reading your review of the Coral Reef as we were thinking of eating there our next trip. I'm glad you enjoyed your meal. We've never eaten there before and I was curious as how the food is. I had read a review that was not too favorable, so I think we will check it out for ourselves since yours was good.
Also enjoyed your other reviews and your pictures are wonderful.

Thank you very much for reading! We also had read a lot of mixed reviews about Coral Reef, but our food was absolutely perfect. Hopefully, you'll have just as good a meal as we did if you choose to dine there.

I'm a bit late jumping on board with this review, but I've just read the whole thing and I'm in awe of your pictures! They're all so good. Really enjoying your reviews, but sorry you didn't get your banner at Coral Reef.

Thank you for joining my food review party. Glad you're enjoying the reviews - the next one will be up shortly.

 

[Crystal_27]

Since we were nearing the end of our trip, we had used up all of our TS credits and were spending our last full day trying to use up our CS and snack credits.

Breakfast found us (once again) at Captain Cooks, where I ordered a Mickey Waffle and DH ordered the Breakfast Platter for all three of us to split.

As had been the case with every breakfast that we ate at Captain Cooks, we found the food to be tasty, hot, and satisfying. The cost was approximately $23.00.

We hit Wolfgang Puck's Express for lunch and ordered a roast beef and cheddar sandwich and a pepperoni margherita flatbread with frozen yogurt and a cookie for dessert.

Total for this meal was $33.65 and, again, it was very, very good.

Since we were already at DTD, we decided to head to Goofy's Candy Shop to try and blow the remainder of our snack credits. We actually ended up buying items that were not covered by the DDP, so we had to pay out of pocket for them, but I did take some pictures of some of the offerings that I thought you all would enjoy.

For dinner that night, since we were attending Mickey's Not So Scary Halloween Party, we opted for Pecos Bills. We ordered burgers all around and they were very tasty. Total for this meal was $23.58.

All right, guys, this brings us to our last meal at Disney - breakfast at Captain Cook's before we hit the road. DH ordered one last offering of Tonga Toast, I ordered the Skillet for DD and I, as well as these yummy pastries to snack on.

For all of you "number crunchers" out there, my next post will contain some math as well as my thoughts on the DDP as a whole.

I can't tell you guys how much I have appreciated your interest, compliments, and support in reading this report. Thank you from the bottom of my heart.

 

[luckytobeme88]

Where did you take those amazing firework pictures of the cindy castle? It looks like somewhere we will want to watch "Wishes" from. Thanks.

 

[janloz]

I just found your food reviews and photos which are both wonderful. We leave in 11 days and are eating at many of the same places so it was nice to see them. thanks.

 

[Crystal_27]

Where did you take those amazing firework pictures of the cindy castle? It looks like somewhere we will want to watch "Wishes" from. Thanks.

We were right in the middle of the masses on Main Street - LOL. We actually were a little bit back from the main hub (and the real craziness), on the left sidewalk, near a trashcan. It was a good location!

I just found your food reviews and photos which are both wonderful. We leave in 11 days and are eating at many of the same places so it was nice to see them. thanks.

Oh, enjoy your trip, you lucky thing! Glad my review was helpful to you!!

 

[Ciciwoowoo]

I really enjoyed your review and love your pics! Your daughter is just as cute as can be!

 

[Crystal_27]

Even though we were going to Disney in September (during free dining), we opted for a room discount at the Poly and paid out of pocket for the dining plan. Therefore, it was very, very important for me to come out ahead with dining costs.

The dining plan for 8 nights cost us $688. The total that we paid for the food we ate on the dining plan (not including tips) would have been $963.40, so we saved $275.40 by using the dining plan. Our tips, refillable mug, and Cinderella's Royal Table cost us another $250.79. So, essentially, for $938.79, we got $1,214.19 worth of food. Not bad at all.

I think that we were all very happy eaters on the DDP. We had a couple of "just okay" TS meals, one horrible CS meal and, other than that, we were very happy with all of our restaurant and entree choices. Also, there was something very gratifying about not having to worry about the cost of an entree when sitting down to eat.

I will say, however, that we got a lot of mileage out of our CS meals by splitting two adult CS meals at one time. Instead of 16 adult/8 child CS credits, we used them so that we ended up with 24 adult CS credits. I'm sure that is where we found most of our savings with the DDP, and I'm quite sure that that little "loophole" will be closed next year with the Quick Service plan - LOL.

The only drawback that I encountered was that I got *sick* of Captain Cooks by the end of our trip. Most days, we had breakfast and lunch at Captain Cooks, and it just got old by the end of the trip (although the food was always very good - it all just ended up tasting the same).

Again, I thank everyone for hanging in there with me, and for saying such wonderful things about my DD and my pictures. I hope that this report was helpful to you all. Please free free to post any questions you have. Take care everyone!

 

[Crystal_27]

I really enjoyed your review and love your pics! Your daughter is just as cute as can be!

Thank you!!! I really had a great time reliving my trip through food.

 

[wilma-bride]

Woohoo, more food - yum! Is it wrong that a plain ole croissant looks so damn delicious

Great reviews - thanks so much for posting them

 

[Crystal_27]

Woohoo, more food - yum! Is it wrong that a plain ole croissant looks so damn delicious

Great reviews - thanks so much for posting them

Yes, and that croissant was perfect - flaky and soft and yummy. Thanks again for reading!!

 

[Donald is #1]

Well, I develop my RAW pictures using Photoshop Elements, so for each picture I typically adjust the exposure, fill light, and white balance (and sometimes the saturation and contrast). In shooting RAW, you can get up to 2 more stops of exposure, but I don't think I've ever boosted exposure that much and had a workable result - LOL. Even with my adjustments, though, each picture takes less than a minute to "develop" and I think the results are well worth the time investment.

Very interesting! My new DSLR (Nikon D300) is much better for RAW mode than my previous one (D100). So I have been toying with the idea of switching to RAW mode but I haven't pulled the trigger yet.

 

[Crystal_27]

Very interesting! My new DSLR (Nikon D300) is much better for RAW mode than my previous one (D100). So I have been toying with the idea of switching to RAW mode but I haven't pulled the trigger yet.

Oh, you should totally do it. I'm serious, once you see the detail that you've been losing with JPEG and once you realize how much more flexibility you have with your pictures, you will be hooked on RAW. It is a time investment but it's well worth it! If you have any questions along the way, just PM me! Good luck and happy shooting!!

 

[Mocharilla]

Great review!!

It was great to read it, since yours was the first TR I ever read (your cruise one)

 

[Crystal_27]

Great review!!

It was great to read it, since yours was the first TR I ever read (your cruise one)

YAY - glad you found me the second time around too. Thanks for reading!!

 

[TigerKat]

Thanks so much for taking the time to post your reviews!