Sunday, September 6
La Cava del Tequila
Had to go for a last hurrah (until the food and wine festival) at The Ditch of Tequila. If youre in Epcot stop in and say hi to Jamie, Rafael, Hector and Pepe, the bartenders.
They have a tequila named after Frida Kahlo and she appears on the backs of some of the chairs. Maybe this is Unibrow as opposed to Unibroue.
One day I will have to try a shot of Frida. But today I am going out with the Pepino margarita.
This one has cucumber and agave nectar (agave nectar is a good vegan ingredient by the way). Its a little strange, but the more I drink it, the better I like it. I believe this one is also the strongest specialty margarita Ive had so far, with the exception of the one they threw an extra shot in for my birthday. Its in my top three my top three are the Naranja Roja (blood orange), Aguacate (avocado), and the Pepino (cucumber), but I have enjoyed all seven margaritas I tried here over the past 9 days.
My lunch was an order of guacamole (they really have some good guacamole and it has already received a Full Monty Burns) and shrimp cocktail.
They bring you these four beautiful little shrimp shooters. Theyre fun! And tasty, too.
Go and sit in the table in the back corner and you can have some fun with the Avenging Angel of Tequila.
This little guy is hanging up in the far right-hand corner of the seating area looking like hes about to dive into your guacamole. I think we took about five photos of him, when youre drinking a big margarita hes just that funny.
We also got some chips and salsa. They are not on the menu and you need to ask for them. They cost $3.50.
The downfall of The Ditch appears to be vegetarians and vegans. My friend tried to get something prepared that she could eat, and the best they could do was bring her a salad, which was a big pile of various greens and some oil and vinegar. She cant eat the chips because theyre cooked in oil containing lard. So are the chicharrones accompanying the guacamole. The salsa was okay for vegans. All the other appetizers contain seafood or chicken, except for the fruit and vegetable enchilada, and there was some concern with what the tortilla was cooked in and what type of sweetener was used. (You meat eaters out there note that The Ditch doesnt have any red meat appetizers). She does think that some if not all of the margaritas might be OK for vegans due to the use of agave nectar for sweetening, but she didnt ask about them, so vegans should check with the bartender.
The Epcot Wine Walk
You can now do a wine walk at Epcot if youre touring the countries like we were. The participating countries are Germany, Italy and France. You can buy a wine walk card at any of these countries for $20, carry it with you, and at each of the three countries listed you can get half-glasses of two different wines. Pictures of wine arent really that interesting, so I didnt photograph the wines. The German pavilion poured the wine into the tiny glasses used for tasting portions at the festival, but they filled them up, not stopping at the tasting portion line. France and Italy both used regular sized plastic wine glasses and filled them about halfway. You can take both wines with you, or you can take one, then come back and get the other one. They stamp the card for each wine you get. The upshot is that you receive the equivalent of 3 full glasses of wine for $20 (six half glasses). It isnt a bad deal for Epcot.
Its two whites in Germany (Liebfraumilch and a riesling), a pinot grigio and Rosa Regale from Italy, and a white and a red in France.
Ohana
Im going to start by getting the bad stuff out of the way first, not that it was food-related bad. Ohana is probably the messiest restaurant in all of WDW. We had a late seating and were among the last to leave and you would not believe the mess in that place. The other problem was the servers we had two that worked our table, and one was frantic and the other surly.
The good stuff
This is our (blurry) view.
We got a table right by the window with a very good view of Wishes at MK. Its a long way off but I think the view here is better than the California Grill.
This is a Backscratcher.
That refers to both the drink and the thing sticking out of it. The drink is two kinds of rum, passion fruit juice and a Jack Daniels floater. Use the straw, dont sip from the glass, or you get straight Jack. And you get to keep the handy bamboo backscratcher. I do like practical drinks.
This is Chef TJ.
Vegans love TJ, and he loves vegans. If you are a vegan or vegetarian TJ will make up a really amazing meal for you. He used to do this when he works at Boma, and he still does it at Ohana. So bring along a vegan friend if you really want to know what Chef TJ has to offer. (Hes doing a culinary demo at the Food & Wine Festival on September 30 if you want to see him break loose from the menu.)
Because we had someone with dietary restrictions in the party, they cant serve us until the chef chats with her about the food. So we were not served until TJ was able to break away and visit the table. He says he had lots of assistants at Boma but is pretty much on his own at Ohana, so it took a little while. Be good and hungry though, because Ohana means no one goes away hungry and we will feed you until you scream. Or explode, whichever comes first.
Here is the regular salad:
Greens, with lime and honey dressing (obviously not vegan but good for those of us who are not). The dressings pretty good. Lisa:
Chicken sticky wings and pork pot stickers:
I just love these. I could buy dishes of these and eat them for dinner. I did get to eat all the pot stickers because nobody else ate pork. Theyre just awesome. One Burns for both courses:
Bowl of steamed broccoli:
Its good broccoli. But its just broccoli.
The Infamous Noodles:
Theyre infamous because they replaced those scalloped potatoes that people seemed to love so much. I was not a fan. I like the noodles but theyre not as good as the wings and stickers. Lisa
Its hard to take photos of the meats. There is beef, turkey, pork and shrimp on skewers. If you have an aversion to meat, be careful here, because they carry the skewers around and plop them on the table to ask if we wanted any. The tables small and the meat is very close to those who have aversions and the servers yell Dont you want any meat?
I didnt try the pork. But heres my rundown on the skewers:
Beef: Ned
It was cooked okay and tasted okay, but had fat and chewy gristle. Big no no for me. If I cant cut it, then I cant chew it.
Turkey: Lisa
Cooked pretty well. It was still a bit juicy. Nice spices.
Shrimp: Lisa
I love the grilled shrimp. But you have to peel them, and they are incredibly messy.
, all 3 of my kids are huge foodies, well behaved in restaurants and would adore all the stuff you ate at jiko, so this may be an option...
