Parks? What Parks? We're Here for the FOOD!**PICS!** COMPLETE!

[Ms. Heimlich]

Welcome to my dining review!

I hope you enjoy what I have to say and find some of it useful. Please post your thoughts on what I have to say!

I hope to do this day by day and sort of meal by meal. We did a ton of eating on this trip and I took pictures of most everything.


Pop Food Court - Day 1 - Right here!
Beachs & Cream, cake - Continued day 1 - Post 5
Riverside Mill & F&WF Booths - Day 2 - Post 8
Recipe for Soup - Post 12
Coral Reef Food & Wine Pairing - Post 16, page 2
More Food & Wine Booths - Post 17, page 2
Kona Cafe Dinner - Post 18, page 2
Kona Cafe Breakfast - Post 22, page 2
Pizzafari Lunch - Post 40, page 3

Chef's Table - part 1 - Post 41, page 3
Chef's Table - part 2 - Post 56, page 4
Chef's Table - part 3 - Post 60, page 4
Chef's Table - part 4.1 - Post 71, page 5
Chef's Table - part 4.2 - Post 74, page 5
Chef's Table - part 5 - Post 75, page 5
A Potty Break - part 5.1 - Post 83, page 6
Chef's Table - part 6 - Post 91, page 7
Chef's Table - part 7 - Post 98, page 7
Chef's Table - part 8 - Post 116, page 8
Chef's Table - part 9 - Post 119, page 8
Chef's Table - part 10 - Post 121, page 9
A Coffee Break - part 10.2 - Post 122, page 9
Chef's Table - Part 11 - Post 121, page 9
Chef's Table - Part 12 - Post 126 & 135, page 9
Overall Thoughts - Chef's Table - Post 137, page 10

Wolfgang Puck - DTD - Post , Page 10
Goofy's Candy Company Snack - Post 150, page 10
Gardenview Tea - Afternoon Tea - Post 160, page 11
Gardenview Tea - Afternoon Tea, part 2 - Post 167, page 12
Final Food of the Day - Casey's - Post 179, page 12

Sunshine Seasons & Starring Rolls - Post 193, page 13
Flying Fish - Post 195, page 13
Sassagoula Floatworks @ POFQ - Post 207, page 14
Food & Wine Festival Booths - Posts 222,223,224, page 15
California Grill - Post 243, page 17
California Grill, part 2 - Post 265, page 18
Captain Cooks (Polynesian CS) - Post 273, page 19

Final Thoughts - Post 274, page 19

_________________________________________________________________


Bon Appetit!

Day 1.

Today when we arrived at WDW, our first stop was to check in at POP. We got ourselves settled and headed down to the Everything POP Shopping and Dining food court. We hadn't checked in to our main resort yet so therefore we didn't have our dining plan yet either. We ordered one main course and a couple of sides to share.

We shared a Parmesan Chicken (it comes with a side arugula salad and breadstick), some carrots and celery with ranch, and a fruit cup. We also had a bottle of water to share.



Food totals:
Chicken Parmesan: $8.19
Carrots & Celery: $3.69
Fruit Cup: $2.99
Water: $2.00
Total OOP: $17.84

I thought the chicken was good. It wasn't dry or overcooked. The breading was a little too much in some places, but overall was really good. The salad was excellent. I loved the vinagrette dressing on it. The breadstick was okay... Not too good, not too bad. I thought the fruit cup was a little overpriced as it was just melon and grapes, but I felt better for eating it. The carrots & celery were.... Carrots & Celery. The ranch dressing that came with it was good (it was light - but didn't taste light) and we finished it.

Overall, I always think Disney food is overpriced, but this meal was satisfying and somewhat healthy so we walked away happy!

Stay tuned for more updates!

 

[TigerKat]

Love your thread title!!!!!!

 

[luckytobeme88]

subscribing

 

[engle]

Love it!! Subscribing...hope the rest are just as well described!!

 

[Ms. Heimlich]

Well, we had some time to kill before our Illuminations Cruise-Meet-Birthday-Anniversary Excitement, so we decided to have a No Way Jose at Beaches & Cream. This restaruant is located at the Beach Club and does NOT take ADR's.

I cannot speak to the food here, as we only had ICE CREAM...

Here is what we ate:



Basically, the No Way Jose is 3 scoops of vanilla ice cream topped with fudge sauce and melted peanut butter. All of that is then topped with Whipped cream, peanut butter chips and chocolate chips, and finally a cherry.

This is one DECADENT dessert! The warm peanut butter is so good combined with the hot fudge and cold ice cream!

We LOVED it. I could eat one right now!

Here is what it looked like AFTER we were finished...



I would recommend this to EVERYONE!!!

Cost:
No Way Jose $7.99
AFter Tax - $8.51
After Tax and Tip - Total OOP - $12.00

********************************************

I will also include the cake we had on our specialty Illuminations cruise here - a fellow dis-er ordered it so I can't give the specifics on cost or even what Disney gave us, but I can tell you it was good.

It was a white cake had a light frosting with a lemon filling. It was surprisingly good .



Have a great day!

 

[Ms. Heimlich]

Love your thread title!!!!!!

Thanks -- It's not just a thread title... It's a way of life!!

subscribing

STay tuned for good food!

Love it!! Subscribing...hope the rest are just as well described!!

I will try to describe everything as well as I can -- I truly hope you like what i have to say and find it useful!

Ms. H

 

[my3disneygirls]

That No Way Jose looks so good. My kids are peanut butter fiends, they would love that.

 

[Ms. Heimlich]

Even though we had checked in and gotten our DDP, we opted to pay OOP for breakfast.

The Port Orleans Riverside Food Court - The Riverside Mill - was not a bad place to grab a snack, but we were somewhat disappointed in their breakfast selection. We are not big (=heavy) breakfast eaters. I like oatmeal, yogurt, fruit, etc. Most of the breakfasts lean toward eggs, breakfast meats, pancakes, waffles, and potato type products.

We decided this morning to split a breakfast sandwich they offer.

The sandwich is a white bread that was kindof dry - it had the consistency of really thick white bread, eggs that were thick and dry, cheddar cheese, and a couple of pieces of rubbery bacon. We also got a small orange juice to split as well.



We did not get this sandwich again.

Breakfast Sandwich: $5.99
Small OJ: $1.99
Total OOP: $8.50



Lunch on Day 2

Today we snacked around the world for lunch - we were there during the Food & Wine Festival by design and DH REALLY wanted to get back there and taste some of the offerings.

So here we go:

Our first stop was Argentina (it was the first booth we came to that appealed to us!).

We ordered the Spicy Beef Empanada for $3.00 and the Dulce de Leche for $2.50. Total OOP $5.00


The empanada was good. The pastry was flaky and soft. The filling was spicy and flavorful but I wished there was more filling and less crust! The Dulce de Leche was excellent. The almonds on top were such a great addition to this classic dessert. We enjoyed BOTH of these samples!!

Total OOP $5.00

Next was Mexico.

Here we ordered the Chilaquiles for $3.75, the Quesadilla con Chorizo for $3.50, and a 6 oz Dos Equis for $2.50. Total OOP: $9.75
The Chilaquiles is basically a REALLY REALLY good chicken & cheese casserole topped with a YUMMY green sauce. This was one of the recipes we bought the Festival cook book for. The quesadilla was okay. It was well cooked and the chorizo was good, but overall it was.... boring. I live in TExas, so we get pretty good Mexican food. This just didn't compare! If you can't get mexican food where you live then try it! Thomas got a beer to drink (a Dos Equis).



Next we stopped at Ireland.

Here we ordered the Boxty with Bacon Chips and Kerrygold garlic and fresh herb butter for $2.25. I also got some Bunratty Meade Honey Wine for $3.75. Total OOP: $6.00

***We did NOT remember to get a photo here.***

I did not enjoy EITHER of these samples. The Boxty was lacking in flavor. It was bland. It was boring. The honey wine tasted like someone had added TOO much sugar to a weak beer. We threw most of this sample away.

Our Next Stop was India.

Here we ordered the Curried Butternut Squash Soup for $2.75 and the Coconut Indian Rice Pudding for $1.50. We also had a $2.00 bottle of water.

I LOVED BOTH of these samples. The soup was outstanding. I never knew I liked curry or butternut squash, but this soup changed my mind. The soup was spicy but not hot. IT was so flavorful! This was the other recipe we bought the festival cookbook for!
The pudding was sweet but not too sweet. We did not enjoy the coconut on the top, but after we scraped it off, we really liked it. India was a clear winner!

Total OOP: $6.25.


More Food & Wine to come!!

 

[FirstMagic]

I loved your Before and After pix of the No Way Jose! Looking forward to more reading of your food experiences!

 

[klinlin]

OMG--- I just laughed out loud at your title!! It describes us to a tee!! I spend most of my time on this board thinking about the food. (Heck I spend most of my time in general thinking about food!!)

 

[~*~Michelle~*~]

this is an awesome review!

 

[Ms. Heimlich]

Well, since it's fall - and the temperatures are coming down, I thought I would include the recipe for the soup we had in India.

I hope you enjoy.

2 Tablespoons butter
2 medium onions, peeled & finely chopped
1 teaspoon Madras curry powder
1/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon ground ginger
2 pound butternut squash, peeled, seeded, and coarsely chopped
4 cups water or chicken broth
Salt & Pepper to taste

Garnish
1/4 cup heavy cream
Ground cinnamon

In a large saucepan, heat the butter over low heat & stir in the onion, currry, cinnamon, and ginger. Cook, stirring frequently until the onions begin to brown.
Add the squash, the water/broth, and enough salt & pepper to taste. Bring the liquid to a boil over medium heat. Reduce the heat & simmer for 25 minutes uncovered or until the squash is soft. Set aside to cool slightly before pureeing.
Working in small batches, puree the soup in a food processor until smooth. Return the soup to the pot & reheat.
Season to taste.
To serve, divide the soup amoung four serving bowls and drizzle a small amount of cream on top and sprinkle with a pinch of cinnamon.

 

[Minniespal]

Brillant

 

[oybolshoi]

Hi Ms. H.

I see that you and your hubby have excellent taste in desserts ... the No Way Jose is sooooo good!

Looking forward to reading more about your F&W experiences!

 

[Ms. Heimlich]

I loved your Before and After pix of the No Way Jose! Looking forward to more reading of your food experiences!

We really liked this dessert. I think DH was surprised that I picked this one over the brownie sundae, but we ended up being very happy with our choice... Obviously!

OMG--- I just laughed out loud at your title!! It describes us to a tee!! I spend most of my time on this board thinking about the food. (Heck I spend most of my time in general thinking about food!!)

Me, too! I am a food fiend! We had such a good time on this trip trying different kinds of food! Thanks for reading!

this is an awesome review!

Thanks! I hope you enjoy the rest!

Brillant

Thanks!

Hi Ms. H.

I see that you and your hubby have excellent taste in desserts ... the No Way Jose is sooooo good!

Looking forward to reading more about your F&W experiences!

Thanks. More coming up soon!

 

[Ms. Heimlich]

Our next food adventure was a food and wine pairing at Coral Reef.


Chef Ronnie Strickland created a menu to pair with wines from Wente Vinyards. Phil Wente was there from the winery to discuss the different wines. All three wines were Merlots with suited us perfectly as we are red wine lovers.

We started the afternoon with a glass of (non-alcoholic) sparkling cider. It was nice.


On with the food…

Our first pairing was Wente Vineyards 2004 Crane Ridge Merlot paired with ChickenSchnitzel with a tossed salad and potato cake finished with tomato vinaigrette.

The winery says this wine has a smooth feel and tangy balanced tannins, this vintage offers undertones of blackberry and vanilla complemented with a smoky finish from oak aging.



This pairing was excellent. The chicken was pounded flat and schnitzel-ed. My favorite parts of this dish, however, was the vinaigrette and the salad. The wine and food paired perfectly and I finished both the wine and the food for this pairing. The wine was EXCELLENT. I love the flavor that comes from the oak barrel aging – it gives it a complex finish that we both greatly enjoyed. We are in the process of locating this wine at our local wine shop.

The second pairing was Wente Vineyards 2005 Sandstone Merlot paired with Ox Tail with roasted garlic mashed potatoes, a crostini, and finished with a merlot sauce.

The wine is described as having aromas of herbal tea, licorice, and blackberry accentuated with hints of spice and perfume. This wine has a smooth mid-palate that showcases flavors of cherry and truffles with tobacco undertones.



The wine and food paired perfectly here, but each taken on its own I was not enthralled with. I found the ox tail fatty (I gave a big chunk of it to DH because I found it unappealing).
The wine a little strong flavored and stout, but it had a smooth finish with out the “normal” red wine finish – where it bites back. The potatoes were EXCELLENT.

Dh and I both enjoyed this pairing, but the first was still our overall favorite wine and pairing as the first 2 we could enjoy independently.

The third pairing was Wente Vinyards 2004 Nth Degree Merlot paired with Lamb Chops with a touch of fontina cheese sauce and spoon bread.



The wine here is a specialty wine made at Wente Vineyards. The following paragraph was taken from the Wente Vineyard site.


“As part of The Nth Degree wine program, Winemaker Karl Wente and his uncle Phil Wente select the vine rows and often the individual vines that show the most promise. Every vine receives at least fifteen passes by vineyard workers to prune, pull leaves, remove shoots, and thin clusters in an effort to ensure that the grape clusters remaining at harvest are of the highest quality. The vineyard blocks are meticulously farmed, handpicked, sorted and brought to the new small lot winery Karl helped create at the family's estate winery facility. In this micro winery, the work is done by hand and Karl oversees every step of the process. Thirty one-ton fermenters enable Karl to vinify small quantities of grapes, with a focus both on quality and experimentation. The wines are aged in different types of oak from several coopers. After aging, Karl blends the best of the barrels together and bottles them in small batches.”


The Nth degree wines are not available for purchase to the general public but can be found in some special restaurants. This wine is described as being a complex wine with certain nuances of the barrel maker. It is aged in these barrels at least 18 months prior to bottling.

The food for this pairing was excellent. I loved the lamb chops and the fontina cheese sauce was so good I wanted to lick the plate clean. The wine paired very well with it as well and accentuated both the lamb and the cheese sauce. The spoon bread is basically a mushy cornbread that you can see under the lamb chop bones. I didn’t enjoy the spoon bread and the chef later told us that it didn’t rise as much as he would have liked so it wasn’t as light as he wanted. The wine here was VERY aromatic and I could smell many different things as the waiter was pouring it into my glass. I didn’t even have to put my nose up to it. It was however very strong and high in tannins so it “bites you back.”

Finally at the end of our pairing we were given a small sample of mango papaya sorbet. It was really sweet but really good! An excellent palate cleanser!



Final thoughts – I wish we had been given something to cleanse our palates in between each course like crackers or something. I found many of the flavors overwhelming by the end of the pairing. Other than that…

Would I do another food & wine pairing? YES. Definitely! DH and I both really enjoyed this experience and would have done it again in a heart beat.

Total Cost: $45 per person plus Tax.

 

[Ms. Heimlich]

Our last food & wine festival booths today were Champagne and Turkey. We were sufficiently liquored up, so I just got some food.

Turkey
We had the Manti for $3.50 and the Baklava for $2.50. Total OOP: $6.00
The Manti were little ravioli type things with beef filling. They were covered with a yogurt sauce and then topped with paprika butter.



I found these to be REALLY oily/greasy. The paprika buter was really good, but the greasyness of the ravioli overpowered anything that I might have enjoyed about this dish.

The baklava was... baklava. It was GOOD! We finished it.

Champagne
Duo of Chocoalte Truffles for $3.50. total OOP $3.50.

These were really good, but of course I preferred the dark chocolate one to the milk. Would I get them again? You bet. I. Love. Me. Some. Truffles.



More to come!

 

[Ms. Heimlich]

Having feasted on food from around the world and more food at the pairing, we were ready for a rest.

We departed Epcot and headed over to check into our "home" for the next 6 days.

Our next gastronomical adventure was PLANNED to be Chefs de France in Epcot...

After some discussion, we decided that I had made a boo-boo. It was Friday night, it was EMH at Epcot, and it was during the F&WF. We decided to avoid Epcot. I called Disney Dining and there was an available ADR at Kona Cafe for 9:00 pm - we took it and canceled our Chefs ADR.

Kona Cafe was a restaurant I had wanted to eat at for dinner but we couldn't fit it in... This was lucky!

We checked in, only waited a few minutes and were seated right along the railing by the walkway that leads out to the monorail or to Ohana.

Dh ordered iced tea and I ordered a Strawberry-banana smoothie.



We ordered our appetizers and the bread also came out with them (at the same time...)

Dh ordered the Pot Stickers:



I ordered the Crab Cakes:



And the Bread:



Dh loved his pot stickers. He said they weren't overly oily and that they had a great flavor. He really enjoyed them and he'd recommend them to anyone. He managed to finish them after telling me at the begining of the meal that he was going to save room for his entree... He really liked them! (I ate one, too!)

I also loved my crab cakes. The were mostly crab (very little breading) and were perfectly cooked. I have to admit, I knocked the pineapple chutney off before I ate them. I finished my appetizer and I also would recommend this appetizer. The salad in the middle was good too!

Our entrees were the Shrimp and Scallops for DH and I had the Tuna Oscar.





Dh wanted to order something light (small) so he chose the shrimp and scallops. He really enjoyed the sauce on the scallops and the shrimp were fried shrimp - it's hard to screw that up! He didn't each much of the rice in the middle, but he said the flavor was good. Overall he really liked it.

The Tuna Oscar is a relatively new menu item - it's described as rare tuna served with fried green tomatoes, tempura fried lump crab meat, and a wasabi hollandaise sauce. It was also served with some asparagus. This was FANTASTIC. I loved the spicy flavor of the tuna seasoning along with the fried green tomato. The hollandaise was SOOOO good - this was another moment when I wished it was consiered polite to lick a plate clean... I loved every bite of it. DH also really liked it. I would order this again in a minute.

Dessert was next... DH got his to go - Chocolate-macadamia nut tart - and we shared the Chocolate Fondue served with fresh fruit.





The fondue was outstanding. It was dark chocolate with fresh fruit to dip and the sugar cookie, too. It was both decadent and light at the same time. I loved it. Dh liked it too! Chocolatey goodness!!!

The tart reminded me of a pecan pie but made with a chocolate crust & macadamia nuts. I liked it and so did DH but we were never hungry enough to fully appreciate it.

The total on the reciept was $98.89 before tip and we used 2 TS meals. We also left a little extra tip even though the service was s-l-o-w.

Stay Tuned for more!

 

[maxiesmom]

Ohhh, that chocolate fondue looks sooo yummy. I love dark chocolate too.

Love your pictures, even though they are making me very hungry. Thanks for posting. I can't wait to see more.

 

[DLo]

Great reviews and pics. I appreciate your detailed descpriptions. I love Kona Cafe. I chose it for my 40th b'day last year. Looking forward to the rest of your reviews.