Restaurant reviews May 25-May 29

[Remy is Up]

AP Holder, TIW. We like to eat at new places at Disney when we go and have our go to places as well. For this trip it was myself, Fiance, Niece. Niece is a bit picky and prefers basic fare, so for this trip we stayed away from the normal places we might go and tried a few that were not norms for us. I wish I had better reports than this one because it may be the most disappointed Ive been in Disney restaurants in a long time.

Day 1- Lunch at Blaze- Excellent. Food was well prepared and the AP discount covers tax. 3 pizzas, one soft drink, and a couple of beers. Was just to relax a bit before checking in after an EMH morning at MK.

Dinner- Tusker- Have not been there in a while but I figured a buffet would have food to please a picky eater and have cool stuff I like to try. That was wrong. Service was not great, the food was average at best. Even with TIW, I still this may be the worst value I couldve gotten in AK. I love Tiffins, Yak, Canteen. This was not good. Wont go back anytime soon.

Day2- Lunch Pepper Market after morning EMH at AK. SHouldve eaten at AK. The food was bad and we just wanted something small to get by until dinner at Yachtsman. We didnt walk into pepper market again after this.
Dinner- Yachtsman- The one big meal on the trip and one restaurant always in my top 5 on property. This was the biggest disappointment and after 10 or so times eating there, I know what to order and have never felt rushed or ignored by a waiter. The last time there the food was excellent, the server was excellent. This time...We order the porterhouse everytime we go and split it. They changed the presentation from a flat iron skillet to a gravy bowl looking thing. I know regardless order rare because it keeps cooking in the skillet. Our server insisted that the new presentation order it medium rare. When it arrived it was cooked in varying degrees from Medium to medium well. We never received bread, we ordered a glass fo wine each and he left the bottle on the table only to remember it at the end of the meal. By that time I was so frustrated I didnt order any dessert and we usually order the Sundae because the gelato is excellent. Even with the TIW discount, this was the worst meal Ive ever had at Yachtsman. Strike one. Ill go back because it couldve been a bad day or bad server, but, one more experience like that and Ill drop it off my list.

Day 3- Lunch- Garden Grille- Another restaurant I have not been to in a while and it reminded me why not. Food was average at best. Some of it cold. Mac and cheese was sticky and not creamy, Pot Roast was heavy and overpowered by a too thick gravy. Server was ok, but, again the meal felt rushed. Only good point was the dessert and the fact TIW took 20% off the meal.
Dinner- Columbia Harbor House- Did the online order and food was ready and hot. Grabbed a quiet spot upstairs and for counter service, this was a decent meal. Im not a fan of any MK restaurants other than Skipper, but, that menu is a bit too daring for the niece. CHH was a good compromise.

Day4- Did some booths here and there but wasnt feeling well so decided to concentrate on dinner at Via Napoli. Again, a go to restaurant that never has let me down. On this occasion, it did. I ordered a personal pizza and Niece and Fiance ordered pasta. Their pasta came first and my pizza had not even gone in the oven 20 minutes later. I felt bad for our waiter because he obviously doesnt control the kitchen but I had them cancel the pizza and spoke with the manager about the failure of the kitchen. Very nice guy and he gave us our drinks on the house and apologized. I still got the TIW discount and Ill go back to Via but be sure to just order pizza and never order both pizza and pasta at one meal.

Day5- Lunch at Homecomin- FINALLY a meal worth the time. As always, Homecomin was excellent. Got the 22 buck refillable bottles since we go so much we will make use of them. The Chicken sandwich was spot on as usual and the Teashine was so refreshing. But, the highlight was the Hummingbird cake and a really nice conversation with the dining room manager. Homecoming is now firmly entrenched in my top 5 restaurants on the whole Disney property.

 

[pattyw]

So sorry to hear about the bad meals!! We haven't tried Yachtsman in years- little worried now!

We have TIW too , so we are regular Disney diners! I don't like some of the recent changes, however. Too many similar items at many restaurants.

 

[Remy is Up]

Agreed and I wouldnt fret yachtsman. Ill never bail on a place becauise of one bad experience. When it becomes a trend I worry.

 

[heidijanesmith]

We had very similar issues at Yachtsman and Via Napoli this last trip.

Via Napoli used to be a must for us, we have always had good to excellent service and the pizza is fantastic. DD ordered spaghetti and DH and I ordered pizza. The spaghetti came 30min prior to our pizza arriving!! I understand now that they are two different kitchens, but you can not tell me that they can not send out the spaghetti and pizza at the same time. Our local pizza place does it, no problem. We had terrible service this time, it was just an awful experience.

We have heard great things about Yachtsman and made a reservation there for Father's day. We are from Iowa and love a good steak. We eat steak quite often and were excited to try this eatery. We had the worst service and our steaks were all cooked incorrectly. A restaurant specializing in steak should know how to cook a medium-rare and a medium-well done steak. We have only been there once and will probably not go back, there are just so many other places we like better to eat.

 

[NYCgrrl]

Thank you for taking the time to write up your experiences!.

 

[Jadyreen1282]

Yachtsman never let us down either. But an off day is an off day.

 

[phyllis1966]

I’m sorry your dinner at Via Napoli was such a disappointment! We were there the week before you, and this was about our fourth time dining there over the years. For the first time ever, our server told us that pizza and pasta are cooked in two different kitchens, and if we planned to order both, they’d come out at different times. It’s unfortunate that all the servers aren’t informing diners of this situation.

 

[OneinThree]

I don't know what's going on at the Yachtsman these days, but it's not isolated.

From someone I know, last week:

I got the Rib Eye and ordered it medium. Unfortunately it was undercooked. Also while the Manager did come out and offer everything to us but the kitchen sink, the waitress we had (service wise) was poor. It took her a while to greet us and we felt somewhat rushed once she did come to our table. Our ADR time was 8:30pm. I did try the Filet and it was great. The only reason this restaurant isn't at the bottom of the list is because of the manager who did spend quite a bit of time talking to us and apologizing and wanting to fix things. I probably would give this restaurant another shot but it didn't leave a good impression food wise.

 

[DisneyHardin]

Thanks for the reviews. We had a bad experience at Yachtsman last year. It was our first visit and I was so excited because I had heard so much about it. Our steaks were way over cooked. Mine so much that I sent it back and the new one wasn't much better. We've had MUCH better steaks at Texas Roadhouse.

 

[gharter]

So sorry to hear about your experiences.
You had several that should have been good and for whatever reason, underperformed. Hopefully you have better luck next time.

 

[focusondisney]

I’m sorry your dinner at Via Napoli was such a disappointment! We were there the week before you, and this was about our fourth time dining there over the years. For the first time ever, our server told us that pizza and pasta are cooked in two different kitchens, and if we planned to order both, they’d come out at different times. It’s unfortunate that all the servers aren’t informing diners of this situation.

That was good that he told you that. But wouldn't a good server put the pizza & pasta orders in separately? Shouldn't the server try to time them to come out as close together as he could?

 

[Airb330]

AP Holder, TIW. We like to eat at new places at Disney when we go and have our go to places as well. For this trip it was myself, Fiance, Niece. Niece is a bit picky and prefers basic fare, so for this trip we stayed away from the normal places we might go and tried a few that were not norms for us. I wish I had better reports than this one because it may be the most disappointed Ive been in Disney restaurants in a long time.

Dinner- Tusker- Have not been there in a while but I figured a buffet would have food to please a picky eater and have cool stuff I like to try. That was wrong. Service was not great, the food was average at best. Even with TIW, I still this may be the worst value I couldve gotten in AK. I love Tiffins, Yak, Canteen. This was not good. Wont go back anytime soon.

We just got back from the same 4 nights, also TIW/AP holders, and also generally try new places. We went with my stepdad who sounds similar to your niece. We agree 100% with Tusker. We waited 30 minutes for a table and overall it was not good! This was our second visit to Tusker, with the first time being a very nice lunch in 2016.

This time the service was scattered, and the food was not great. The carved pork was fatty and seemed cheap and the other "carved meat" was salmon. I thought that was odd. Have salmon but don't count it as a carving station meat. Before we had prime rib and turkey I believe in 2017. The shrimp curry was good, but that's about all I can remember really enjoying. The mashed potatoes and other cheap generic stuff was fine, but for $47 it was not great. Kids were louder than any other place I've ever been on property this time too, but I cannot fault the restaurant for that. We wish we did Tiffins too because for the price we paid we could have had an excellent dinner there. We are very disappointed and it easily was the most disappointed we've been at a Disney restaurant in 5+ years. We ate there Monday night.

 

[Tigger's ally]

I’m sorry your dinner at Via Napoli was such a disappointment! We were there the week before you, and this was about our fourth time dining there over the years. For the first time ever, our server told us that pizza and pasta are cooked in two different kitchens, and if we planned to order both, they’d come out at different times. It’s unfortunate that all the servers aren’t informing diners of this situation.

I worked in the restaurant business for years and I can't wrap my arms around the thought of not having all the diners at each party getting their food at the same time (at least relatively that is). It goes against my inner beliefs not just in the business, but in my home as well!

 

[Remy is Up]

I had a good chat with the dining room manager at Via and his explanation made sense to a degree. Half of the servers there have never worked in a restaurant before and the turnover of servers is extremely high as they are only there a year or less and it turns constantly. he said trying to get the kitchen to plan pizzas and pastas out of two kitchens to come out accordingly created more of a mess and the servers are supposed to tell the guests that the food may not come together. Being as Ive never ordered pasta there before I didnt know this and the server didnt tell us. It was understandable and the manager was very nice about it. It was disappointing, as I love their pizza, but, I think it was the culmination of a whole trip where the food and service was just very poor. Thankfully Homecomin didnt let me down.

 

[krum]

our server told us that pizza and pasta are cooked in two different kitchens, and if we planned to order both, they’d come out at different times.

In other words, the service is bad by design. This is completely unacceptable.

 

[krum]

Half of the servers there have never worked in a restaurant before and the turnover of servers is extremely high as they are only there a year or less and it turns constantly.

All I'm hearing here are excuses. The cost of the food at these places is high enough that they should keep professional wait staff.

 

[Tigger's ally]

All I'm hearing here are excuses. The cost of the food at these places is high enough that they should keep professional wait staff.

You new here? It is Disney Dining we are talking about here.

 

[OneinThree]

I had a good chat with the dining room manager at Via and his explanation made sense to a degree. Half of the servers there have never worked in a restaurant before and the turnover of servers is extremely high as they are only there a year or less and it turns constantly. he said trying to get the kitchen to plan pizzas and pastas out of two kitchens to come out accordingly created more of a mess and the servers are supposed to tell the guests that the food may not come together. Being as Ive never ordered pasta there before I didnt know this and the server didnt tell us. It was understandable and the manager was very nice about it. It was disappointing, as I love their pizza, but, I think it was the culmination of a whole trip where the food and service was just very poor.

It's one thing to receive sub-par service. It's totally unacceptable for a manager of all people, to provide those sorts of excuses which basically amounts to complaining to a guest. They must have some serious turnover in management as well, if this is any indication.

 

[Airb330]

Day2- L
Dinner- Yachtsman- The one big meal on the trip and one restaurant always in my top 5 on property. This was the biggest disappointment and after 10 or so times eating there, I know what to order and have never felt rushed or ignored by a waiter. The last time there the food was excellent, the server was excellent. This time...We order the porterhouse everytime we go and split it. They changed the presentation from a flat iron skillet to a gravy bowl looking thing. I know regardless order rare because it keeps cooking in the skillet. Our server insisted that the new presentation order it medium rare. When it arrived it was cooked in varying degrees from Medium to medium well. We never received bread, we ordered a glass fo wine each and he left the bottle on the table only to remember it at the end of the meal. By that time I was so frustrated I didnt order any dessert and we usually order the Sundae because the gelato is excellent. Even with the TIW discount, this was the worst meal Ive ever had at Yachtsman. Strike one. Ill go back because it couldve been a bad day or bad server, but, one more experience like that and Ill drop it off my list.

Was this 5/26? We actually ate there around 5:20 on 5/26. We had a great meal and I am sorry you did not. Our server was awesome, and we were seated in the small rotunda overlooking the pool (it has the cool ceiling). I would have been frustrated too; it does seem like lots of the problems were based on the server except the steak. We had bread, multiple glasses of wine, and the steaks (Filet, NY Strip, Ribeye) were all cooked perfectly. I'm glad you're keeping an open mind and will try it again, but yes that experience was certainly not signature!

After I wrote my post about Tusker earlier I actually decided to write WDW regarding it because the more I thought about it, the more annoyed I became. I'm not looking for anything, but want to let them know it was not up to par and really the worst dining experience we've had on property.

 

[Remy is Up]

Possibly. I am a foodie and appreciate a really good meal. But, not so snooty I cant appreciate the typical Disney park fare either. But, there is something to be said for the food and service being a little better considering the prices. I always look for best "value". Places like Homecomin, Boma, Captain Cooks, Blaze, Nomad Lounge and on the higher end Cali Grill, Morimoto etc. I could name others but Via and Yachtsman were on my decent "value" especially with the TIW discount. But, they certainly were disappointing on this trip.