The Dirty Dozen – 12 Days of Disney, Drinks & Dining - Updated 2/26

[tigerlilly]

I truly love reading your reports. They make me feel like I am in WDW. After the last few years that is a lovely thing too "feel" like. I have lurked in this report for sometime and decided to finally post.
Your reports are so fun and personal. I feel like I am hearing about my friends trip

I think I posted to one of your reports years ago (Casey was only 4 then) about you reminding me of my daughter. She is 25 now... happily married (wedded during the height of Covid no less and in the parking lot of the Anaheim Honda Center after cancelling their wedding in April of 2020) to a fun whiskey and beer lover like yourself!

Anywho. Thank you for all the hard work on dining reports and sharing your time in WDW with everyone here.

You will have a great time here on the West Coast (we are Californian's...the daughter I mentioned lives about 7 miles from DL in OC...she grew up to be an exciting CPA lol). Can't wait to read your West Coast dining reviews! Do Napa Rose... it is lovely

 

[luvpoohandcompany]

When we went down in December we went back to ordering appetizers and not putting our entree order in until we were done with it. If Disney can't time my meal right I'll time it myself

That’s exactly what we do too! I hate when they rush a meal so totally with you on this one

Great finish to your report. I mean who doesn’t love some elevator dancing You managed to save your AK day and get some freebie beer from Disney. I am in awe of your greatness
Casey as always has great taste and your final toppolino dinner looked so tasty plus you then took an extra vacation after your vacation which looked like a pretty fun time for all and definitely the best way to ease those “end of holiday blues”

 

[buzzrelly]

Since The Wave is no longer with us (RIP) I've got little more than that. And since I also forgot to take a picture we'll just use this as our chicken stand-in.

After lunch we were finally allowed into MK and were able to get our pirates, splash, big thunder, and carousel of progress on before bidding the parks adieu.

Always such a sad day

We started with their amazing Ricotta and bread again.

This seriously is one of the best things ever. Creamy ricotta with some acidity and sweetness from the vinegar and tomato jam. Perfection.

You going twice makes me regret yet again that we've skipped it like four times

But we were still 2 happy girls.

And beautiful

I say if I recall because my notes gets a bit sparse as we were distracted by the most amazing show.
We may have been at the Riviera but we'd somehow been transported to Batuu with the most amazing dinner show. Shocked Disney didn't charge extra for this "magical" experience.

That's hilarious!

Fitting way to end a fantastic trip.

Love the elevator dancing

And with that finally the dirty dozen comes to an end.

Aw, boo. I'm sad it's come to an end…it's literally the only report I've been following lately. We'll have to talk pre-planning for the west coast soon. I'm curious what your plans are! That trip is what's been most on my mind lately and I'm getting slightly annoyed that DL hasn't released any discounts past April 7. I've been patient long enough!

 

[2xcited2sleep]

Always sorry to see one of your fun reports come to an end. Hurrah for west coast plans! I'll be heading out toward the end of the year so I will be interesting in hearing any must-dos or stay away froms. Sorry the last morning at AK was a bit of a cluster. I am not an IT professional but I just don't understand how their systems can go down so often. LOVE that chicken rigatoni dish at Topolino's. SO good. And the lightsaber show was awesome! I'll have to request that next time.

 

[suse66]

On our last day we headed to my favorite Animal Kingdom but sadly it was a bit of a cluster. Crowds were insane, Everest was down, every ride had at least a 45 minute wait, and to add insult to injury the entire dining reservation system was also down

What a mess!

Thankfully The Wave was taking walk-ups since the reservation system had gone kaput. It must have been fate as we had a great server named Casey who sensed our exacerbation (or really liked our kids name) and brought us a couple of cold ones on the house.

Now that is old school Disney service.

While she was a little disappointed this was not actually bacon, and more like pulled pork, I thought it was delicious. The cheesy grits were definitely the best part and paired with the runny egg and tender pork it was a great combo. Good to see Steakhouse 71 still has this on their menu.

Mmmm, thinking about ordering this on the 16th when we are dining there.

For our final dinner of the trip we let Casey pick the restaurant and after a phenomenal experience a few days prior we were headed back to the Riviera Resort and Topolino's.

Sweet! Also Casey's dress is so sweet! I would totally wear that if it was in an adult size.

First and foremost this lobster was probably the best I'd ever had. It was cooked to absolute perfection and worth the $48 price tag by itself. As for the pasta it was well cooked but the sauce was just kind of bland. Definitely needed some spices to kick it up a notch. But we were still 2 happy girls.

I don't even like lobster and that looks delicious!

We may have been at the Riviera but we'd somehow been transported to Batuu with the most amazing dinner show. Shocked Disney didn't charge extra for this "magical" experience.

That's awesome!

My food pics were not on point but there were pretzels

You can never go wrong with pretzels!

And Jason and Casey even made his soon to be famous crab cakes

Yum! So much crab!

And with that finally the dirty dozen comes to an end. My sincerest thanks to everyone for following along all of these months. Writing about Disney and food is the next best thing to being there myself and I truly love sharing it with you all. Ok enough niceness. I'm pouring myself a drink and cheersing myself to finally getting this thing done.....

So fun to follow along again!

And the 113 days till we do it again.... West coast style.​

Will be living vicariously through your DL trip and taking notes for 2023!

 

[BroadwayHermione5]

So sad it’s over but looking forward to the next one!

 

[ThreeBoyMama]

Awesome report as always! Can’t wait for the next one. Might need Jason’s crab cake recipe~they look amazing!

 

[missjackiemcg]

We ended up cutting our losses and headed towards MK in hopes of park hopping early. You'll be shocked to know this wasn't allowed

UUUUGh. I cannot wait til (hopefully someday!!!) they let us return to pre-covid park hoppping! I DESPISE the 2:00 rule!

It must have been fate as we had a great server named Casey who sensed our exacerbation (or really liked our kids name) and brought us a couple of cold ones on the house.

Now that is my kind of pixie dust!!!

If I didn't read the description and KNOW those little funguses were in there, this looks AMAZING!!

The Swan blasts music in the elevators so every trip on it required us to bust a move. Fitting way to end a fantastic trip.

There's nothing like an elevator dance party! We loved that at Legoland when we took Jimmy. When you get in, there's regular elevator music playing, but as soon as the doors close, the lighting changes and a disco ball starts spinning with crazy music. When you get to your floor, the music and lighting changes back to boring as the doors open. It's so much fun!

 

[Avery&Todd]

and once again a FABULOUS trip report!!

We head back home on Saturday - in 6 days!! WOOT!! your reports get me even more excited about all the food and drink to be had!

 

[Wood Nymph]

It must have been fate as we had a great server named Casey who sensed our exacerbation (or really liked our kids name) and brought us a couple of cold ones on the house.

I discovered that the CMs don't always use their real names on their nametags. But whether she was a real Casey or not didn't matter since she was really nice to give you free beers.

For our final dinner of the trip we let Casey pick the restaurant and after a phenomenal experience a few days prior we were headed back to the Riviera Resort and Topolino's.

That's a nice picture of Casey standing in front of the mosaic. Her dress is cute, too.

Some elevator dancing. The Swan blasts music in the elevators so every trip on it required us to bust a move. Fitting way to end a fantastic trip.

I love the dance party. Would you stay at the Swan again?

And Jason and Casey even made his soon to be famous crab cakes

Those look good with lots of crab meat.

And the 113 days till we do it again.... West coast style.

Have you been to Disneyland yet? I would have to do tons of research to get it right.

 

[disneyAndi14]

Awesome report as usual, Disney dining is always so much more interesting when you put it to keyboard on the dining board!
Excited to hear about your DL food and drinks in the near future!

 

[StarWarsMomofGirls!]

Crowds were insane, Everest was down, every ride had at least a 45 minute wait, and to add insult to injury the entire dining reservation system was also down

There was a few days like this. Not good Disney!

We may have been at the Riviera but we'd somehow been transported to Batuu with the most amazing dinner show. Shocked Disney didn't charge extra for this "magical" experience.

That is hilarious!

But we were still 2 happy girls.

Great photo of you two!

Some elevator dancing. The Swan blasts music in the elevators so every trip on it required us to bust a move. Fitting way to end a fantastic trip.

Does Casey watch Norris Nuts? Gwen does ALL the TIME. (like literally right now) And they always dance in elevators.

Ok enough niceness. I'm pouring myself a drink and cheersing myself to finally getting this thing done.....

Cheers Lady! Great report as always!

And the 113 days till we do it again.... West coast style.

Awsome! I am 99% sure we are going to Disneyland NEXT Spring Break. Did you book anything yet? where are you going to stay?

 

[princessbelle2015]

I loved your dinning review! I can't wait to read your next one!

 

[kittylady1972]

Great report and those crabcakes look AWESOME! I mean I make a pretty mean crabcake myself of course.

Always enjoy your reports and makes me have some new food goals of course. Let's hope I have some success with that in about another week!

 

[amazingact21]

Sounds like a great final meal of the trip. Topolino's sounds delicious. I loved reading your report and can't wait to hear how DL's food measure up.

 

[Eastern]

Such a good dining report and I love the clickable index at the beginning. You covered so many restaurants I was wondering about.

 

[Jenny Sanders]

Yup ladies and gentlemen we've come to the longest and best dinner of our entire trip!

This was a long meal but worth every minute to spend time with you all. XOXO

And who were we meeting? My fabulous sister wife (@Jenny Sanders) and one half of the the YouTube sensation Jen and Joe on The Go.

I miss you soooooo much!

Beyond the food spending time with Jenny and Joe was everything we needed. And at a meal clocking in at 3+ hours even Casey was a trooper through it all.

Casey is amazing. I say this to you all the time but I will say it again...Casey is an awesome young lady!!!!!!

 

[erinch]

Resurrecting this!
Does anyone know where the crew that used to post such amazing reports disappeared to?

 

[csjordan]

Resurrecting this!
Does anyone know where the crew that used to post such amazing reports disappeared to?

Was wondering the same thing as I was reading through this.

 

[AliceNDinah]

The author of this report is one of the wittiest, most fun writers here. Her reports are so engrossing and hilarious - I really wish she would be back.....I feel like she hasn't been on here in a really long time.