So here's the thing.
I write great trip reports in my head when I am at WDW.
You would be impressed.
No Really!
But I found on my last day there while being interviewed for a survey that I could barely remember which day I had been where. Now writing it down might be a good idea, but then you have to be organized and keep paper and pen handy and when you get right down to it that is way to much work on vacation. Now you may be thinking that we had way to much to drink while down there and thats why it's all a blur. You would be wrong. We're just naturally that way.......
So who are we:
This I can handle: DH 47-disney fanatic
Me 47-hey I consider myself one of Walt's kids
On our 11th (we think) trip to the world and maybe about 4 without the kiddies. (so sad, they have college and all)
What you say, it can't possibly be fun without the kiddies...
TRUST ME!!!
RESTAURANTS:
Lets get it over with right now. I know many of you will be shocked but......we just don't care for more than one or two ADRs and as long as we are airing family laundry not a big fan of buffets either...
I know, I know,
But let me explain
See when we first started going we could only afford one "big" meal plus the character meal included in our plan. And that was great..well except for the fact that we believed Birnbaums kids travel book and went to Prime Time Cafe which the kiddies hated and still talk about 12 years later.
So we discovered a liking for the breakfast at Tonys (sigh it's gone) and Ohanas. And the character meals were okay too.
But the first time without the kiddies, well we were going to do it up right and had a priority seating for every day. We quickly discovered that we are just not that structured on vacation and we were started feeling very blimpie very quickly and well we may be just a bit cheap too. So we did a couple of P.S.s and then said forget it.
FAst forward a couple of years and after reading more and more on the boards we decided this time that yes...ADRs are the way to go......turns out it is still not our style...Guess we're just fast and cheap...
So here's where we ate and what we thought.
Sitdown Meals with ADRs
Plaza Restaurant:
We like this one, it's not to big, people only invade my space a little, you know I seem to not enjoy sharing a bench with another person I never met 1 foot from me...didn't know that was my sense of personal space, but it isn't too bad here. The food is generally good and we have always had good service. We made the ADR for 5pm the night of MVMCP on Dec 4th. And we got in right on time. I had the chicken and pear salad and DH had hmmm French Dip. We used the DDE card and spent around $20-$25 I wouldn't hesitate to eat here again...And we didn't waddle out either.
Alfredos
Know this date too. It was part of our Candlelight package so it was Dec 8th at around 6. We had the 8:15 time and I didn't want us to feel rushed. This was a misty sort of day. Not really a downpour, but enough for our wonderful Eddie Bauer rain ponchos. Turns out alot of people thought this would be a good time to wait. The lobby area was crowded and very noisy...Mostly an american crowd that was very loud in a very echoy place. Turns out that the host/hostesses from Italy have very quiet voices, very quiet. Loud Americans/Quiet Italians..you get the picture. We finally made out our name by reading lips (okay not really, but it would have helped) and were sat at a table very cuddly with our neighbors on both sides. Maybe it saves on the heating bill in the winter....We had a wonderful server named Antonio and a secondary server whose name started with Rom, I never could see the rest. I could have stayed there all night with Antonio calling me senora but you know, things to do. He told us to take our time with the ordering. I'm not much of a drinker and neither of us drink wine which for some reason seemed wrong, but my iced tea was good. Appetizers: I had the calamari and DH the fettucine alfredo. We both thought ours was very good, but the calamari was practically a meal. Our main dishes quickly followed DH had the roast chicken with maybe 2 potato pieces and I had a pasta dish with a vodka sauce and shrimp. Mine was very yummy but the pasta was apparently breeding in the bowl. I swear it never got any smaller so I eventually gave up. DH gave his main meal an okay. Just as an aside the neighbor to my right ate faster than I thought was humanly possible. He had the lasanga and it seemed like a decent portion and although I did not actually see it he must have eaten it in one bite. A big table next to us was starting to get nervous about missing their scheduled time for CP and the waiter was very accomadating
Tip #4-make dinner reservations with plenty of time to spare if you are going to cp. Our over 2 hour window left plenty of time for casual dining.
Now dessert. Rom brought these and honestly I couldn't understand most of what he was saying. He did call me senora though, so what did I care and I knew what I wanted the cannoli. Dh did too. Very, very yummy I must say.
Antonio made sure we were all set and we were off. Total price of bill which included tip since it was a CP package was around $95. While this meal was quite good and like nothing we have at home and the cannoli was excellant we're too cheap to probably do this again. Food a little more than lukewarm. Waitstaff was wonderful but it is very crowded in here. Who knew I had so many personal space issues!!
Kona Cafe-
We had dinner here one night. Had a ADR. Don't remember what night, but it was a MVMCP night because we watched the fireworks afterward on the beach. No appetizer but I had a chicken breast crusted with something and DH had a steak of some kind. This food was wonderfully hot and was it ever good...Wasn't crowded in although bench sharing occured again. Tables are farther apart though. We had a volcano type thing for dessert and it was good, just not as good as the cannoli. We've had wonderful servers here when we have come for breakfast. Server that night was just average. The bill was around $50 and we used our DDE. Would eat here again in a minute so I'm not that cheap.
Boma-Breakfast
So here it comes..my buffet issues.
1. Why is the food at buffets in general never hot. I know the health department has some sort of temperature rules, but it must include just lukewarm.
2. For the price at disney I can't eat that much food and the atmosphere just isn't worth it.
3. So I used to work in infection control..you can share e choli 0157, staph, hepatitis A...how do I know that last guest washed their hands after the bathroom...
Despite all that we decided to try Boma for breakfast. DH reports that the omelet station was great. I had things like a waffle and the potatoes which would have been very good had they been more that maybe lukewarm. The frunch was great, cinamon roll okay and the fruit was good. We used our DDE card and spent around $35.
We canceled our other buffet for the crystal palace after this experience. It had been awhile since we had been to a buffet anywhere and my opinion remains the same. Waitstaff was fine, we won't be back.
Rainforest Cafe downtown
We went at 5pm so didn't have to wait long to be seated. That darn bench thing again. Good thing DH is such a good sport. The couple inches from us ordered the hugest appetizer I have ever seen. We decided to pass and just ordered food. I had the barbque wrap because I thought I needed french fries, dh ordered shrimp trio..both very yummy, but wow you could share a main course. Big appetizer couple-female ate like 3 bites of her main dish. Couldn't blame her and I really need to stop checking out everyone elses eating habits!!! Family on the other side of us had 3 little girls. Turns out not everyone likes someone to grab something off their plate, take a bite and put it back. Can't remember what we spent. And the sad thing is now we are too full to eat at Ghiradellis. Waitstaff fine, food hot and very good. We'll be back.
9 Dragons
No ADR, went here for lunch. Not many people in there and they still wanted to sit us on top of someone else, but slid us down when we asked. We bought the shared meal and felt it was about what we get around here. Service was fine. It was hot but not outstanding. We may be back.
Fast Food:
First of all to those of you that save your receipts, or write down what you spend, bless you. I've tried saving receipts but well.....
Over all I have to say that WDW has definitely improved their fast food in terms of quality and variety since we first ate hamburgers and chicken fingers till I thought my stomach would revolt.
I think I'll organize this by park.
Downtown Disney
Ghiradellis-I had a special sundae based on their peppermint bark candy. Very, very good even though they forgot my piece of candy
Dh had his usual hot fudge sundae. We love this place
Earl of Sandwich
I had tomato soup and a sandwich with turkey in it. DH had some sort of sandwich. This food was very good, hot and we'll be back. It is also for WDW reasonably priced.
Animal Kingdom
Pizzafari
pepperoni pizzas and breadsticks. Not bad, we were hungry and wanted something quick. Wouldn't be our first choice but wouldn't rule it out.
Flame tree barbque-
We ate here twice, I think mainly because we loved the seating. All these little places tucked in here and there. I had the pork sandwich both times and DH had the ribs. Corn is yucky, but baked beans very good. Dh ribs were good first time not so much the second. We would eat here again
On a side note we used to love Tusker House but menu now doesn't do much for us.
MGM
Catalina Eddies
We eat here almost every time. We think their pizza is fairly good and get it with a salad.
Epcot:
Fish and Chips shop-They changed the way you stand in line. I learned more than I ever wanted to about a family member of the women behind me. We love to share a fish and chips in the back part of Great Britain where British Invasion sings. Usually nice and peaceful.
Bakery at Norway
DIS did not steer us wrong with that schoolhouse bread. My only regret is the rest of the week I was always full when we went near here.
Bakery in France
Love the Napoleons.
And I love the green iced tea in Japan
Magic Kingdom
Cosmic Rays
I had a really good wrap here and DH had a burger. He liked the fixins bar.
Pinoc (I can't spell it but you know the puppet whose nose grows)village house
You know we should really know better than to eat at noon....But there is a little seating upstairs most tables for 2 and it looked like upstairs outside seating too. I had the Italian sub. I think it was supposed to be warm but it wasn't...turns out the french fries are a very small portion which is okay since they were yucky too. Dh isn't sure what he ate. Sure must have been memorable.
So that's it. Many times we skipped breakfast and had an early lunch. Sometimes we skipped lunch. We cancelled adrs at Le Cellaire, Bomas dinner, 1900 park faire and crystal palace. We just are not into taking the time to have a scheduled time to eat and we don't really go to disney for the food. Plus we're cheap!
If you're still around next time is our take on the parks
Then special events
Then Magical Moments and what on earth?
I write great trip reports in my head when I am at WDW.
You would be impressed.
No Really!
But I found on my last day there while being interviewed for a survey that I could barely remember which day I had been where. Now writing it down might be a good idea, but then you have to be organized and keep paper and pen handy and when you get right down to it that is way to much work on vacation. Now you may be thinking that we had way to much to drink while down there and thats why it's all a blur. You would be wrong. We're just naturally that way.......
So who are we:
This I can handle: DH 47-disney fanatic
Me 47-hey I consider myself one of Walt's kids
On our 11th (we think) trip to the world and maybe about 4 without the kiddies. (so sad, they have college and all)
What you say, it can't possibly be fun without the kiddies...
TRUST ME!!!
RESTAURANTS:
Lets get it over with right now. I know many of you will be shocked but......we just don't care for more than one or two ADRs and as long as we are airing family laundry not a big fan of buffets either...
I know, I know,
But let me explain
See when we first started going we could only afford one "big" meal plus the character meal included in our plan. And that was great..well except for the fact that we believed Birnbaums kids travel book and went to Prime Time Cafe which the kiddies hated and still talk about 12 years later.
So we discovered a liking for the breakfast at Tonys (sigh it's gone) and Ohanas. And the character meals were okay too.
But the first time without the kiddies, well we were going to do it up right and had a priority seating for every day. We quickly discovered that we are just not that structured on vacation and we were started feeling very blimpie very quickly and well we may be just a bit cheap too. So we did a couple of P.S.s and then said forget it.
FAst forward a couple of years and after reading more and more on the boards we decided this time that yes...ADRs are the way to go......turns out it is still not our style...Guess we're just fast and cheap...
So here's where we ate and what we thought.
Sitdown Meals with ADRs
Plaza Restaurant:
We like this one, it's not to big, people only invade my space a little, you know I seem to not enjoy sharing a bench with another person I never met 1 foot from me...didn't know that was my sense of personal space, but it isn't too bad here. The food is generally good and we have always had good service. We made the ADR for 5pm the night of MVMCP on Dec 4th. And we got in right on time. I had the chicken and pear salad and DH had hmmm French Dip. We used the DDE card and spent around $20-$25 I wouldn't hesitate to eat here again...And we didn't waddle out either.
Alfredos
Know this date too. It was part of our Candlelight package so it was Dec 8th at around 6. We had the 8:15 time and I didn't want us to feel rushed. This was a misty sort of day. Not really a downpour, but enough for our wonderful Eddie Bauer rain ponchos. Turns out alot of people thought this would be a good time to wait. The lobby area was crowded and very noisy...Mostly an american crowd that was very loud in a very echoy place. Turns out that the host/hostesses from Italy have very quiet voices, very quiet. Loud Americans/Quiet Italians..you get the picture. We finally made out our name by reading lips (okay not really, but it would have helped) and were sat at a table very cuddly with our neighbors on both sides. Maybe it saves on the heating bill in the winter....We had a wonderful server named Antonio and a secondary server whose name started with Rom, I never could see the rest. I could have stayed there all night with Antonio calling me senora but you know, things to do. He told us to take our time with the ordering. I'm not much of a drinker and neither of us drink wine which for some reason seemed wrong, but my iced tea was good. Appetizers: I had the calamari and DH the fettucine alfredo. We both thought ours was very good, but the calamari was practically a meal. Our main dishes quickly followed DH had the roast chicken with maybe 2 potato pieces and I had a pasta dish with a vodka sauce and shrimp. Mine was very yummy but the pasta was apparently breeding in the bowl. I swear it never got any smaller so I eventually gave up. DH gave his main meal an okay. Just as an aside the neighbor to my right ate faster than I thought was humanly possible. He had the lasanga and it seemed like a decent portion and although I did not actually see it he must have eaten it in one bite. A big table next to us was starting to get nervous about missing their scheduled time for CP and the waiter was very accomadating
Tip #4-make dinner reservations with plenty of time to spare if you are going to cp. Our over 2 hour window left plenty of time for casual dining.
Now dessert. Rom brought these and honestly I couldn't understand most of what he was saying. He did call me senora though, so what did I care and I knew what I wanted the cannoli. Dh did too. Very, very yummy I must say.
Antonio made sure we were all set and we were off. Total price of bill which included tip since it was a CP package was around $95. While this meal was quite good and like nothing we have at home and the cannoli was excellant we're too cheap to probably do this again. Food a little more than lukewarm. Waitstaff was wonderful but it is very crowded in here. Who knew I had so many personal space issues!!
Kona Cafe-
We had dinner here one night. Had a ADR. Don't remember what night, but it was a MVMCP night because we watched the fireworks afterward on the beach. No appetizer but I had a chicken breast crusted with something and DH had a steak of some kind. This food was wonderfully hot and was it ever good...Wasn't crowded in although bench sharing occured again. Tables are farther apart though. We had a volcano type thing for dessert and it was good, just not as good as the cannoli. We've had wonderful servers here when we have come for breakfast. Server that night was just average. The bill was around $50 and we used our DDE. Would eat here again in a minute so I'm not that cheap.
Boma-Breakfast
So here it comes..my buffet issues.
1. Why is the food at buffets in general never hot. I know the health department has some sort of temperature rules, but it must include just lukewarm.
2. For the price at disney I can't eat that much food and the atmosphere just isn't worth it.
3. So I used to work in infection control..you can share e choli 0157, staph, hepatitis A...how do I know that last guest washed their hands after the bathroom...
Despite all that we decided to try Boma for breakfast. DH reports that the omelet station was great. I had things like a waffle and the potatoes which would have been very good had they been more that maybe lukewarm. The frunch was great, cinamon roll okay and the fruit was good. We used our DDE card and spent around $35.
We canceled our other buffet for the crystal palace after this experience. It had been awhile since we had been to a buffet anywhere and my opinion remains the same. Waitstaff was fine, we won't be back.
Rainforest Cafe downtown
We went at 5pm so didn't have to wait long to be seated. That darn bench thing again. Good thing DH is such a good sport. The couple inches from us ordered the hugest appetizer I have ever seen. We decided to pass and just ordered food. I had the barbque wrap because I thought I needed french fries, dh ordered shrimp trio..both very yummy, but wow you could share a main course. Big appetizer couple-female ate like 3 bites of her main dish. Couldn't blame her and I really need to stop checking out everyone elses eating habits!!! Family on the other side of us had 3 little girls. Turns out not everyone likes someone to grab something off their plate, take a bite and put it back. Can't remember what we spent. And the sad thing is now we are too full to eat at Ghiradellis. Waitstaff fine, food hot and very good. We'll be back.
9 Dragons
No ADR, went here for lunch. Not many people in there and they still wanted to sit us on top of someone else, but slid us down when we asked. We bought the shared meal and felt it was about what we get around here. Service was fine. It was hot but not outstanding. We may be back.
Fast Food:
First of all to those of you that save your receipts, or write down what you spend, bless you. I've tried saving receipts but well.....
Over all I have to say that WDW has definitely improved their fast food in terms of quality and variety since we first ate hamburgers and chicken fingers till I thought my stomach would revolt.
I think I'll organize this by park.
Downtown Disney
Ghiradellis-I had a special sundae based on their peppermint bark candy. Very, very good even though they forgot my piece of candy
Dh had his usual hot fudge sundae. We love this placeEarl of Sandwich
I had tomato soup and a sandwich with turkey in it. DH had some sort of sandwich. This food was very good, hot and we'll be back. It is also for WDW reasonably priced.
Animal Kingdom
Pizzafari
pepperoni pizzas and breadsticks. Not bad, we were hungry and wanted something quick. Wouldn't be our first choice but wouldn't rule it out.
Flame tree barbque-
We ate here twice, I think mainly because we loved the seating. All these little places tucked in here and there. I had the pork sandwich both times and DH had the ribs. Corn is yucky, but baked beans very good. Dh ribs were good first time not so much the second. We would eat here again
On a side note we used to love Tusker House but menu now doesn't do much for us.
MGM
Catalina Eddies
We eat here almost every time. We think their pizza is fairly good and get it with a salad.
Epcot:
Fish and Chips shop-They changed the way you stand in line. I learned more than I ever wanted to about a family member of the women behind me. We love to share a fish and chips in the back part of Great Britain where British Invasion sings. Usually nice and peaceful.
Bakery at Norway
DIS did not steer us wrong with that schoolhouse bread. My only regret is the rest of the week I was always full when we went near here.
Bakery in France
Love the Napoleons.
And I love the green iced tea in Japan
Magic Kingdom
Cosmic Rays
I had a really good wrap here and DH had a burger. He liked the fixins bar.
Pinoc (I can't spell it but you know the puppet whose nose grows)village house
You know we should really know better than to eat at noon....But there is a little seating upstairs most tables for 2 and it looked like upstairs outside seating too. I had the Italian sub. I think it was supposed to be warm but it wasn't...turns out the french fries are a very small portion which is okay since they were yucky too. Dh isn't sure what he ate. Sure must have been memorable.
So that's it. Many times we skipped breakfast and had an early lunch. Sometimes we skipped lunch. We cancelled adrs at Le Cellaire, Bomas dinner, 1900 park faire and crystal palace. We just are not into taking the time to have a scheduled time to eat and we don't really go to disney for the food. Plus we're cheap!
If you're still around next time is our take on the parks
Then special events
Then Magical Moments and what on earth?
