"We're Just Here For the Free Food"--One vegetarian & one omnivore 8/25-9/4 (w/ pics)

[smartestnumber5]

The vital Preliminary info

Me: 25 year old vegetarian, Disney Dining planner, and lover of sugar, chocolate, and cheese.
GF: 31 year old former vegetarian and current lover of seafood and meat; likes to sit back and let me do the planning.

2nd time on (Free!) DDP: 8/26-9/4. We arrived a day early and stayed one night without the DDP.

Total cost of food obtained on DDP: $1023.80

TS Restaurants:
Ohana
Boma
Le Cellier
Flying Fish
Garden View Tea Room
Chefs de France
California Grill
Kona Café
Cap’n Jacks
Planet Hollywood
Rainforest Café

CS Restaurants:
Riverside Mill
Pop
Sunshine Seasons
Main Street Bakery
Columbia Harbor House
Cosmic Rays
Wolfgang Puck Express
Pizzafari
Earl of Sandwich

And of course many snacks.

 

[MickeyNicki]

Cannot wait for your reviews!

 

[TigerKat]

Subscribing...

 

[smartestnumber5]

We arrived at Disney a day before Free Dining began and stayed at POR for the night. We went to Riverside Mill for dinner. GF had the carver special—turkey w/ gravy, mashed potatoes, green beans, and cornbread. GF says it was just what she needed—meat and potatoes. The potatoes even had real lumps which she enjoyed (GF: “mmm … lumps”).

I “made” my own pasta. I chose penne, pesto sauce, and sundried tomatoes, kalamata olives, pine nuts, artichoke hearts, spinach, and onions. It was very good and I definitely enjoyed it. (I’m a pretty big fan of pesto and it was nice to have some different ingredients than usual salad bar fare which I’m used to at “make your own pasta” stations.) It came with a piece of toasted garlic bread. The only problem was that there was a vast vat of oil at the bottom of the container which made the last few forkfuls way too oily. Since GF had a few bites, too, we both ended up coated with oil head to toe. (GF: “The upside, however, was that our skin became soft, silky, and supple thanks to the Riverside Mill.”)

We bought a refillable mug (which since they are the same at each resort can now be used at any resort over the course of your stay) and had iced tea. And we shared carrot cake. The cake had amazingly sweet cream cheese icing. I hadn’t been all that excited about carrot cake at first, but I really loved the icing. I told you I loved sugar! GF actually couldn’t eat that much of it because the icing was just way too sweet for her; she says it actually made her mouth sting. (GF: “ouch!”)

We were both pretty pleased with the meal. I commented that we were already to a great eating start and we hadn’t even gotten our free dining credits yet! We also must have gone at a good time because the food court was less than half full. We were able to get a nice table in a quiet area right next to the Mill wheel.

One complaint about the Riverside Mill, though, was that there were not many vegetarian options for dinner—it was either pizza or make-your-own-pasta. At least the pasta offered numerous possibilities though.


Pasta your way: 8.99
Carver: 8.99
Carrot Cake: 3.59
Mug: 11.99
Tax: 2.18
Total: 35.74--OOP (paid with rewards dollars)

Food: 4 out of 5
Atmosphere: 4 out of 5
Service: N/A

 

[swankybeth]

Great start, looking forward to the next installment.

 

[wishesUT]

Subscribing! Can't wait for more.

 

[OneBadApple]

Looking forward to reading the rest of your reviews.

 

[kimisabella]

Great start - looking forward to more!

 

[passthepixiedust]

I'm in!

 

[TinkrBeth]

Me too!

 

[momofdbsdc]

Great start!!! Can't wait for the rest! Thanks for sharing!

 

[smartestnumber5]

Still none of the good stuff (the T.S. restaurants of course ), but it's coming soon. Just a note, GF has insisted on interjecting her own comments into these reviews--hence the constant parentheses with a quote from her inside.

Breakfast—Riverside Mill & Room

I woke up earlier than GF and headed over to Riverside Mill. I got some hot chocolate in our refillable mug and decided on a make-your-own-yogurt-parfait. I try to eat yogurt every day—mostly Dan Active—and it really does seem to work in regulating the digestive system. I also had a pop tart in the room and GF stuck with her usual coffee (how nice to have a coffee pot in the room at POR!).

The make your own yogurt area also offered make-your-own-oatmeal and make-your-own-cereal. I only saw people ordering yogurt. One would tell the parfait maker what toppings one wanted and the parfait maker would put them all together in a bowl and stir them up. I was expecting them to just be dumped on top as toppings and that it would be up to the individual to mix it up. I kind of like it that way--so you can control exactly how much yogurt, fruit, and granola goes into each bite.

I chose blueberries, strawberries, banana chips, and granola for the parfait. Unfortunately, though, the yogurt was not sweetened. I saw honey and brown sugar as potential add ins, but since it was also the make your own oatmeal station, I assumed they were intended for oatmeal, not yogurt. Most yogurt is vanilla and already sweetened—this was not. Yuck. (GF: "Unsweetened yogurt was good enough for the Huns of the Mongolian Plains--none of this sweetened vanilla crap for them.") I had to add some sugar from a packet that came with the coffee in the room to make it edible. (GF: "She's lucky to still have her original teeth!")

Yogurt parfait: 3.79
Tax: .25
Total: 4.04 --> OOP (used rewards)

Food: 1.5 out of 5 (Would have been more like a 3.5 if the yogurt had been sweetened)
Atmosphere: N/A—ate in room
Service: N/A


Snack—Pop

We decided to go right over to Pop after leaving POR in order to get our dining credits so we could use them for lunch at Epcot. By the time we got to Pop it was already creeping up on lunch time and GF hadn’t eaten anything yet. While I checked in she went and grabbed a snack—a fruit and cheese plate. We brought it back to our room after check in to eat.

It had grapes, about 1/3 of a granny smith apple, walnuts, and 3 kinds of cheese—cubes of what seemed to be cheddar, a large hunk of brie, and a smaller hunk of something with an orange rind. There was also one package of crackers. It was good, but could have used more crackers. (GF: “Two crackers! Its like they expected people to scoop up giant hunks of oozing cheese with their bare hands and just gobble it down”) GF let me have all of the brie as she doesn’t like it. A good idea for a snack (to share).

Cheese plate: 5.49
Tax: .36
Total: 5.85 --> OOP (used rewards)

Food: 4 out of 5.
Atmosphere: N/A—ate in room
Service: N/A

 

[smartestnumber5]

Once we checked in at Pop and got our room we headed right to Epcot. We were pretty hungry at that point so we decided to eat first thing as it was approaching 1pm. We headed to Sunshine Seasons thinking we could get a Soarin fastpass, but on the way one of the big boards indicated that the fastpass times being given out were between 5 and 6 pm (and the standby line was of course over an hour long.) We weren't planning on staying in the park, so we realized that meant no Soarin for us that day (actually we didn't end up getting to go on Soarin or Everest this trip ). We started worrying that the parks might be more crowded than usual and what if there were long lines for everything? (We were really worrying for nothing--the parks didn't really appear to be significantly more crowded than last year.) I tried to set our minds at ease and said, "It doesn't matter if it's crowded. We're just here for the food!" We ended up repeating this mantra every time we got tired or faced some kind of obstacle--"Just remember, we're just here for the food."


Lunch at Sunshine Seasons

The past few visits I have gotten the same sandwich here and I was committed to getting something different this time. I was pleased to see a new vegetarian entrée in the Chinese section—it appeared to be broccoli, white rice, stir fried veggies, and lo mein. I thought about getting this, but I knew that the vegetarian entrée at Ohana was a lo mein like dish, so I thought I’d better get something else.

I ended up with the same old Cuban veggie sandwich like usual! I also chose the butterfinger cheesecake and an iced tea.

GF went for the seared tuna on mixed greens, strawberry shortcake, and coke.

I had the same problem with the sandwich as the previous time. The veggies (which seem to be marinated in some type of dressing or oil/vinegar) don’t really go with the bread/cheese/mustard thing going on. I decided to just eat the two separately. I took all the veggies out and then had myself a cheese sandwich on nice crusty bread with a lot of mustard (I’m a big mustard fan!) and ate a few of the veggies on the side. I was happy.

The butterfinger cheesecake was fine—not great, but better than what I’ve had at other counter service places. I didn’t really understand what made it butterfinger. (GF: “they were just trying to trick gullible candy-holics like you”) There was a light drizzle of chocolate and something that looked like caramel or peanut butter--I couldn’t really taste it.

GF said her salad was light and fresh but wished the tuna had more flavor. She enjoyed her strawberry shortcake; it had lots of strawberries but would have been better with real cream. (GF: “Most of the counter service places use a tasteless whipped-air sort of crap”)

This place is always pretty crowded. We’ve found the corner area by the land is usually less full of people than the other table areas.


Grilled Vegetable Cuban Sandwich: 7.59
Seared Tuna on Mixed Greens: 8.39
Butterfinger cheesecake: 3.50*
Strawberry shortcake: 3.50*
Drink: 2.49
Drink: 2.49
Tax: 1.68
Total: 29.64

Food: 4 out of 5
Atmosphere: 2.5 out of 5.
Service: N/A.

 

[AnninIowa]

Subscribing!!!

 

[christinou]

Great report, thank you.... I can't wait to read more.

 

[susieq76]

Yuuuuummmmyyy! Sounds delicious!

 

[kelleigh1]

Great reviews!

I love reading reports from vegetarians because even though I'm not, I think it opens up my eyes to other options that I may not try. And there are plenty of times when I just want a meat-free option.

 

[Smurfy]

very interested in this report as i did not do so well at Disney my last visit, i only really had Mac and Cheese and the vege burger... very boring

 

[my3disneygirls]

Can't wait to see more.

 

[kabuki]

Thanks for posting! Can't wait for more!