Waterfront dining…

Maybe you should get in line now for what looks like it will be a prime spot for viewing Illuminations at Epcot…

As noted in  couple of months ago (see “Now it makes sense…”), there has been major construction around Cantina de San Angel (the quick service restaurant in the Mexico pavilion).

The view in February 2010

As you can see in the photos below (from April 2010), much construction to add some of the additional seating is well under way…

The same area in April 2010.

Let’s hope the food comes close to matching the view… we’ll see…

WDW Weekend Eats…

This weekend I had the chance to visit the World (okay, yes, both of my regular readers know I practically live there…), see the fabulous performer Peter Noone of Herman’s Hermits fame at Epcot, and most importantly, spend some true quality time with some really great friends! And along the way, yes, there was food and beverage involved… so here’s a few (relatively brief) notes about some of the items consumed the past couple of days…

Best picture I was able to get of Peter Noone... sorry...

Saturday Breakfast at Chef Mickey’s

This venue in the Contemporary Resort hosts a popular character breakfast populated by the Fab Five (for those not in the know, the Disney Fab Five consists of Mickey, Minnie, Donald, Goofy and Pluto) in their chef garb.

The characters come by and visit periodically during your meal, and on this occasion, our group was there to attend the first Character Meal for young Master Everett. The characters were great, and especially when interacting with an infant.

So, how about the really important stuff? The food?

They serve a large buffet with pretty much something for everyone – typical breakfast items of scrambled eggs, pancakes, Mickey waffles and so forth are accompanied by a good selection of “healthy” fresh fruits (and lox and bagels discreetly hidden down that way).

Fresh fruit and other healthy stuff... note how there is no one there...

Hearty selections included Pluto’s Corned Beef Hash (topped with a cornbread-style topping), Bacon and Cheese Potatoes (cheesy shredded hash browns) and a pretty good Vegetable Lasagna (courtesy of Chef Goofy).

Veggie Lasagna, sitting (ironically?) next to Biscuits and Sausage Gravy

A decent breakfast pizza was on the “kids” section of the buffet, along with tater tots, the latter excited many in our party (as tater tots seem to be a rare treat to some…) until they tasted them – they are not a good item to hold under the heat lamps apparently…

Mickey Waffles, the "Sad Little Tater Tots" and Breakfast Pizza

Did someone ask for pancakes?

Big Keg 'o Syrup

Plenty of pastries and sweets were also around, including the ever-popular Rice Krispies treats. I popped a couple of doughnut holes in my mouth on the way out…

Overall the food was really pretty good, and with the high volume of diners most items seemed to be fresh and turning over pretty quickly.

People always want to know about the “value” of WDW restaurants – character meals are a special case, as you defiantly pay a premium for them. The food here was good, but was it worth the extravagant $28.99 (for an adult meal)? When you just consider the food alone, of course not (the breakfast buffet at Boma for under $20 is, in my opinion, much better than this), but when you factor in the character interaction, and in our case for this meal, spending time with some great friends, yes, it was more than worth it… and we did have a plum table with a great view of the castle and Space Mountain that didn’t hurt…

Beverages at Animal Kingdom

Later that day several of us ventured to the Animal Kingdom park for a meeting with the Great Mongello. As Cocktail Hour (noon, that is) approached, a friend (who shall remain nameless to protect his pristine reputation) suggested that it might be time for a Yak Attack. As I had never tasted this allegedly delectable drink, I (not-so reluctantly) agreed, all in the name of “research”, of course…

This frozen combination of “Mango Daiquiri, Bacardi Light Rum and Wildberry Flavors” is served at a window around the corner from the Yak and Yeti restaurant. The colorful concoctions was yes, dear readers, quite tasty… and I now regret that I haven’t sampled it sooner… I will have to make up for lost time…

Yak Attack!

Snacks on the Boardwalk

Mid-afternoon I made my way back to my room at the Boardwalk Villas (yes, life is rough) for a bit of a rest and clean-up before the evenings festivities. Feeling a bit peckish, I scouted out the kiosks and stores around the Boardwalk area… Funnel Cakes? No…  Something from the Bakery? Nope… Something from Boardwalk To Go?

This kiosk is referred to simply as the Hot Dog Cart on the area guidemap, and yes they feature said franks, but a small hanging sign was touting a new item, Fried Cheese Ravioli… sounded like it was just the right thing…

Five ravioli were pulled from the freezer, dropped into hot oil, and a few minutes later were presented to me with some marinara sauce for dipping. Yes, they were frozen (no shock there), but freshly fried to order and was certainly something different than the usual fare…

Fried Ravioli

At $4.50 (including tax), it was not a cheap snack, and for five pieces of cheese-filled dough, this is most definitely a snack, but I’d gladly have those again to compliment a cold brewed beverage… (I did have my friend Stella waiting in the ‘fridge in my room).

Sunday Breakfast at Kouzzina

This was my second breakfast trek to the still fairly new restaurant from Iron Chef Cat Cora. Kim Possible and I had the morning meal there on the second day they were open – we both had savory selections that day (that we quite liked), so on this AM I wanted to try something more sweet… my server suggested her favorite of the “Classic” Waffle, but I was intrigued by the flavor combos of the Blueberry Orange Granola Pancake…

While trying to make up my mind I sampled a White Sangria… now dear readers, no, I really don’t usually drink at breakfast, well not that often, or even regularly, usually not at all… (anyone believe me?)… but again, I took one for the team… just for your elucidation, dear readers… (okay, we all know this is BS – I had one the first time I was here as well…).

Mmmm... refreshing White Sangria

The drink is actually quite crisp and refreshing – and since it’s basically diluted wine, the alcohol content can’t be too high. I think one could consume two, or even three of these and still not lose it on Space Mountain soon after…

Anyway, I did decide on the pancakes…  eventually a large platter arrived with a large single pancake of nearly 12” (almost up to a foot!) in diameter. I was initially disappointed by the sparse scattering of blueberries, until I found more hidden in the batter…

Blueberry Orange Granola Pancake

I first tasted it sans butter or syrup, and it was quite flavorful – the orange was definitely there, but not overpowering. I added a bit of buteer and some syrup, and made fairly quick work of disposing of my meal. On the side was a choice of bacon or chicken sausage. I selected the latter – it was very dense with a nice flavor, but somewhat tough… yet I’d probably chose it again…

So there’s a quick look at some of the items I put into my system over the past weekend… hope you enjoyed eating vicariously…  now we need to get back to the kitchen!

It’s never too early for a tasty beverage…

White sangria served during breakfast hours at Kouzzina on Disney’s Boardwalk.

— Post From My iPhone

Lets cook! Grown-up Grilled Cheese

Tomato soup (usually Campbell’s condensed from the familiar red and white can) and grilled cheese sandwiches have been a staple for American kids as long as I can remember (and that’s more years than I will let on right now…). I recently, and after a long wait, had the more grown-up version of this classic that is (on occasion) served at the Wave restaurant at Disney’s Contemporary Resort. This establishment opened on the ground floor of the Contemporary in mid-2008 and is becoming (along with the Kona Café at the Poly) one of my “go-to” dining spots… both have been good, reliable in both food quality and service, reasonably priced (for Disney sit-down dining) and, at most times, fairly easy to get into. We’ll do a more complete coverage of this restaurant in the future, but for now we’ll move on to the appetizer section of the menu…

There is always a soup, along with a special “accompaniment” – the selections rotate out fairly frequently… Right after the restaurant opened, Kevin Klose of the DIS Unplugged podcast did a review of the opening day dinner service (you can listen to his review on the June 10, 2008 episode here http://www.wdwinfo.com/disney-podcast/archives-2008.htm). On that visit they had the Tomato Soup served with Grilled Cheese Sandwiches as the side – his review was so glowing of the sandwich sides that I was just aching to try them! I (along with She-Who-Shall-Not-Be-Named) went for lunch only about two weeks later… sadly the tomato soup wasn’t offered on that day (the soup was, as I recall, a bean soup with small corn muffins as the accompaniment, which was good as well…). The chef came by our table and as we complimented him on the entire meal, which we had both enjoyed, I mentioned that I was disappointed in not being able to try the tomato soup and cheeses sandwiches I’d heard about… he noted that they were changing the soup on a regular basis, so we’d just have to return and hope for the best on getting our sought-after grilled cheese…

I’d been to the Wave two or three times since, with nary a glimpse of the elusive Tomato Soup and Grilled Cheese… but a few weeks ago during the Princess Half-Marathon weekend, Mistress Sandra and I had my pre-race dinner at the Wave… low and behold, there it was on the menu…

As we got our appetizers, Mistress commented on how cute the little sandwiches were… and then I put one in my mouth… wow… have you seen the Food Network show “The Best Thing I Ever Ate”? It was like that – this was literally one of the best things I ever put into my mouth… I gave a piece to the Mistress – she paused, covered her mouth with her hand, and I though we were going to have that deli scene from “When Harry Met Sally” re-created in the Wave… it was like a religious experience.

And, no, there was no fancy secret ingredient, no truffles or the like, just a great combo of Swiss and goat cheeses, good bread, all grilled until the bread was crispy on the outside and the cheeses gooey inside – simple but great. The tang of the goat cheese and nutty flavor of the Swiss made for a great compliment. We had a very good meal top to bottom that night, but we both agreed that the best thing was, yes, the grilled cheese sandwiches.

So, dear readers, here is my take on these – I’m sure it’s not exactly the same, but it turned out pretty darn good… If you’re freaked out by a “recipe” without exact measurements, just breathe and relax, after all, it’s just a darn grilled cheese sandwich!

Grown-Up Grilled Cheese

Serves 2 (okay, if you can’t figure out how to make this for 1 or for more than 2, well, sorry…)

4 slices bread (I think Rye is very nice for this, I used a Marble Rye ‘cause it was so darn pretty. Sourdough would also be very good. In any cause use a good quality bread with some flavor of it’s own.)

Pretty Marble Rye Bread!

2 to 4 slices Swiss cheese, preferably aged.

Goat Cheese (I had some crumbled on hand, so that’s what I used, about 2 – 3 tablespoons per sandwich. Otherwise slice some about 1/4” thick or a bit less, enough to cover the bread completely.)

Mustard (Dijon is what I used, but something like spicy brown “deli” mustard would work too.)

Butter (room temperature, about a tablespoon or a bit more total)

Lightly spread the bread slices with mustard.

Add the goat cheese and sliced Swiss on top of mustard.

Press the sandwich halves together (you following this? Not being too difficult on you I hope…). Lightly butter one side of the sandwiches.

Like the fancy plate?

Heat a pan to medium or medium-low heat (you kinda have to play this one by ear, you want to cook the sandwiches until golden brown on the outside, but still long enough for the insides to get nice and melty… ). Add some of the remaining butter to melt in the pan and then put the sammies in with the unbuttered side down (or you could just butter both sides of the sandwiches, but it’s a bit messier…). Press down a bit on them with a spatula and when nice and golden on one side turn and finish cooking until brown the other side and the cheesy innards are soft and melted.

Remove from the pan, slice as desired and eat! If you like, serve with soup of your choice, and feel free to dunk!

Back to the kitchen… guess we’re gonna have to come up with a soup recipe to share soon…

And the walls come tumbling down….

Early last month we gave you a lovely tour of many of the construction walls that were gracing the World (that’s Walt Disney World for those of you not in the know…).  You can revisit this amazing homage to walls here.

At least one venue has had the walls removed recently – the Tomorrowland Terrace in the Magic Kingdom. It was announced this week that the Wishes Dessert Party that had been held in this area was, not surprisingly, returning the end of March.

Details are on the  official Disney Parks Blog.

Some had wondered why this relatively newly introduced, and apparently popular, event had been called off a while back… when I saw the walls up around this area I knew that it was just a matter of time (that is, when one of the slower times of the year had passed, and they had the opportunity to spruce the area up a little bit…) before this was to return…

It doesn’t appear that any massive changes were made to the terrace area… here are some pics for your visual enjoyment:

This space seems that it would be the most fought-over spot… if you look up you’ll see that this is right in line with the path that Tink takes on her travel from the Castle…

We at Eating and Drinking Around the World haven’t yet sampled the offerings and view of the Wishes Dessert Party, but will force ourselves to do so as soon as possible, as usual, just for you dear readers (both of you)…  can’t say how soon we’ll be able to procure a spot there, as we’re heading into some busier times of year (Spring Break, etc.), but we’ll report when we can… if any of you out there tried it out before, please post a comment with your thoughts!

Back to the kitchen…

Mark your calendars!

Disney has announced the dates for the 2010 Epcot Food & Wine Festival! This year we will again be “Celebrating Culinary Adventures” and the dates will be from October 1, 2010 until November 14. 2010. The festival is starting a week later this year, but will again run for a wonderful, food & drink filled, six weeks (plus a couple of days, if you want to be picky…).

No details are available yet, but I’m already salivating… (okay, yes I know, I drool a lot anyway…)

The first weekend corresponds with the inaugural running of the Disney Wine & Dine Half Marathon. This race essentially replaces the Race for the Taste 10k (and the departed Tower of Terror races that were also held in the fall). This new 13.1 mile event is a night race that can either be run by an individual, or with a new twist for Disney races, as a relay for two runners. Also that weekend will be a 5K “Mickey’s Halloween Family Fun Run”.

For more details on the race weekend, check the Disney Endurance site here. For those of you participating in the race, they are offering some fairly good group rates at selected resorts for that weekend.

More to come….

Research, research, research….

I sure hope you people appreciate what I go through for you…

This weekend I forced myself to spend a weekend at Kidani Village (the fairly new DVC resort at the Animal Kingdom Lodge in Disneyworld)… along with this hardship I had scheduled meals at Sanaa and Jiko to add to the misery….

Since I wasn’t sure I could endure all this alone, Mistress Sandra reluctantly agreed to accompany me on this arduous task of research for you, dear readers… I can only hope that the three of you truly can understand all that we here at Eating (and Drinking) around the World go through just for you…

Along the way we also forced ourselves to try the Wine Walk at Epcot, the Culinary Tour at the Animal Kingdom Lodge, as well as a couple of new quick service choices around the World…

So over the next few weeks you can look forward to several new posts from this weekends agony…

We put ourselves through such pain and tribulation, and all just for you… we damn sure hope you appreciate it…

Cocktails? In the Magic Kingdom? Could it be true???

What’s keeping it from really being the Happiest Place on Earth? Cocktails, of course!

But we are teased… there is the Liberty Tree Tavern… and the first definition of “tavern” (according to the online version of the Merriam-Webster Dictionary) is “an establishment where alcoholic beverages are sold to be drunk on the premises”. And we’re promised in the new Fantasyland expansion an establishment called Gaston’s Tavern… will we find the desired Adult Beverages there? I doubt it… (okay, I know we won’t…).
Can I sue Disney for false advertising?

But why, oh why, do they tease us? Apparently if you live sometime in the unspecified future, in the Magic Kingdom you can be served martinis (with the biggest freaking olives you’ve ever seen) by your robot servant… okay I guess you’d have to live in the newly refurbed exit queue of Space Mountain, but is that too much to ask for a cocktail? I say no…

Every time I pass through Fantasyland and look upon that hill at what used to be the site of the Skyway station I think about how wasted that piece of land is, and, yes, what a great place it would be for a place to purvey adult beverages… Imagine if you will, there (or someplace else) Tink and her petite pixie pals serving as waitresses… and maybe even pole dancing Princesses… okay… I’m getting a bit carried away… pardon me, I need to excuse myself for a while…

Food & Wine – Day 1 (or 2?)

Now that we’re almost to the end of the Epcot Food & Wine Festival, I figured it was about time to go into the first day…. actually Real Life (and three Disney race weekends in the past six weeks) has interfered the past few weeks or this would have been posted sooner, but as they say, better late…

So Friday September 25 was the official opening day of Food & Wine, and I had originally planned on being there at “rope drop” of the opening day, but after the events of the day before (see “Mission Impossible?” below), I felt that actually being there at that exact moment was now not necessary…

Instead I started my day by going to the sports complex to do packet pickup for the next days Expedition Everest Challenge (the event that turned into the Expedition Everest Deluge…) – ran into several friends (including the lovely Gazette Girls) and spent some time socializing. From there I did eventually make my way to the World Showcase to continue the culinary adventure.

I tried several items that I had not had the day before – since my plan was to make at least four trips during Food & Wine, I felt no rush to try everything the first go-round or two. And I won’t try to enumerate all the dishes yet, will save that for a series of posts that will probably show up way after the event is over…

One of the new booths I was eager to try was Thailand – I love Thai food and was curious to see how Disney would present this wonderful cuisine (as I’ve always been a bit disappointed in the way they give us another of my favorites, Indian food…). So I made my way to Bangkok (no giggling, please…) and ordered up the Papaya Salad with Shrimp and, of course, a Singha. There was also a soup on the menu that sounded tasty (Chicken and Coconut with Mushrooms, Lemongrass & Ginger), but I was simply saving that for a later trip.

I paid for my food and made my way around to corner to hand in my ticket, and low and behold, who’s serving me again but my New Best Friend to be, Chef Dahlmann!

One of the things they are doing differently this year at the festival is that there is a good deal of actual cooking that’s going on inside the booths. Soups, sauces, sides, prep-work, etc is all done in kitchens off stage as usual, but items that can be fairly quickly grilled or finished off in the actual kiosk, such as the beef items in South Africa or Argentina, the lamb in Australia, or as in this case, the shrimp, are being done right in front of you. I think this was a great idea, as the food generally won’t be sitting around for long waiting to be served, and it adds a bit of extra show, as well as the great aromas of cooking food!

So that being said, Chef Dahlmann, okay now that we’re going to be buddies I guess I could just call him Jens, was finishing last minute training for the cook in the Thai booth, showing him how to tell when the shrimp was just perfectly done.

As he handed me my dish, I mentioned to him how he had served me the first meal of the festival the day before, he smiled and said yes, he remembered. I pulled out my trusty iPhone and showed him a picture of the meal… he casually asked me what I’d though of the food I’d has so far, and since he asked, I told him… most of it was good, but I did mention that I thought both the dishes in New Orleans were not as spicy as I thought they should be (understanding of course that they probably couldn’t serve anything to the mass public that would actually be as spicy as I’d like!), and how when I was at New Orleans, they had all the utensils except spoons…. And that both gumbo and the stew were a bit difficult to eat with a fork! He made a quick call at this news to correct that situation, and he actually seemed interested as to my comments on the food. He even gave me a serving of the soup I hadn’t ordered to try out – will wonders never cease – free food at Disney! Unheard of!
And when I casually mentioned that I wrote a blog mostly about food at Disney, he sensed I was a person of great import and influence on my massive single-digit numbers of readers and he pulled out his card and handed it to me – so now I have the email, phone, Fax and pager number (do people really still have pagers?) of the Executive Chef at Epcot – Chef Jens probably didn’t realize he may have made the biggest mistake of his life – okay, I probably won’t culinarily stalk him too much – I can’t afford to have a restraining order put on me that would prevent me from going to the World Showcase now can I!
We chatted so much that as I left the booth, I actually forgot my Singha and had to go back and dig out my receipt to retrieve it… me, of all people, forgetting beer, imagine that!

So how was the food? Actually pretty tasty – the shrimp nicely seasoned and grilled on a bed of marinated julienned papaya and carrots and the soup was thick and flavorful (of course, could have been a bit hotter, spice-wise, for my tastes…). I have since had the shrimp a second time, and if it’s not 100 degrees out next weekend, will likely have the soup again as well.

There was much more food and drink as the day progressed… but we’ll get to that later…

All I can say is WOW!

The news that came out of the D23 Expo yesterday about the parks was just amazing! Some rumors do come true!

http://d23.disney.go.com/articles/091209_NF_FS_RasuloImagineeringtheFuture.html

The Star Tours refurb had been talked about for quite a while, and there were so many credible-sounding hints the past few months, that one was not really a big surprise – but the whole Fantasyland thing… well, I had not put a huge amount of stock into those rumors…

I didn’t doubt that there were real concept drawings and ideas thrown about, but I thought it was more likely a “blue sky” thing than something we’d actually see. Boy was I wrong on that one!

I won’t go into any great details – there will be plenty of info popping up soon all around the interwebs, and no need for me to try & duplicate that… but we will be getting a couple of more dining options, both themed around “Beauty and the Beast” – the Be Our Guest Restaurant appears to be a new sit-down place and Gaston’s Tavern likely a counter service – even thought “Tavern” is in the name, I’m not holding my breath that I’ll finally be able to get an adult beverage in the Magic Kingdom! It’s not like I can get a freakin’ drink at the Liberty Tree Tavern!

What really excites me is the Ariel ride and the new Princess and Pixie Hollow areas, ‘cause I’m all about the Princesses! And the Fairies (okay, Disney says they are Pixies, but we all know Tink is a Fairy), and Alice, and Mary Poppins… okay – pretty much any female face character… so shoot me…