Where is the funnel cake? Updated 4/7/13 Breakfast at Crystal Palace

[DonaldDoleWhip]

I rarely see reviews of Maya Grill, so this was really neat! Sounds like a fantastic experience, and I think the menu looks very good (plus, those shot-size desserts are perfect portions!).

[angelbear425]

I just subscribed to this thread and I love reading your reviews. I can't wait to read more of them great job!

[Linda67]

I love it when we get to read reviews of some of the out of the way places that don't get much coverage
I'd never even considered the Maya Grill before but it sounds great!
Oh boy does that cake look good, and it sounds like it tasted as good as it looks

[NoOrdinaryPrincess]

I love Maya Grill. We tried it for the first time in January, and when we were there I was feeling quite ill. The restaurant was nearly empty, the servers were accommodating, and it ended up being an excellent experience, despite the circumstances.

[DisneyMomFanatic]

Originally Posted by Linda67

Thanks for the great Y&Y review

We've never tried the deluxe dining plan as I really do think it would be just too much food for us

Sounds like you thought the same following your trip; with so much yummy food you need to go to a restaurant hungry to really enjoy it

This was the second time we tried the DxDP and it is a lot of food. The first time we had a lot of buffets and ate and ate and ate. BAD move on our part. This time we tried to do new places and less buffet and when we did the buffets, we tried to limit what we ate. We love Y&Y. My DH now wants to do it again, DXDP but next time do almost all of our dinners as signatures.

Originally Posted by jabead

Trying to get caught up on all the DRs now, as I've been a little busy lately. Looks like you had a couple of great meals at Animal Kingdom. I especially liked the looks of those Y & Y ribs...YUM!

Glad you were able to find time to catch up. I know some people don't think there are great options in AK, but we like Flame Tree BBQ and Yak & Yeti. If we do a breakfast, we do love Tusker House, even if our choices are boring. We always do a resort restaurant for dinner on our AK day because they close earlier than other parks. That is usually when we do Maya Grill. We just take a bus to Coronado Springs. We have found it works well for us.

Originally Posted by DonaldDoleWhip

I rarely see reviews of Maya Grill, so this was really neat! Sounds like a fantastic experience, and I think the menu looks very good (plus, those shot-size desserts are perfect portions!).

I have never seen Maya Grill full! We have never had a bad or even questionable meal there. It has always been good/great. This last one was the best for multiple reasons. Those shots were perfectly sized and perfectly executed. You got different textures and flavor in every spoonful. They worked really well. I think you should give it a try sometime soon!

Originally Posted by angelbear425

I just subscribed to this thread and I love reading your reviews. I can't wait to read more of them great job!

Thanks for reading. I appreciate the kind words. I hope to get the next review up on Tuesday night. Hope you will continue to read and like!

Originally Posted by Linda67

I love it when we get to read reviews of some of the out of the way places that don't get much coverage
I'd never even considered the Maya Grill before but it sounds great!
Oh boy does that cake look good, and it sounds like it tasted as good as it looks

Linda, it is a very nice restaurant. Most of the food is flavorful but not too spicy. My mom can't do much spice and she loved her dish. The menu they had this trip was different almost completely from when we were there last time and it is much more tex-mex/mexican. Last time we were there I got a beef tips meal. This is along the same line as La Hacienda, where La Hac is on the mexican (in case you didn't know where it was located - really, cause noone readying this would know where it was??? but Maya is skirting the tex-mex side of the fence). Have I completely messed with anyones head on that explanation, or is it just mine???

Originally Posted by NoOrdinaryPrincess

I love Maya Grill. We tried it for the first time in January, and when we were there I was feeling quite ill. The restaurant was nearly empty, the servers were accommodating, and it ended up being an excellent experience, despite the circumstances.

We can't remember how we found it, but however it was, we are so glad we did find it! We had to cancel it one time, when we were on the DXDP last time and we all got sick, and we were all really sad that this restaurant was the one we had to let go. It was a sad day on our trip! Like I said before, we love that place and have had nothing but great experiences each time. The servers are excellent there and yes, it is true, very accomodating. I will continue to book this restaurant.

[emmysmommy]

I'm caught back up with the last couple of reviews.

I'm glad it wasn't just me that noticed the pork egg rolls at Y&Y were a bit greasy. I liked them but by the second one I was beyond the initial amazement at how good they were (and steaming hot!) and noticed the grease. Next time I definitely want to try the shrimp tempura - that looks really good.

I don't think I've seen more than 1 or 2 Maya Grill reviews so it was great to see yours. I'm so glad that you had an awesome family dinner and were able to celebrate all of those birthdays. Yeah... I think they mean't to put an "n" instead of an "m" in your nieces name?

1900 PF is one of my favorites so I am looking forward to that one!

[DisneyMomFanatic]

Day 4, 1900 Park Fare

Sorry for the small hiatus in the report, I really hate when real life gets in the way of a good dining report. But anyway, I am back now and we are moving on to Day 4 which was August 26th. We chose to eat at 1900 Park Fare for breakfast before we headed to the Magic Kingdom. We have eaten here before and we really love their dinner here.

*Small side note of history* we had eaten here in November 2000 for dinner when our DS was 19 months old and this was a villain character dinner. DS was calling all the villains over to our table by waving them in. Captain Hook let him play with his hook. My niece was terrified of them though and she was 3 ½ yrs old. We loved that meal and wanted to go back, but they discontinued it. On our last trip we did the Cinderella dinner there and absolutely loved the step sisters’ act. They were phenomenal!

So we decided we wanted to do breakfast there on this trip. We hadn’t been there for breakfast since they were doing Alice and friends. We got our picture taken and were shown to our table within about 15 minutes.

I didn’t take any pictures of our food because we had nothing terribly interesting. I had eggs, ham, potatoes, all standard fare. DD had some yogurt and fruit. I will say this, the fruit was fresh and sweet, not overly ripe and mushy. The hot food was hot and good. Nothing stood out as a really good item or really bad item. It was all middle of the road edible. The characters we good, stopped for pictures and to say hi.






I like the feel of this restaurant and the food is always dependable, however, it doesn’t have anything that screams “Come back to me every time you are at Disney World”. It sometimes does have screaming children and it can be a loud restaurant. For this reason, I don’t think I will have it on my list for breakfast again, or at least not for a while. If, when we go back again, it still has the step sisters, we may have to squeeze it in again for dinner.

We are giving this a
3

This meal cost us $89.42 or 4 TS or $22.35/credit

Up Next Lunch at Tony’s, but now that we are in the Magic Kingdom, will we finally find the Funnel Cake???

[emmysmommy]

Hi there Karla - welcome back from real life! We need more Karla photos with the characters!

We've done 1900 for breakfast twice and the first time loved it, second time was good but not fabulous and haven't been back since so I agree with your assessment that it doesn't scream come back every time.

I do like the bread pudding there so it has that going for it!

[angelbear425]

During my last trip, we ended up with an extra TS credit and were going to do either 1900 or Crystal Palace, but read the reviews that 1900 wasn't memorable and opted for Crystal Palace instead. We ate their 3 times and had 3 yummy breakfasts (and me craving Pooh's puffed french toast lol). I'm happy that we opted for CP since it is average and not memorable. Although, I do like the family picture background.

[DisneyMomFanatic]

Originally Posted by emmysmommy

I'm caught back up with the last couple of reviews.

I'm glad it wasn't just me that noticed the pork egg rolls at Y&Y were a bit greasy. I liked them but by the second one I was beyond the initial amazement at how good they were (and steaming hot!) and noticed the grease. Next time I definitely want to try the shrimp tempura - that looks really good.

I don't think I've seen more than 1 or 2 Maya Grill reviews so it was great to see yours. I'm so glad that you had an awesome family dinner and were able to celebrate all of those birthdays. Yeah... I think they mean't to put an "n" instead of an "m" in your nieces name?


1900 PF is one of my favorites so I am looking forward to that one!

Hi Brenda,

Are you still caught up on all the threads, cause I know I am not! We love Y&Y but there is usually one thing that is slightly off. This time 2 for us, the egg rolls and my chicken. Oh well, still really good and good enough to want to go back to. We really do like Maya Grill, it is a little secret that not many people seem to know about. They are very friendly and accomodating and the food is really good. It is one of our must do's. It's funny about the birthday cake, noone noticed when we were there but we were just so happy to see each other and get a chance to really catch up with each other. So it was all good!

Originally Posted by emmysmommy

Hi there Karla - welcome back from real life! We need more Karla photos with the characters!

We've done 1900 for breakfast twice and the first time loved it, second time was good but not fabulous and haven't been back since so I agree with your assessment that it doesn't scream come back every time.

I do like the bread pudding there so it has that going for it!

Real life is not fun sometimes! I kept wanting to write an update earlier in the week and there just was no time. I will get another one up today or tomorrow though! Now about 1900, we are not big breakfast fans and that could have colored our view on things but it just didn't have any one thing that I would HAVE to come back to have, if you know what I mean!

Originally Posted by angelbear425

During my last trip, we ended up with an extra TS credit and were going to do either 1900 or Crystal Palace, but read the reviews that 1900 wasn't memorable and opted for Crystal Palace instead. We ate their 3 times and had 3 yummy breakfasts (and me craving Pooh's puffed french toast lol). I'm happy that we opted for CP since it is average and not memorable. Although, I do like the family picture background.

Hi angelbear

If I am comparing those 2, I would definitely choose CP over 1900. Not that CP has really stellar food either but it just seems slightly better and if you are going to the MK, more convenient as well. CP will make an appearence later in our trip, stay tuned!

[DisneyMomFanatic]

Day 4 Tony’s Town Square Lunch

So after some rides and picture taking at Magic Kingdom, we headed to our lunch reservation at Tony’s. I go to check in and the CM tells me we are early by about 45 minutes. What??? I got our reservation time wrong. We weren’t terribly hungry (as has been the story for most of this trip) but coming back in 45 minutes didn’t make much sense to us. So we were allowed to check in but we were told they couldn’t guarantee us a seat before our original time. We were fine with that. We were sitting down, off our feet, in air conditioning, works for me! 10 minutes later we were called, so much for having to wait a long time.

Now I will tell you that the last time we dined there, I didn’t have a great experience. It wasn’t anything horrible, but bad moments stick in my memory from Disney because you aren’t supposed to have them when you are in the happiest place in the world. It takes me a while to get over bad experiences at restaurants. I don’t go back for a long time or ever. But on this trip, since we were on the deluxe plan, and had so many credits, and DH wanted to go here again, I relented and we went.



So we started with appetizers and I wanted something on the lighter side. Not so sure I succeeded but I went with the
Toasted Cheese and Garlic Bread - topped with fresh Tomatoes and Basil

It looked really good and was not quite light but good. Now at some point after it arrived, I asked myself “WHY did you order this Karla???” I have to be in just the right mood to have slices, pieces, or chunks of tomatoes on my food. This was not one of those times and I managed to wipe most of them off. But holy moley goodness Basil!!! That basil was fresh and delicious on that cheesy bread. I loved this option and it was huge!
Next was my DH, he said he wanted something different and went with the
Seasonal Fruit - with prosciutto

It was cantaloupe and prosciutto with some dark sauce. It as salty, sweet goodness. He said he would eat it again but it wasn’t the greatest gift but it was good.
DD and DS both opted for the same item. They each chose the
Calamari - topped with Olive Relish and served with a side of Marinara Sauce

They both liked this but said that they liked Raglan Road’s better. They weren’t as fond of the breading on this one as much as at RR, but they ate it!

On to our entrees: DS knew immediately what he was going to have because if you remember correctly, his favorite food is??? If you guessed shrimp, you are correct. So he got the
Shrimp Scampi - Linguini with Sun-dried Tomatoes and Asparagus tossed in a Garlic Sauce

He loved the shrimp, he said they were juicy and cooked right. He liked the pasta, but wasn’t hungry enough to eat it all because it was a huge portion. He didn’t touch the veggies that were in it.
DH had no idea what he wanted. He decided he wanted something small. Ever get a small Italian anything??? Yeah, me either! So not being able to find something he really wanted he opted to get the
Meatball Sliders - Meatballs cooked in Marinara Sauce topped with provolone and arugula on Focaccia rolls

They were good and he would get them again. He really like the homemade chips that were served with them. He was pleasantly surprised by this plate. He went into this dish just to get something small and found something good.
DD also had decided rather quickly what she was going to have. She went with the
Chicken Parmigiana - Lightly Breaded Chicken Breast with Marinara Sauce topped with Melted Mozzarella over Spaghetti

She loved this. The breading was light and had just enough cheese to give it some good flavor. She barely touched the pasta. This was the dish I had gotten last time that gave me the bad experience. When it came out last time and I was eating it, it had some other components on the chicken and in the dish that weren’t listed on the menu. I hated it and was afraid to order it this time. I was also afraid for DD when she wanted to order this. But I didn’t want to taint her view of this dish by saying that I didn’t like it last time. It wasn’t fair to her to unduly influence her (whether or not she knew that’s what I would have been doing). So I kept my mouth shut and let her order it. Thankfully this time the meal didn’t include any extraneous items. So, I didn’t order this, instead I ordered the
Spaghetti - with choice of Meatballs or Sweet Italian Sausage with Marinara Sauce

I got this dish with the sweet Italian sausage. I had maybe 8 bites of the spaghetti and 5 of the sausage. I wasn’t a fan. Here is where I think the problem with Tony’s is for me. I am 50% Italian. My Mom’s side of the family is all Italian and we had the Sunday dinners with the whole kit and caboodle. I have seen the love and devotion put into the food from the time I could stand and the stories to go with it. This is restaurant Italian, it is NOT the same thing and to me a VERY inferior product. Now, having said that, it is GOOD restaurant Italian food, as verified by my DH, but for me, it is just not the same. I love the decor and the server was great. We had Jihane. She kept us hydrated and checked in with us to make sure everything was ok. Then we went onto dessert and I have to say that as Italian as I am when it comes to entrees, I am not when it comes to dessert. I am not fond of tiramisu at all! So I was looking for something small and cold or light and found this
Spumoni - layers of ice cream with pistachio nuts and cherries


I don’t know what I was thinking I would get, but it wasn’t this. I think my head was thinking a glass cup with some ice cream, then a layer of pistachios and some more ice cream then some cherries. But it wasn’t thinking this block of ice cream. It was ok but weird. DH ordered the same thing as I did. Our Server was very nice. She noticed that we had our anniversary pins on and with our dessert plates she included a timkerbell light on mine and a buzz lightyear light on DH’s. It was very sweet of her and it was unexpected because that was the first time on the trip any of our servers did something for our anniversary. We had plenty of people wish us Happy Anniversary but this time she gave us something. It made us smile a bit. Of course, it was short lived because DD immediately took them off our hands.
The kids decided to get gelato, chocolate. (sorry, no picture)
So thus ends our Tony’s adventure. We had a good meal, if not extraordinary. I just can’t really like this place. I kind of want to, but can’t. I always think about how it was at family gatherings and it just can’t live up to those memories. Sorry Tony’s. The service was good, the atmosphere nice and sweet and the food ok. I don’t know when or IF we will be back.

We are giving this meal a
3-3 ½

It cost us $135.63 or 4 TS credits or $33.91/credit

UP NEXT: We head to Ohana for dinner. We have more than 4 in our party and a nice Meet! Stay tuned to see who all the extras are.

[CraigInPA]

I had the same impression of Tony's, and being 50% Italian myself, I have to say that it's not because of that. My wife, 0% Italian, also found the food disappointing.

Tony's food is not just "restaurant Italian", it's "red sauce pizzeria Italian". You know the type of place: a restaurant that is 99% pizza and has a few "entrees" on the menu. Everything gets the same canned red sauce, casually heated by dumping it cold into a pot with the (usually over-) cooked pasta and swirled a few times before being dumped onto a plate. It's over-sweet, slightly under cooked, and adds little or nothing in the way of taste. On the foodie scale, it's lower than Olive Garden, which is the mass market "restaurant Italian" leader, and well below an authentic Italian restaurant.

[NoOrdinaryPrincess]

I've always wanted to attend 1900 PF, but for dinner not breakfast. I know That's one we're saving for when we have a child traveling with.

We had Tony's last May and thought it was okay. The restaurant was crowded and the service was mediocre, but the food was passable.

[DisneyMomFanatic]

Originally Posted by CraigInPA

I had the same impression of Tony's, and being 50% Italian myself, I have to say that it's not because of that. My wife, 0% Italian, also found the food disappointing.

Tony's food is not just "restaurant Italian", it's "red sauce pizzeria Italian". You know the type of place: a restaurant that is 99% pizza and has a few "entrees" on the menu. Everything gets the same canned red sauce, casually heated by dumping it cold into a pot with the (usually over-) cooked pasta and swirled a few times before being dumped onto a plate. It's over-sweet, slightly under cooked, and adds little or nothing in the way of taste. On the foodie scale, it's lower than Olive Garden, which is the mass market "restaurant Italian" leader, and well below an authentic Italian restaurant.

Hi Craig,

See, I can't stand Olive Garden. Been a few times and I refuse to go back there. I think Tony's is actually a little better than them. But I get what you mean. I just don't think that we will be going there for a very long time, if we go there again at all.

Originally Posted by NoOrdinaryPrincess

I've always wanted to attend 1900 PF, but for dinner not breakfast. I know That's one we're saving for when we have a child traveling with.

We had Tony's last May and thought it was okay. The restaurant was crowded and the service was mediocre, but the food was passable.

Yeah, we do want to go back for dinner. The food is good enough and the characters much better so it is much more worth it (IMHO). Again with Tony's, it is okay and that is a problem for me. If I am spending that much money in Disney, I know I can get alot more meals that are a whole lot better than just okay.

[emmysmommy]

Hi Karla. I know what you mean about Tony's. It is ok if you don't think of it as an authentic Italian restaurant. When I had the chicken parm last year, it fell flat as well. (Here's what I had to say about it!) Glad that your DH and kids like it though. Your review is one of the reasons I love the dining boards with the reviews - I may have overlooked the shrimp pasta that your DS ordered without having seen that it looks pretty good. Definitely a contender!

Like you, I'm not a tiramisu fan. However, that was nice of the server to garnish your dessert with a Tink and Buzz!