Go Big or Go Home! 17 Days of Disney Dining! COMPLETE & Food & Wine Fest Index

[jerseytinkerbell]

Following our afternoon in DTD we went back to our hotel and walked over to Epcot to partake in F&W Fest.



Our first stop was Ireland.


We both got the Kerrygold Cheese Selection. Reserve Cheddar, Dubliner with Irish Stout & Skellig.


OMG! YUM! This was a favorite for both of us. My biggest regret was not getting another one of these the next day. I hope they have this again this year because this was fantastic. Everything about this was delicious.

Rob also got a Guinness.


Next I stopped at Greece.


I had the Spanakopita.


I love spanakopita and this was delcious! The pastry was so soft and flaky and the spinach was yummy. Another hit!

Next we both stopped at the Craft beer booth. I got the Leinenkugel's Seasonal Shandy.


This was so light and refreshing. Definitely my kind of beer. I'm pretty sure this was the Orange Shandy because I have purchased a few six packs of those since we got home and it tastes like the same thing. I am definitely a big Leinenkugel fan now.

Okay, I dropped the ball on this one and I didn't write down what beer Rob got here, but I think it was the Abita Fall Fest.


Next Rob stopped at Brazil.


He tried the Seared Scallop with ragout of tomatoes, peppers & hearts of palm.


This scallop was huge! He shared a bite with me and it was delicious. He really enjoyed it too. Tons of flavor in this dish!

Next I stopped at Singapore.


I tried the Lemongrass Chicken Curry with Coconut & Jasmine Rice.


I wasn't crazy about this. It was good but kind of boring for me. It was definitely spicy though!

Continued next post...

 

[WDWaddictt]

Looks yummy! I can't wait until we go this year!

 

[jerseytinkerbell]

Next we stopped at Africa for the Berbere Style Beef with Onions, Jalapenos, Tomato, Okra & Pap.


Rob loved this when he had it the first day, so he really wanted it a second time and I was looking forward to trying it. This time it was a little disappointing for Rob and I wasn't crazy about it. There was barely any beef and too many jalapenos. Having the curry and this back to back was a bad idea. My mouth was on fire!!!! After eating the two tiny pieces of beef and the okra and tomatoes out of this, the huge mound of remaining jalapenos got tossed in the trash.

Next Rob stopped at Florida.


He had the Cigar City Brewing Florida Cracker Belgian-style White Ale.


While he was there I went to Hops & Barley. I love the cranberries and oranges in the line here.


I got the New England Clam Chowder.


Believe it or not, I had never tried clam chowder before. This was so good! There were tons of clams and potatoes in this tiny portion. A surprise hit!

I also got a Sam Adams Cherry Wheat.


I love this beer and I can usually only get it bottled at home, so it was nice to have it on tap here. Delish!

We took our beers and headed over to watch Survivor at the Eat To The Beat concert.




Rob was in 80s heaven.

Once the concert was done Rob decided to stop at Japan. He got the Sapporo Beer and Spicy Hand Roll.


Okay, where is my husband and what have you done with him?!?!

He really liked the spicy hand roll. Who knew he would end up being the sushi fan instead of me?

Next I stopped at Morocco for the Baklava.


This was a perfect sweet ending to the day.

 

[jerseytinkerbell]

Before we went back our room for the night I decided to stop at Boulangerie Patisserie les Halles.


I had a hard time deciding on a treat, but finally landed on the boring decision of the chocolate chip cookie.


On our walk back to the room we were lucky enough to see a truly beautiful sunset. Here are a few snapshots for you.












I enjoyed my cookie back in the room along with my leftovers from Captain's Grille later in the evening. I took them out on our little patio and ate while I watched the pool movie, which I had a great view of. And guess which movie I got to enjoy once again? Hocus Pocus!


Another perfect day at the happiest place on earth!

 

[wilma-bride]

Awesome update Jeri I love your sunset pics, love that you saw Survivor but, most important of all, I love the fact that there were far more booze pics than food pics in this last update

 

[Linda67]

Couldn't agree more. Love the sunset pictures and love the beer pictures!

 

[Mrs Doubtfire]

Really enjoying you report, the F&W festival gives a good excuse to eat and drink to the max! (if you need one)

The classic cookie choice was a perfect ending

 

[CHIPSTER]

Thank you for your reviews. Glad you went to Captain's Grille and liked it - it is overlooked but we always eat there. Love their crab cakes - better than Fultons - I love that there is no filler.

 

[Belle's Castle]

This is one of my favorite trip reports!!!!

 

[jerseytinkerbell]

Looks yummy! I can't wait until we go this year!

I hope you enjoy your trip there this year! There is so much great food to try!

Awesome update Jeri I love your sunset pics, love that you saw Survivor but, most important of all, I love the fact that there were far more booze pics than food pics in this last update

I hope you currently have a Disney boozy drink in your hand Joh! Wait, it's 9am, maybe not. No, on second thought, it's 5 o'clock somewhere right.

Couldn't agree more. Love the sunset pictures and love the beer pictures!

Thanks Linda! I am so excited to get back there in September and try more drinks during the Festival.

Really enjoying you report, the F&W festival gives a good excuse to eat and drink to the max! (if you need one)

The classic cookie choice was a perfect ending

I never need an excuse to do that!

Believe it or not, I think outside of the cheesecake from Narcoossee, the best desserts I had this trip were chocolate chip cookies. The classics are classics for a reason I guess!

Thank you for your reviews. Glad you went to Captain's Grille and liked it - it is overlooked but we always eat there. Love their crab cakes - better than Fultons - I love that there is no filler.

Thanks so much for joining in! We are really looking forward to Captain's Grille again this year. It will be hard to not get those yummy crab cakes again.

This is one of my favorite trip reports!!!!

Thanks so much! I am so sad it's almost over. I need another trip ASAP!

 

[jerseytinkerbell]

Oh no, it's time to start our last full Disney day.

For our last day we wanted to finish up the last of the booths we missed at F&W, but first we needed some breakfast. We decided not to venture too far and stopped on our way into Epcot at Boardwalk Bakery.


Love this sign on the window. Cute touch!


We ordered our breakfast and took it outside to enjoy at one of the tables on the boardwalk. It was a nice temperature outside. Finally a cooler day after so much hot weather.

Rob had the Breakfast Bowl with bacon.


He said it was pretty good, but it was very hard to eat. Cutting into that bread bowl with a plastic fork was no easy feat. He made a mess out of it since he ended up trying to hold it and eat it that way.

I had the Bacon, Egg and Cheese Biscuit.


This was disappointing. The biscuit was a mess. It fell completely apart the second I touched it. It was tasty, but a pain in the neck to eat.

Rob and I also shared a slice of Jersey Crumbcake.


This is wasn't that good either. It tasted stale, which was kind of a bummer.

All and all, not the best breakfast. We should have done Sunshine Seasons instead. Overall, the Boardwalk Bakery was a bit of a disappointment this time. I won't be making a special trip there next trip, that's for sure.

We got into Epcot bright and early and it was fun to walk around an empty WS after walking through there with it packed shoulder to shoulder every other day.


Up next, the last of our F&W adventures!

 

[Cookie Princess]

Your reviews are great...and I am now starving for WDW food.

 

[Mrs Doubtfire]

Can't believe it's nearing the end

 

[Mich123]

Just found your trip report as I'm planning for our trip in August. Love the report! Your descriptions are great and I'm getting new ideas for our 9 day stay.

 

[wilma-bride]

Jeri, although it is clear that you have been pretty slack about updating this, I am glad that a) it isn't finished just yet and b) I haven't got too much to catch up on since I'm always pretty rubbish at getting on the DIS while I'm suffering from Post-Disney Depression

Sorry that your BB breakfast was a little disappointing. I didn't get to try half as many yummy snacks from there this time as I'd hoped.

And, for the record, no I didn't have a drink in my hand at 9am on Sunday morning. In fact, I didn't have a drink at all that day I had plenty of cupcakes though. Still debating on whether or not to do a dining review as I don't normally bother as most of our meals are usually off site. We ate on site the whole week this time though so I might consider it.

 

[jerseytinkerbell]

Your reviews are great...and I am now starving for WDW food.

Thanks so much! Doing these reports always make me way too hungry.

Can't believe it's nearing the end

I know. I feel like I have been working on this report forever, but I wish it never had to end. On the plus side I just booked my dining for September, so I'll throw in an update on that today as well.

Just found your trip report as I'm planning for our trip in August. Love the report! Your descriptions are great and I'm getting new ideas for our 9 day stay.

Thank you so much! I hope you have an awesome time on your trip in August!

Jeri, although it is clear that you have been pretty slack about updating this, I am glad that a) it isn't finished just yet and b) I haven't got too much to catch up on since I'm always pretty rubbish at getting on the DIS while I'm suffering from Post-Disney Depression

Sorry that your BB breakfast was a little disappointing. I didn't get to try half as many yummy snacks from there this time as I'd hoped.

And, for the record, no I didn't have a drink in my hand at 9am on Sunday morning. In fact, I didn't have a drink at all that day I had plenty of cupcakes though. Still debating on whether or not to do a dining review as I don't normally bother as most of our meals are usually off site. We ate on site the whole week this time though so I might consider it.

Hi Joh! Sorry you had to leave Florida. How dare Disney not let you stay!

I seriously fail at updating this report with any regularity. I used to have tons of free time to work on it at my old job, but now I don't get a break at work so I have to try and work on it at home. At least you have less to catch up on.

I hope you do a DR this time! It seems like you had a lot of great stuff this time. I definitely want to hear about all the cupcakes!

 

[jerseytinkerbell]

Before I post my next update I wanted to tell you all about my dining plans for our September trip! I just booked everything yesterday, so chances are I'll change everything at least 87 more times between now and then, but here are the plans as they stand right now.

Day 1
-Drive all day, check in at a value resort TBD and eat at the resort or DTD depending on how late it is.

Day 2
-Check in at BLT.
-Trail's End for breakfast
-I got Rob to agree to tea at GF, but I can't book that yet, so hopefully there are openings for this particular afternoon.
-Narcoossee for dinner

Day 3
-Via Napoli for lunch. This will be our first time here.
-Captain's Grille for dinner

Day 4
-Tusker House for breakfast. This will be our first time here as well.
-DTD for lunch. Probably WPE
-Jiko for dinner

Day 5
-Captain's Grille for breakfast. We enjoyed dinner here so much that I really want to try out breakfast and since HS is lacking in b-fast options we will start out our HS day here.
-Since lunch options at HS aren't my favorite either we will take a late afternoon lunch break to go to Beaches & Cream!
-No dinner booked because I'm not sure how full we'll be from a big lunch and breakfast, so if we get anything it will probably be at DTD.

Day 6
-As long as there is no EMH morning hours at MK we will have a pre-park opening breakfast at Crystal Palace.
-Trail's End for dinner. We love breakfast and the dinner options look great, so we'll check it out this trip.

Day 7
-This is the first day of F&W, so I am going to fit as many treats in my belly this afternoon as I can manage.
-'Ohana for dinner. We only ate here once about 7 years ago and I have been wanting to get back here, so we have a late reservation to let our F&W yummies settle before we stuff ourselves again.

Day 8
-Check out and have breakfast at Boma before we get on the road and head home.

There is a possibility we might add on time at the beginning or the end of the trip with either some time at Universal or possibly a side trip down to Key West, so the beginning or end days might change a little bit, but those are the plans for now.

What do you think?

 

[jerseytinkerbell]

We started our morning at Epcot with a few rides. We finally got to ride the new Test Track for the first time in 16 days. Then we did Living with the Land, Soarin', Nemo and finally Spaceship Earth. But first, some photo ops in front of the ball.




Then it was finally time to finish up our missing booths at F&W!

First we stopped at Refreshment Port.




We each got an order of the Pineapple Fritters.


I mean, it's hard to go wrong with any kind of fried food. It all tastes like fatty yumminess, but the fried pineapple wasn't terribly exciting. It needed some type of dipping sauce to kick it up a notch.

One unvisited booth down!

Next Rob stopped at Canada since he hadn't been there yet. He went with the "Le Cellier" Wild Mushroom Beef Filet Mignon with Truffle Butter Sauce.


He loved this! It was probably his favorite food item at the festival. He was wishing he had tried it sooner because he would have had a lot more throughout our trip.

Next I wanted to stop at Desserts & Champagne for a repeat tasting of the Hazelnut Chocolate Cheesecake.


So, so yummy once again.

Rob decided to get the Guylian Belgian Chocolate Seashell Truffles.


He graciously shared with me and they weren't as good as we hoped. Kinda plain. I didn't get much of the hazelnut flavor.

Next I made a return trip to Scotland.




I wanted to try the salmon and the haggis, but in the end I decided on the Seared Scottish Salmon with Cauliflower Puree, Watercress & Malt Vinaigrette.


The salmon...amazing. The cauliflower puree...amazing. The malt vinaigrette... I don't care for strong vinegar and this was STRONG. Rob said I was offending him with the smell. It would have been perfect without that element for me. But other than the vinegar it was so delicious.

Next we stopped for the first time at Terra.




I was torn about what to try here too, but I finally decided on the Chocolate Cake with Coconut Mousse & Passion Fruit Sauce.


The cake and the mousse were surprisingly delicious. As you may remember from my incident with the passion fruit cream puff at BOG, I was not messing around with that passion fruit sauce. I took a tiny little taste of it just in case I might like it but nope. The cake got eaten without the sauce and I still very much enjoyed it.

Rob had the Fresh Watermelon Juice.


I tried some too and it was pretty good. It was funny because you think it will taste like watermelon, but maybe watered down watermelon, but you take a sip and think, "Holy cow, they're not kidding. That's watermelon juice alright." I wish you could buy that juice. We would definitely drink it on a regular basis.

Continued next post...

 

[jerseytinkerbell]

Next Rob made a return trip to the Australia booth. This time he tried the Grilled Lamb Chop with Mint Pesto & Potato Crunchies.


He did not care for this at all. I'm not sure if maybe it was a bad batch, but it seemed undercooked and it smelled a little weird. It seemed very unappetizing in person. I was glad I didn't get one too.

As we made our way further around WS I was getting thirsty so I decided to stop at China and try the Lychee Aerated Water.


This was THE BEST! I absolutely loved this drink. I have been trying to find it at the Asian markets near me since I got home, but no luck so far. This was so refreshing and light. I liked this so much better than a soda. I need to find these somewhere because they were fantastic.

My next to last booth left to try was South Korea. Since I don't care for mustard the kimchi dog was out, so I went with the Lettuce Wrap with Roast Pork and Kimchi Slaw.


There was a sick amount of mayo on this and the pork was very old and dry. It was the worst thing I ate this trip. I couldn't even stomach this. Most of it ended up in the trash. Bummer.

Up next was the very last booth for both of us to try this trip. The American Adventure Coffee Cart.


They had some yummy looking donuts displayed here, but we're not here for those.




We're here for the only F&W selection. The Shakin' Jamaican Coffee made with Kahlua, vanilla and caramel, served hot or frozen.

We both got ours frozen. And here it is. Our last item in our passport to get our last stamp!


I loved this! It was so refreshing to sip walking around WS in the sun. It was, sweet and boozy. You can't go wrong. Surprisingly Rob didn't like it. I don't know why. We'll chalk it up to him being a weirdo.

As we finished up our walk around WS we made two more quick stops. First I stopped at Canada because Rob was still raving about the filet, so I had to try it for myself.


He was right, this was fantastic. I was wishing I had tried it sooner too.

Then we both made our final F&W stop of the trip at Hawaii where we both got the Pork Sliders for the second time.


Yum! Just as good the second time.

Then we made our way over to the Festival Center with our completed passports.


We both got our completion stamps.




Okay, we were so hyped to get our completion stamps and we went up to the booth inside the festival center all excited. The guy at the booth giving out the stamps was talking with another CM and barely acknowledged our presence. He just put the stamp on our first page without ever glancing at our passports. It was a little anti-climactic. We spent so much time (and money) at the booths and we just wanted some type of acknowledgement. They should do a little something more for the completion stamp. Give you a cheap pin maybe. Heck, they could have a pin for sale and I would have bought it. It's still so cool and I love that we have this, but Rob was especially hoping for just a little something more.

We did it! We both did all 30 booths. I saw two Eat To The Beat concerts and Rob saw three. We really did it up this trip. We loved every second of it. I wish we could spend that much time at F&W every year. It was the best experience. We also got these cool shirts, which were the only real souvenirs we bought this trip.


Oh, and I also got a pin. I couldn't resist. It was too cute.


That's it for F&W, but there are still two more restaurant updates left. Stay tuned!

 

[Miss Potts]

I was very late to this DR... Started and finished reading everything today! Loved every update and all your experiences! A 17 day trip! So jealous!

As I was reading, I kept telling my DH... "We need to go here" or "why don't we try there".... Needless to say, we have a lot of places to try!

The plan for your fall trip looks great... Convincing your DH to go to tea! Good job! I've been working on that too...
You have our current favorite restaurant on you list... Narcoossee's!!! YUM!! I've never had the almond cheesecake there though, but thanks to your review I am next time!

Thanks for the enjoyable read!