Too, too, TOO much food: 10 day dining review COMPLETE

[ForKeeps]

Concourse Steakhouse

I was very nervous about my ADR here because I had read many poor reviews about both the food and the service. I obsessed over this reservation and whether I should change it. In the end I took a deep breath and kept it.

Our experience was a fantastic one. To start with I think it had a lot to do with our fantastic service. Our server was just great. She recommended certain things off the menu. For me she recommended the filet. She also recommended the scallops.

Dh had the scallops and the strip steak. I had the French Onion soup and the filet. We just don't have a bad thing to say about any of it. Sure, maybe the filet I had at Le Cellier was better...but this wasn't too shabby. It was great in its own right.

DH's scallops to start:

My French Onion soup (wish I could give you a comparison but it was the first time I had French Onion soup -- it was REALLY good though!)

DH's strip steak:

My filet:

We decided to split the dessert: he ordered the chocolate cake and I ordered the vanilla brulee. The cake was good. Better than the CRT and Mama Melrose chocolate cake. Not quite as elaborate as the chocolate wave and the chocolate banana tart. My creme brulee was much better. It was a shame that I had to trade half way. Ah...the sacrafices of married life.

This is my latte that I ordered. I just loved that they put a mickey on top!

What was really nice was that they started the whole thing with a complimentary champagne toast in celebration of our wedding! How sweet!

For us, it was a great experience, miles better than we expected. It was the ADR biggest surprise of the trip.

A

 

[S.Poppins]

I love the review and the pics! That ice cream sandwich looks fabulous! I want to go to the Concourse just for a latte with a mickey head! Got to go check out your wedding thread!

 

[DisneyJo]

To be honest I didn't ask for a tank view. The first time we went the 2 of us were seated right next to the tank. But I found the booth facing the tank that we had this time to be just as good. In fact, I enjoyed the view more from a bit of distance as I could see more of what was going on.

It never hurts to ask though.

You're right -- I went for the atmosphere. That and the chocolate wave. YUM - it was so good the last time I obsessed about it until I went back. This time it seemed much sweeter than the last time -- almost...ahem.. too sweet.

It seems to be a hit or miss with this restaurant, but this time my food was very good.

GL!

Thanks can't wait to try the chocolate wave.

We're not going to the Concourse Steakhouse but the Creme Brulee looked gorgeous.

 

[lurkyloo]

OK, I know I'm going to regret this cuz I won't get to try one til November, but could somebody please describe what a chocolate wave is?

 

[The Sweetness]

It is a warm chocolate cake dessert served at the Coral Reef. I *think* it has an oozy white chocolate senter

 

[tinkamom]

Concourse Steakhouse


DH's strip steak:

A

This steak looks like it is perfectly cooked! How did you request it cooked? Last time we were at WDW we kept having problems with our steaks being underdone, we asked for medium/medium rare but kept being served steaks that were cooked black and blue. When its cold in the middle its way too rare for me!

 

[ForKeeps]

It is a warm chocolate cake dessert served at the Coral Reef. I *think* it has an oozy white chocolate senter

You're right....the middle has white chocolate and Grand Marnier. I am not a white chocolate fan, but I love the chocolate wave, so it isn't overpowering.

So sorri I forgot to take a picture. We were all so excited we gobbled it up.

 

[ForKeeps]

This steak looks like it is perfectly cooked! How did you request it cooked? Last time we were at WDW we kept having problems with our steaks being underdone, we asked for medium/medium rare but kept being served steaks that were cooked black and blue. When its cold in the middle its way too rare for me!

Ah yes....we had a similar issue before when we asked for our steaks medium.

This time we ordered everything medium-well and every one was great. They all showed up with just a little pink.

 

[ForKeeps]

Liberty Inn (American pavilion counter service):

We decided to head to the Liberty Inn to have a something that was a bit "lighter" (if ceasar salad can be lighter). But after 8 days of food, food, and more food, the luxuary of the of the dining plan was starting to fade. We had to keep eating to use all of our credits, but we just didn't feel like it.

We both ordered the chicken caesar salad and the apple cobbler for dessert.

The salad wasn't half bad. I would compare it to a Wendy's chicken caesar salad, without as much dressing. The chicken made me a bit nervous. After a bout of salmonella this summer I'm just a tad nervous with chicken. But I can tell you near a month later that it was fine.

I really didn't like the cobbler. I ate a spoonful and threw the rest out. It just tasted dough-y. I could barely taste apple.

Was it the best counter service we had? No. Was it terrible? No. Just average

So it gets a

C

Le Cellier
So this is the review that everyone wants to know about. I can tell. Because when I was in your shoes reading dining reviews I wanted to know about (and drool over Le Cellier). I had heard about the pretzel bread and cheddar soup phenomenon. I was stoked.

When I opened the menu though I just couldn't do it. Cheddar cheese soup? That's just not me. I don't like exotic soups. And I don't like dipping bread in soup. I ordered the Grilled Beef Tenderloin Kabob and the Le Cellier Mushroom Filet Mignon. That's right beef, beef, and more beef. I felt very close to Albertans.

The Tenderloin...was not that tender. It wasn't bad. But it wasn't a melt-in your mouth kabob either.

But the filet.

Oh the filet.

I still dream about that filet.

Now I like mushrooms. And I like filet. And I really like the Le Cellier Mushroon Fliet. Right now, I wish I could have it.

You'll notice that there's no pictures. Le Cellier, pour vous qui ne devrez pas prendre le francaise...is a cellar. So it's dark. Which means a flash is really obvious. And the tables are really close together. Seriously I may have gotten our neighbour's elbow in the pic if I tried to take a picture of it. However, there are plenty a muchroom filet posted on the "post your pictures of food here" thread -- I know because I drooled over them in September...and October...and November...and December (I still go and look now).

It was well cooked (medium well proved to be a great instruction again) and very tasty.

For dessert DH had the chocolate mousse and I had the creme brulee (maple and vanilla split). It was another great creme brulee. DH also said the mousse was good. I'm not sure if mousse can be bad though...it isn't that hard to make. But they sure do make it look cute:

Le Cellier gets a solid A

 

[ForKeeps]

Cosmic Ray's Starlight Cafe

DH headed here for lunch when Startlight Cafe opened. At this point, I was kind of getting tired of eating. We were ODing on the Dining Plan.

I ordered the half chicken meal, while DH opted for the 1/2 chicken and ribs combo. We both had the chocolate cake.

The chicken was good - moist and tender. And the potatoes and carrots were tasty. But that's too much food for me for lunch. Seriously. I couldn't eat more than a bite of the cake, only because I was so stuffed. It wasn't bad, and it wasn't great. If it's included as a dessert go for it, if not then save your money for a dole whip.

B+

Garden Grill:

We were really excited to go to GG because we had such a great experience there last time. The operative word in that sentence is "last". Our service was not good at all. We waited a long time for our second plate to come.

The food was...alright. Maybe we'd been spoiled for too long. I mean after nights and nights of filet can you really expect the flank steak to be all that good?

I didn't like the salad, I found the catfish really greasy and I only ate one piece. I liked the veggies but in both servings they were beyond odente. They weren't cooked. Period. The first lot of steak was very tough. The second was better.

The dessert was just terrible. But then again...there was no chocolate option so maybe I'm biased.

The character interaction was great! We really enjoyed it. We also enjoyed the atmosphere and "coolness" factor about the rotating restaurant.

But it was very disappointing. We won't go back and wouldn't encourage others to go.

C-

 

[S.Poppins]

I have really enjoyed this review. I want to try Coral Reef next time. We love Le Cellier. You are right about the crowds though. We had lunch there in 05 and the place was practically empty. Not so this time. But we had a pretty good table. However I am sure the table next to us heard my DH lean over and loudly threaten to beat our DS. Nice!

 

[SRUAlmn]

Great reviews! I understand now about the Garden Grill, it'll be a no for us. Thanks for the warning. The only reason we really wanted to go was because the place rotated. Not a reason to waste a meal


I'm glad you mentioned about ODing on the dining plan. DF and I are back and forth right now about whether or not to do it. It just seems like SO MUCH food. Plus, you find yourself getting the most expensive thing to get the better deal and then you're overstuffed. We figured if we skipped breakfast every day and ate early lunches it might be feasible. Did you two eat breakfast every day on top of the DP?

 

[KAC2005]

Great reviews thank you for sharing.



Kathryn

 

[ForKeeps]

However I am sure the table next to us heard my DH lean over and loudly threaten to beat our DS. Nice!

I can almost see you lean over with clenched teeth. Why? Because my parents would do exactly the same thing to us when we were younger. Hey...those threats worked. We knew that we'd be hauled out of the World if we didn't behave.

Great reviews! I understand now about the Garden Grill, it'll be a no for us. Thanks for the warning. The only reason we really wanted to go was because the place rotated. Not a reason to waste a meal


I'm glad you mentioned about ODing on the dining plan. DF and I are back and forth right now about whether or not to do it. It just seems like SO MUCH food. Plus, you find yourself getting the most expensive thing to get the better deal and then you're overstuffed. We figured if we skipped breakfast every day and ate early lunches it might be feasible. Did you two eat breakfast every day on top of the DP?

No, I know. We were really disappointed. Of all the table services we wouldn't do Chef Mickey's again (because we found crystal palace so much better that we'd rather go there twice) and we definately won't do GG again. It's too bad really...we liked it the last time. We also won't do CRT again. But we would still recommend that as an experience at least once. Now that we've been twice we can't really justify doing it again.

The dining plan. Oh, the dining plan. Last May we were on the plan as well. We stayed 5 nights and so had 5 TS, 5 CS and 5 snacks. That was perfect. We really liked it for 5 nights.

But it was just too much food for a 9 night vacation. I liked all the TS credits we had, but I was tired of eating full CS meals at lunch. We gave up trying to get the "most value" out of CS credits and started using them for breakfast and skipping lunch because we rather just have a little something in the morning and not feel bad about throwing out our CS dessert.

We did do what you're suggesting a couple times. I just had a granola bar on the bus and then we'd go for "lunch" at 11. That was ok. (We did that both for the Tusker House day and the Starlight Cafe day). But somedays it didn't work because of the CS meals that were available in th epark or the reservation time I was able to get for my ADR.

It was fine in the end. There was just too many CS credits available.

We were talking about going next year for our anniversary (if it works out with our schedules) and just going for 3 nights and buying the premuim plan so we can have 2 table services a day instead and primarily do the tours.

But we just may stick around here too.

If you have the DDE discount card, you might be fine just using that. If we had had that I doubt we would have bought the DP.

 

[ForKeeps]

We only had a few hours left on our last day so we stuck close to home.

Before dashing off to the bus DH and I ordered grilled chicken and pizza respectively.

Sassaugoula is a solid place to use your counter services. We used most of them there and I don't regret that one bit.

Sassagoula gets an A for consistency...it was consistently good!

 

[DisneyJo]

Great review thanks for sharing. We have got 14 days of DP But it's free so we can't turn it down. We are planning to share 2 breakfasts and then share 2 lunches in the hope that we won't get stuffed. We were going to both CM and GG mainly for the characters, think I'll have to do a bit more researching! Thanks again.

 

[Blaynexox]

wow! What FANTASTIC reviews! I really enjoyed them and loved the pictures! Thanks for sharing!

 

[Flossbolna]

thanks for all the reviews! they were great, I especially appreciated the pictures of the CS meals!

With regard to the DDP my plan is to just not order dessert at the CS meals. I hope I can do this, free desert is very difficult to say no to. I actually calculated the prices of what we would have if not on the plan, i.e. only a dessert or appetizer now and then, light CS meals and found out that on the DDP we would save 2 $ per day per person (2 adults). So I hope I will not feel like I need to eat a lot to get what I paid for!

 

[dawgfan]

Thanks for the review.

 

[soupy11]

Thanks for the reviews, just trying to get ADR at Le Cellier and it is tough! The word is out!