hertamaniac
DIS Veteran
- Joined
- Feb 9, 2017
- Messages
- 5,933
Dining Review: The Hollywood Brown Derby
I originally had dinner reservations but decided the morning of to try and get a lunch one instead. The availability was wide open.
We got sat exactly where I like, a booth overlooking the floor. It is a comfortable booth with the tables allowing for manipulation to accommodate most/all guests. I knew what I wanted to order so this was the easy part.
The Cobb salad came out relatively quickly. Of course, the server asked me if I wanted it messy to which I said I could mess it up myself. And am I glad I did. The salad portion size was very good with very fresh ingredients. In fact, they doubled the cut bacon (or at least I noticed two separate piles). Then I did a gentle mix and was really enjoying it and then dove down in to get some turkey. And then I dove again and again and again. Hooray....I found the treasure chest of turkey in my Cobb salad! The 3-4 morsels were hidden under everything. What type of Mickey Mouse trick was this (especially at a $25 price point)? Although tempting to take a photo or inform the waitress, I forged ahead. That was my mistake. I informed our waitress at the end, and she thanked me saying she would inform the kitchen about equal distributions. Honestly, this was the essence of turkey and couldn't even fill up 1/4 of a teaspoon. It now makes me wonder if you let the server "make it messy" it somehow diminishes the abysmal amount of turkey in the dish.
We also got the Shephard's Pie. I didn't have any but was told it was excellent. It was made with lentils and no meat. It did look good from afar. We also got bread, which was merely average, but fresh/warm.
We got two glasses of white wine and a club soda with cranberry juice so no real challenges on that front.
I then decided to get dessert which is a rarity for me. Grapefruit Cake sounded interesting, and I heard/read some positive feedback online. We split it which was perfect portion sizing. The first bite, my mind was trying to register the flavor. It was sweet, but with sour notes. The layers of icing and the top having a single segment of grapefruit made presentation outstanding. The flavors, combined, were outstanding. This is an excellent piece of cake and worthy of being the only reason to stop at THBD. It was so impressive, that we immediately started looking up mock recipes to make it on our own. If that doesn't give a vote of confidence, I don't know what would.
Now that I had time to re-evaluate our meal, I would score the quality of food at an 8, preparation 4, drinks 7, service 7, value even with 20% AP discount, 3, theming 9.
Overall, for me: 6/10. In the future, if I get the Cobb salad, I'm going below the top level to see if there is any turkey. If it was like this past trip, I'm going to immediately notify our server.
I originally had dinner reservations but decided the morning of to try and get a lunch one instead. The availability was wide open.
We got sat exactly where I like, a booth overlooking the floor. It is a comfortable booth with the tables allowing for manipulation to accommodate most/all guests. I knew what I wanted to order so this was the easy part.
The Cobb salad came out relatively quickly. Of course, the server asked me if I wanted it messy to which I said I could mess it up myself. And am I glad I did. The salad portion size was very good with very fresh ingredients. In fact, they doubled the cut bacon (or at least I noticed two separate piles). Then I did a gentle mix and was really enjoying it and then dove down in to get some turkey. And then I dove again and again and again. Hooray....I found the treasure chest of turkey in my Cobb salad! The 3-4 morsels were hidden under everything. What type of Mickey Mouse trick was this (especially at a $25 price point)? Although tempting to take a photo or inform the waitress, I forged ahead. That was my mistake. I informed our waitress at the end, and she thanked me saying she would inform the kitchen about equal distributions. Honestly, this was the essence of turkey and couldn't even fill up 1/4 of a teaspoon. It now makes me wonder if you let the server "make it messy" it somehow diminishes the abysmal amount of turkey in the dish.
We also got the Shephard's Pie. I didn't have any but was told it was excellent. It was made with lentils and no meat. It did look good from afar. We also got bread, which was merely average, but fresh/warm.
We got two glasses of white wine and a club soda with cranberry juice so no real challenges on that front.
I then decided to get dessert which is a rarity for me. Grapefruit Cake sounded interesting, and I heard/read some positive feedback online. We split it which was perfect portion sizing. The first bite, my mind was trying to register the flavor. It was sweet, but with sour notes. The layers of icing and the top having a single segment of grapefruit made presentation outstanding. The flavors, combined, were outstanding. This is an excellent piece of cake and worthy of being the only reason to stop at THBD. It was so impressive, that we immediately started looking up mock recipes to make it on our own. If that doesn't give a vote of confidence, I don't know what would.
Now that I had time to re-evaluate our meal, I would score the quality of food at an 8, preparation 4, drinks 7, service 7, value even with 20% AP discount, 3, theming 9.
Overall, for me: 6/10. In the future, if I get the Cobb salad, I'm going below the top level to see if there is any turkey. If it was like this past trip, I'm going to immediately notify our server.
