May ‘21 Quick Dining Reviews w/Photos

[OhioWDWDuo]

First dining review! Trip dates were May 9-15. Will keep the reviews brief but we had a great trip with some restaurant favorites! Stayed at Yacht Club, the Epcot area is our fav. We are out of state passholders who visit every May (well, not in May 2020 due to obvious reasons). Even with some restaurants closed and menus limited, we still enjoyed our dining! As a first time reviewer, please be patient if I have technical issues with posting...

 

[OhioWDWDuo]

Via Napoli 1
This is a trip tradition for us, as we love the pizza. We snagged 2 reservations here and decided to go twice, once to try food other than pizza and once for our traditional pizza dinner.

This was our arrival evening and we were SO happy to be there! We ordered a white wine flight, red wine flight, garlic focaccia, veal Marsala (on special), and Mediterranean Sea bass. All was delicious!!! Service was great, had a very personable server. Enjoyed everything but still love pizza the best.

Side note: Got dessert from the new gelato place in Italy. Tried the cherry and pistachio. Both were good but the pistachio was FANTASTIC! No pic because it was melting too fast! It was so good that we got it twice this trip!

Red Wine Flight


White Wine Flight


Flight Details



Veal Marsala


Sea Bass

 

[2xcited2sleep]

Via Napoli is our traditional start of vacation meal too. Although I have yet to tear myself away from that pizza. I'm not sure I knew they had wine flights ... will keep that in mind for next time. Looking forward to hearing about the rest of your trip!

 

[OhioWDWDuo]

Via Napoli is our traditional start of vacation meal too. Although I have yet to tear myself away from that pizza. I'm not sure I knew they had wine flights ... will keep that in mind for next time. Looking forward to hearing about the rest of your trip!

Oh yeah, that pizza is amazing! We ended the vacation with it.

 

[OhioWDWDuo]

California Grill

One of our favorites from past visits. This time, it was a bit of a disappointment. We ordered the California combination roll, filet of beef, lamb loin, bottle of Pinot noir, and Grand Marnier soufflé. Our sushi appetizer was great, as usual, but the entrees were lacking for the price. DH ordered the filet and it was good but not great. The quality of the steak was below past experiences at Cali Grill. He said the mashed potatoes were the best part of that dish! I had the lamb. The actual meat was tasty, but the rest of the dish was just strange. The pea purée tasted “off” and the white asparagus pieces were very mushy. Just weird and not that enjoyable. We also ordered the Grand Marnier soufflé but no pics because I forgot(sorry!). Very much enjoyed the dessert! Service was great. We didn’t love our table but great tables for 2 are hard to get at Disney, lol. We decided that our next visit will be drinks, sushi, and dessert.

Side note: The elevators went out right before going upstairs for our reservation. So we got taken upstairs via the manager in a service elevator and walked through the kitchen to get to our seats. It was a cool experience! Appreciated the staff acting quickly and showing resilience during an equipment failure.

California Combination Roll


Filet


Colorado Lamb Loin

 

[hereforthechurros]

I ate at California Grill in April and agree the entrees are just off right now. I had the halibut which was well cooked but the sides were just all sorts of weird and not very tasty. I hope they can figure it out as things improve.

 

[OhioWDWDuo]

I ate at California Grill in April and agree the entrees are just off right now. I had the halibut which was well cooked but the sides were just all sorts of weird and not very tasty. I hope they can figure it out as things improve.

Totally agree! Those sides with the lamb were just weird and didn’t taste good. Also had a strange mix of textures in there. I’m confident that it will get better. Really hoping they bring back brunch soon!

 

[OhioWDWDuo]

ABC Commissary
Lunch during our DHS day. Ordered the Mediterranean salad with chicken and the chicken club sandwich with fries. For CS, this was excellent. Everything was fresh and very tasty. Would have preferred to sit outside but the tables were mostly taken by people not eating...probably taking mask breaks. This was during the time when masks were still required outside. Would definitely visit again for a quality CS lunch!

Med Chicken Salad


Chicken Club



Trolley Car Cafe
While waiting for our ROTR boarding group to be called, we grabbed a carrot cake cookie and Starbucks refresher. The carrot cake cookie is a tradition! Although it was better when it came from the Writer’s Stop (RIP), it’s still delicious.

 

[followthatmouse]

Thank you for these reviews. I’m reliving a couple of meals vicariously! Oh, I do remember the Writers Spot carrot cake cookie with a little tear in the eye. It was reliably yummy!

 

[2xcited2sleep]

ABC Commissary looks great. That salad looks delicious and I'm a sucker for thick cut fries. For some reason it's never been on my radar but will have to keep it in mind as a good stop in the future.

 

[OhioWDWDuo]

Thank you for these reviews. I’m reliving a couple of meals vicariously! Oh, I do remember the Writers Spot carrot cake cookie with a little tear in the eye. It was reliably yummy!

That was such a great place! We always spent time in there with coffees, the carrot cake cookie, and browsing the selection of books.

 

[OhioWDWDuo]

ABC Commissary looks great. That salad looks delicious and I'm a sucker for thick cut fries. For some reason it's never been on my radar but will have to keep it in mind as a good stop in the future.

It was never on our radar either, but I was looking for a salad and a short mobile order window. Lol! The food was fantastic...we’ll definitely be back!

 

[OhioWDWDuo]

Topolino’s Dinner
First time here and had high expectations (maybe too high). Had a table right next to the kitchen window; we could watch the food coming out. Would have preferred a window table but it’s okay. We ordered the gnocchi appetizer, 2 glasses of wine based on server’s recommendation, the sole, veal chop, and warm chocolate cake for dessert. Everything was good but not everything was great. The gnocchi was strange to us, I think it was a texture thing. The crunchy breadcrumbs on top didn’t seem to match the smoothness of the rest of the dish. And some of the kale was crunchy, almost like it was fried. The flavors were amazing though!

DH had the sole and while it was okay, he didn’t feel it was worth $50. It was very salty and a few of the potatoes were charred which didn’t compliment the light fish. The veal chop, however, was worth the price tag. It was tender, cooked perfectly, and seasoned well. Also enjoyed the potatoes served with it. We finished the entire veal dish but left some of the fish dish. Had to save room for dessert! The chocolate cake was good, think we’ll skip it next time because it wasn’t anything special. For a molten chocolate cake, it seemed a little over cooked. Next time, we’ll try the pistachio dessert. We’re going to give this restaurant another try, but just order differently next time. We also had great service here and many of the other dishes we saw coming out of the kitchen looked fantastic. The views were fabulous from the outdoor terrace!

Bread service with olive oil


Gnocchi


Sole


Veal Chop


Chocolate Cake

 

[OhioWDWDuo]

Another review! Hope there are helpful.

Wine Bar George
We LOVE this place! However, on this visit the service was very lacking. Which is not our usual experience with WBG. We’ll chalk it up to an off day (or maybe staffing issues due to COVID). We went for lunch. We ordered the hummus appetizer, 2 steak frites lunch entrees, and a wine flight. When we were sat at the table, we waited for about 15 minutes before anyone greeted us. We were just talking and not sweating it, and a server came over to ask if we’d been helped. She was very apologetic and ran to get us waters. She came back and told us that we have a different server assigned. Okay...but we waited probably another 15 minutes before he came over. They weren’t busy at all and he acted put out or annoyed like we had complained (we hadn’t). No explanation about the wait, no introduction, no asking if it was our first time, nothing. It was- okay I’m here, what do you want? Huh?! Not a good start.

The wine flight that we wanted from the menu was not available- they ran out of some of the wines a few days before. So they put together another wine flight at the same price point. The wines were all awesome and we really enjoyed them! The food was also great. It was just a weird vibe with the server. We will definitely be back, I think they were off their service game for some reason this time. Even if you’re not a big wine fan, the food here is excellent and definitely worth the trip to DS.

Hummus


Red wine flight



Steak Frites

 

[hereforthechurros]

What sort of sauce was with the steak frites? Looks good!

 

[OhioWDWDuo]

What sort of sauce was with the steak frites? Looks good!

It was a caramelized onion aioli. It was delicious! It ‘melted’ into the steak and fries and was really flavorful. DH, who is a ketchup addict, didn’t even use any for his fries.

 

[OhioWDWDuo]

Snack update!

Joffrey’s- Disney Springs
DH wanted to do a “donut challenge” between Joffrey’s pink and blue iced donuts. Pink won!! We also had an iced Lion’s Latte, which is described on the Jofffey’s website as “A decadent blend of espresso, with white chocolate and coconut”. It was delicious with the donuts and hit the spot!





Aloha Isle- MK
Always have to get a dole whip in MK! We had a float with the pineapple soft serve. Soooo good and refreshing! However, this area was nuts. So many people everywhere and you could barely move. We snagged a table that was just vacated in the old Aladdin meet and greet area. We ate our snack quickly and got out of there! Just as good as always.





Cider Flight- Epcot F&G
We didn’t do too many F&G booths on this trip, because we had daily ADRs. However, we had to try this cider flight! Three different ciders- pink lemonade, watermelon, and triple jam. We both liked the pink lemonade cider the best, although all 3 were good.

 

[OhioWDWDuo]

Pecos Bill- MK

Lunch during our MK day. We find the MK CS options very lacking. Next time, I think we’ll leave the park and eat at one of the resorts. Anyway, we mobile ordered early andhad our pick of lunch times. When our food was ready and we made it through the massive crowd blocking the entrance, we had a nice lunch and enjoyed the AC. We had one southwest salad with pork and one with chicken, plus chips and queso to share. The salads were fresh and good. We also got sides of guacamole with the salads and it was delicious. Chips and queso were standard but good. When it’s hot and we have lots of park touring ahead, we can’t eat too heavy. These salads were perfect to keep us going!




Chips and Queso

 

[Avery&Todd]

LOVE your reviews and great pictures! Can't wait to hear (and drool ) more!

 

[OhioWDWDuo]

LOVE your reviews and great pictures! Can't wait to hear (and drool ) more!

Thank you! Will get another one posted tonight!