Restaurant Review: Coral Reef at Epcot

Epcot Restaurant Review: Rose & Crown

This is my review on our recent outing to the Rose & Crown pub and dinning room in Epcot's World Showcase.  Out of the many dinning trips we have had in Epcot, I would have to say our best cast member waitressing experience was here. Our waitress was not only friendly but also shared with us some of the behind the scene details about moving from England, living on Disney property and working in America for a year. The pub (which stands for "public house", did you know that?) sits next to the world showcase lagoon with an option of dining outside to enjoy the scenery.

Your dining experience comes with a free appetizer of bread and butter after you make your selection of traditional British cuisine from the menu. I chose the all time favorite "Fish and Chips" for $17.99.

This comes with one filet of beer battered and fried fish and fries. The white fish used in this dish falls into large chunks as you eat it.  I found my dish very tasty! Outside you can purchase a "to-go" order of fish and chips for $8.99.  This comes with 2 small filets and fries. I am not sure they use the same white fish in the outside to go kiosk as the do inside the restaurant.

My husband chose the  Roasted Rack Pork with colcannon potatoes, roasted apples and whole-grain mustard jus for $21.99. 

He enjoyed this but especially liked the potatoes. 
Our over all experience here was very pleasant.  The portions are not huge, they are just enough to leave room for desert! 

As with all Epcot showcase restaurants I highly suggest making a reservation before you come as some dinning rooms book out even 6 months in advance! You can make your Epcot reservations here: 
https://disneyworld.disney.go.com/dining/epcot/Enjoy!

Tutto Italia, Italy Epcot

I was looking forward to eating in Italy more than most of the places in Epcot this year.  Two of my friends and I went to Tutto Italia for dinner service and this was our experience:
Upon arrival we waited in a line out front to inform the hostess we had a reservation, only to be told we must go inside if you have already made reservations.  (That would have been helpful to know before we waited in a line.) Our service was not very friendly but extremely fast.  To some people that can be a good thing but I kind of felt like our food might have been pre-prepared and just waiting on someone to order it in the back.
When you sit down you receive an arrangement of different types of bread in a basket and an assortment of olives on the side to enjoy as your pre-appetizer. By the end of the night we had gone through 3 baskets of bread!! That means that each of us had a basket of bread for ourselves!
This is what we ordered :
Me: Cannelloni al Forno - baked with spinach, ricotta, bechamel and parmesan cheese
    I thought that the dish was good and the cheese was wonderful but that it was almost too much cheese.  I longed for a little red sauce to be mixed in because everything tasted so rich.  


my friends both had: Farfalle - bowtie pasta, Italian prosciutto ham, peas, parmesan cream
   They both loved their dish and had nothing but good things to say about it.  


Over all we had a nice experience and would go again. 

Le Cellier Steakhouse Review- Canada, Epcot

This was by far the best restaurant we have been to so far in Epcot. You usually have to have a 6 month in advance reservation (Which we did!) and we went here the day after Valentine's day to celebrate a romantic dinner. We were not disappointed.

After about a 20 minute wait we were seated at our table and notice that the atmosphere was a little more casual than we expected.  We are at Disney of corse so there were several shorts, touristy t-shirts and other casual wear.  Our waiter was extremely nice, helpful and had a sense of humor. To start, he brought out 3 different types of bread sticks and said whichever one we like he will continue to bring. In the mix was a warm pretzel bread stick, sourdough or maybe french style breadstick, and a wheat breadstick.  We looooved the pretzel!!

I ordered: Pre-fix meal
                                                         Canadian Cheddar cheese soup

Pan-roasted Chicken Farcie

Airline Chicken Breast stuffed with a Spiced Chicken Chipotle Sausage, Wild Rice Waffle, Pomegranate-Barbecue Glaze, and Cranberry Chutney

And Maple Creme Brulee for Dessert 

I loved every bit of it.  My Favorite was the cheddar cheese soup and the little rice waffles! The Maple Creme Brulee was the best Creme Brulee I have ever had!! 

Daniel ordered: 

Canadian Cheddar Cheese soup

Coffee-rubbed Kansas City Strip Steak 

with Hazelnut Butter and Cream CheeseMashed Potatoes 

He loooved the mashed potatoes and liked the steak.  He thought the coffee was an interesting addition to it.

Overall we really enjoyed our meal here!

Nine Dragons, China

 For Christmas we decided to have dinner at Epcot.  We decided this a little late in the game and the only restaurant that was available to make reservations a few weeks in advance was Nine Dragons, China's restaurant. (That should have told us something right there) I was expecting something traditional yet eclectic, similar to P.F. Changs.  Instead we received mediocre food and service with a classy price!

Here is what we ordered:
Amber ordered: Water, wonton soup, sweet and sour pork w/ spinach noodles, strawberry and red bean ice cream.
Daniel ordered: Diet Coke, hot and sour soup, kung pao chicken
Bill totaling = $60
Shari ordered:Diet Coke, Wonton Soup,  The Fried Rice Platter
The only thing unique about any of these orders were the spinach noodles, which were surprisingly good to me, seeing how I despise spinach. Otherwise we could have eaten this at the local buffet down the street.

wonton soup

Fried Rice Platter

Sweet and sour pork w/spinach noodles

Kung Pao Chicken

Over all we were a little disappointed and I was left craving a pastry from France in the end.
 DON'T GO.
On the bright side, every night in the month of December Epcot has The Candlelight Procession.  It was absolutely wonderful!!

Epcot food and wine festival review

As part of our Annual Passes to Epcot we were able to go to this years 15th Anniversary Food and Wine festival.

Around the world showcase you can stop at different countries (not just the ones that are normally there) and taste foods and wine from around the world.  Here are some things we tried and our experience:

Argentina: Roasted corn and cheese empanada
This was one of our favorites and also the first thing we tried. A little spicy and great flavor!

Mexico: Tamal de Pollo
We were not to impressed with this tamale.  I didnt care for the sauce or sour cream drizzled over it, and I have had many many better tamale from FT. Worth Texas!

China: Pork pot stickers
I would have really enjoyed these if they had not been covered in a ginger viniger sauce.  My husband really liked them.

Germany: Sausage in a pretzel roll
I loved this, any thing is good with a pretzel!
also: Apfel Strudel
One of my husbands favorites.  very very tasty!

Morocco: Beef in a pita pocket
neither one of us cared for this much

Charcuterie & Cheese: (near Canada) Cheese fondue with croutons and roasted potatoes
The best thing about this were the odd potatoes that looked like little cooked olives. I loved the fondue but they only gave me like 4 croutons and 5 potatoes.  I had a lot of fondue left.

New Zealand: Lamb slider with tomato chutney
My husband thought this was pretty good besides the chutney.  I hated it and only took one bite.

Canada: Canadian cheddar cheese soup.
Best food of the night! we loved this soup but also felt they didn't give us enough for $4. I read that they serve this regularly in their restaurant in Canada (Le Cellar)

Over all good experience.  If you have any questions or are going soon, message me and I would love to talk more about our experience. Also they have concerts every night and the night we went Boys II Men were there. It brought back great memories and good times!



Second Night we went with Shari, John, Jason and Me and Daniel:

Greece: Spanakopita
Daniel ate this. It was a spinach and cheese pocket. It was good but very spinachy.

Belgium: Freshly baked waffles with berry compote and whipped cream.
everyone had this except Daniel.  It was very good. Jason even ate the compote!

Hot chocolate:  Shari and Daniel stopped to get this and both really enjoyed it.  It is an everyday epcot drink.

United States: Bison Chili with wild mushrooms.
Daniel really loved this.  I don't like chili and wasn't in the mood to try it, but if you are a chili fan then go for it.

Italy: Baked cheese ravioli with bolognese sauce and melted mozzarella.
This was very cheesy! No marinara with all cheese as the sauce. A very interesting ravioli.

Singapore: Shrimp Cake with Singapore noodle salad.
I liked this to try but I wouldn't order it again.  The noodle salad has a red pepper taste to it and is cold.  The shrimp cake is like eating one large shrimp on a stick.

Poland: Golabki (pork stuffed cabbage)
Daniel had this. It was just ok, but very soggy.

Desserts & Champagne: Strawberry Angel Verrine.
This was the best thing all night.  A very tasty rendition of strawberry shortcake.
Pear Streusel Pudding Cake: This sounds really good, but reminded me of something I would get at the buffet.
Dark Chocolate Sensation: Worst of the night.  Tasted like a hard mini chocolate cupcake.

We went back to Canada for the cheddar soup and Argentina for the Empanada.

Biergarten Restaurant, Germany Epcot Review

Our second restaurant stop this year in
Epcot was Germany at Biergarten.

This restaurant is a full
service buffet.  The cost is $30 per adult and $15 per child.  The atmosphere is very welcoming and child friendly with live German music and a dance floor for the children.  The food reminded me of a well put together church potluck with most of the options having a home-cooked style with a german twist to it. Some of the menu: Chicken spaetzle, Bavarian cheese cake, pretzel rolls and my husbands favorite potato dumplings.  Each table in the restaurant seats 10 people and as it is a German custom, you are sat with another party for dinner to share the table.  This was a little awkward for us as the family that sat next to us was not talkative and didn't seem to be having a good time, but I could see how this set up has the potential to make your dining experience more enjoyable.  We went with friends and had a party of five.  I recommend always making reservations to any Epcot Restaurant and when we showed up almost 30 minutes early to our reservation this time, we were seated within 5 minutes! All of our party enjoyed the food and thought it was a worthwhile experience.

Epcot Restaurant Review:
Les Chefs de France

So we recently bought annual passes to Disney World's Epcot and it is our goal this year to eat at every country.  I will be blogging our experiences, and this last Saturday we ate at our first stop: Les Chefs de France.  This is one of 2 restaurants they have in France. The other is "Bistro de Paris" which is upstairs above the restaurant we choose.

I decided to order the 3 corse meal:
French Onion Soup

Macaroni and cheese made with Cream and Gruyere cheese
Creme brulee

My husband Daniel ordered:
The imported cheese plate
the Duck

We made reservations and everything went very smoothly but the restaurant was very crowded.  Our appetizers came out in a timely manner but everything went down hill from there. The french onion soup was wonderful but Daniel's cheese plate left something to desire. French baguettes come free at each table and you can have as much as you want. They sat us in an all window room and we soon found ourselves very over heated.  Our waiter was sweating and our service (after our appetizers) was very slow. We waited over an hour for our main dish to arrive, by the time it did my husband had an awful headache from the heat and both of us had no desire to even eat anymore. The portions I will add were very generous. Anyone could share a meal here. I am unsure my Macaroni plate was tasty or not.  I ate a few bites but was to miserable to even try and eat anymore.  My desert arrived 2 hours after we had initially arrived. I ate 1/4 of it and decided it was not worth it.  Daniel did not eat his meal at all but brought it home to eat later.  He said the duck was good but a bit orangey.
Overall I had wished we had chose the more private restaurant upstairs or that it hadn't been so hot that day.  Our overall ticket price was: $103 not including tip. If I were to return I would just order the French onion soup. It was plenty of food to make a meal.