After our morning at Epcot, it was soon time to check in for a meal I was very much looking forward to – Le Cellier! This signature restaurant is located in the Canada Pavilion at Epcot.

Can we just take a moment to appreciate how beautiful the Canada pavilion is?

We checked in, and only had to wait a few minutes before being led to our table. As the hostess was seating us, she told us we were sitting in the “Prince Edward Island” section of the restaurant, so I asked where the New Brunswick section was – she quickly pointed to the corner and announced it was that table over there haha.

When our server arrived, she again told us we were in the PEI section, and started telling us facts about the Island (while I sat there grinning and nodding excitedly since I knew what she was talking about haha).

It’s pretty dark in that restaurant, so it was difficult to get great pictures. Here is the menu though:

And shortly before we went on this trip, they had introduced a Prixe Fixe menu for lunch only, here’s that menu:

We had looked over the menu for every restaurant before the trip, and we thought it would be silly to spend $50++ on steak at a Canadian themed restaurant in Florida when we live in Alberta – home to the best beef in the country, so we had decided on splitting a bunch of appetizers. But then, once Luke saw the prixe fixe menu he decided to go with that instead.

First, they bring you a bread basket. There were two of each kind (Luke had already taken his before I took the picture, and he had already dug into the butter). The long one is pretzel bread and the other one is a multigrain roll. The butter was sprinkled with maple sugar and sea salt (ooo, fancy!). Both bread offerings were really excellent, but the pretzel bread wins for best hands down.

You can also kind of see it in the back of the picture with the bread, but Luke ordered a La Fin du Monde to drink. It’s one of his favourite beers, and it just happens to be Canadian! I didn’t take a picture of my drink, but it was a Coke – pretty standard.

Now for the good stuff –

Le Cellier Signature Poutine – fresh-cut french fries, Canadian Cheddar, Truffles and Red-wine Reduction, $10

First of all – this is not a proper poutine (which is pronounced pou-tin, NOT pou-teen!). In Canada, a traditional poutine has brown gravy and big, thick, squeaky cheese curds. That said, this was one of the most amazing poutines I’ve ever had in my life. All of the ingredients worked so well together, and the fries were thinner, shoestring style like I prefer – and they were hot and fresh! I want more of this right now…

Luke’s prixe fixe lunch was a 3-course meal that cost $49. For his first course, he chose the:

Canadian Cheddar Cheese Soup – Moosehead beer, Nueske’s Applewood-smoked bacon

I was looking forward to trying this, but also really apprehensive because of the beer. I was born and raised in New Brunswick, which is where the Moosehead Brewery is located. I’m not a huge fan of beer in general, but I really hate that kind. I was scared the soup would taste like beer, but it doesn’t at all! It was so rich and creamy and delicious.

For Luke’s main course in his prixe fixe lunch, he went with the:

Beef Tenderloin – with grilled asparagus, crispy onions and peppercorn butter.

I tried a small piece from the outside of this – I’m a steak well-done person, Luke is not, so the outside was the only part cooked enough for me. It was very tasty! I believe we were even told it was Alberta beef, which we laughed about since it’s the province we actually live in. Luke seemed to really enjoy this, and ate it all!

I didn’t order a main, but instead went for another side dish:

Loaded Mashed Potatoes – Nueske’s bacon, black diamond cheddar, chives, potato skin crisp, $9

These were really creamy, and really rich! The potato skin crisp was really enjoyable, and they were very generous with the bacon and cheese in these! I actually couldn’t finish them all myself, it was a bit too many potatoes after polishing off that poutine haha.

Luke’s third and final course was dessert. He went for the Maple Creme Brulee

I don’t think I had ever tried creme brulee before, and this was when I realized I don’t like it at all. I ate the chocolate stick and a raspberry haha. Luke loved this though, and ate it all.

Our bill came to a total of $85.99 – which isn’t terrible, but I also only had appetizers and Luke went for the lunch special. That said, we’d absolutely go back (even if it’s just for that poutine!).

Quick Service:

• Be Our Guest (breakfast & lunch only) – Beauty and the Beast themed restaurant, pricey for breakfast, lunch is probably the best. Make sure you pre-order to save yourself a ton of time! 2016 breakfast review here, 2017 breakfast review here, 2016 lunch review here
• Casey’s Corner – hot dogs, corn dogs, french fries
• Columbia Harbour House – sandwiches, shrimp, pot pie, nuggets, etc. One of the better reviewed quick serve options
• Cosmic Ray’s – rotisserie chicken, cheeseburgers, chicken nuggets
• Peco’s Bills – fajita platters, nachos, etc. Huge toppings bar. One of my favourite quick serve locations – 2016 review is here, 2017 review here
• Pinocchio’s Village Haus – flatbreads, chicken parm, nuggets, etc
• Tomorrowland Terrace – open seasonally, hamburgers, nuggets, hot dogs, etc

Table Service:

• Be Our Guest (dinner only) – slightly French inspired. Can meet the Beast after you eat (only place to do so). 2016 review can be found here.
• Cinderella’s Royal Table – princess character meal inside the castle, from reviews food is nothing special but it’s expensive – you’re paying for the characters and location
• Crystal Palace – buffet with Pooh & friends. 2016 review here
• Jungle Navigation Co. Skipper Canteen – chicken, steak, seafood, pork – Asian fusion
• Liberty Tree Tavern – dinner is all you can eat turkey, pork and prime rib. Lunch has a few other options. I need to go just to try the Ooey Gooey Toffee Cake at lunch!
• Plaza Restaurant –  mainly sandwiches/burgers
• Tony’s Town Square – Italian restaurant close to the entrance of the park.

Cafe Orleans – Lunch – January 30, 2017

After really enjoying our meal here a few days prior, we checked the app and were able to get another reservation at Cafe Orleans no problem!

Both times we ate here, we heard them turning away anyone who didn’t have a reservation (or letting them know it would be at least a 45 minute wait until they could seat them) – so make a reservation if you’re interested in eating here!

This time we were at a small table inside the restaurant – there are not very many tables inside, it’s really tiny in there!

Here’s the menu, even though we knew exactly what we were going to order:

We both went for an order of their Pommes Frites – Traditional French Fried Potatoes tossed with Parmesan, Garlic, and Parsley served with Cajun Spice Remoulade.

These are so good. I love shoestring-style fries, and the gar-parm coating is delicious! I once again just shoved the cajun remoulade off to the side, I don’t feel that it really adds anything to them – they have more than enough flavour on their own!

Of course, we also both had to had a mint julep!

I had already drank some of mine by the time I remembered to take a picture… these things are amazing (and bottomless!). I think my glass ended up being refilled like four times (and we didn’t spend that much time there).

I have heard that in the few weeks since we were there, the recipe for the mint juleps has changed, and that makes me so sad if it’s true 🙁

Since we weren’t ordering full meals, we tried to eat as quickly as possible, and we also let our waitress know so she wouldn’t need to keep coming over to check on us.

Since I had the Premier Annual Passport, we saved 15% off our bill. Our bill was under $20 for 2 mint juleps and 2 orders of fries, and it was exactly what we wanted and it tasted amazing.

Cafe Orleans has solidified itself as one of our must-do’s on our Disneyland trips 🙂

Once we had secured our stay at Old Key West, we started researching it a bit more, and discovered that Olivia’s Cafe was considered a bit of a hidden gem in the Disney dining community. So, obviously we had to check it out! Initially, we had booked this reservation for 8:15am, however once we found out that the Race Expo was opening at noon, not 10am like we had planned, we were able to bump our reservation by an hour to 9:15am – extra sleep!

First of all, OKW is gorgeous! Olivia’s is located in the main building, along an open-air hallway with the main lobby directly across from it. How friggin cute is this restaurant?!

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We didn’t have to wait very long before we were led to our table – a booth that easily could have fit 4 people It wasn’t super busy, so I didn’t even feel guilty about sitting at a full-sized booth! According to the picture I took of our bill (which I did for just about every meal mainly for this report…), our server’s name was Andres. I don’t remember anything about him, I guess he was good enough that I don’t remember him being terrible, but he wasn’t one of the best we had on this trip either.

I ordered a glass of water, and Luke went for an orange juice. Nothing fancy for either of us, and no pictures either, sorry.

Here’s the menu:

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I didn’t really need to even look at the menu, I knew exactly what I was going to order! I ordered the Banana Bread French Toast – topped with Bahamian Banana-Rum syrup, Coconut whipped cream, and served with choice of bacon, sausage or ham ($14).

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I went for the ham, which was served with some nice grill marks on it. The ham was ok, but the french toast – oh man! It was so good, but really sweet! It was also a very generous order – remember those are slices of banana bread, so they were quite heavy and dense. I don’t remember any specific coconut flavour from the whipped cream, but that doesn’t mean it wasn’t there – it just means I’m not the best at describing tastes sometimes haha.

I would order this again, but only if someone agreed to help me out with eating it. When I finished eating, there was still enough for another meal on my plate…

Luke decided to try the Eggs and Hash: 2 eggs served any-style over sweet potato ham hash, topped with key lime hollandaise, served with a buttermilk biscuit ($13).

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He decided on poached eggs, and said they were really well done. He loved this meal, and said he would absolutely order it again! I tried the sweet potato/regular potato ham hash, and it was so delicious! I’m not a huge hollandaise fan, but I tried it and you could really taste the key lime in it – it wasn’t overpowering, but it added a nice little something to it. The biscuit was just ok, especially after the amazing ones we had the night before at Homecoming…

Our bill came to $32.48 after tax. We both left this meal full and happy

We had our plans all made, ADR’s were in place, and I just kept coming back to this menu. I eventually decided to squeeze it in on our arrival day, and then spent the next 2 months looking forward to eating here. Seriously, I was so excited, and I’m not typically considered a foodie.

As we were sitting on the Magical Express at the airport, I started worrying about timing. I was still worried when the bus dropped us off at Old Key West, I was worried as bell services drove us to our room in a golf cart, I was still worrying when I boarded a Disney Springs bus. And of course, we ended up being 5 minutes early for our reservation – all that worrying for nothing!

Once we checked in, we were handed a pager and told it would be a few minutes – our pager went off about 90 seconds later. We were led to our table, a two-top directly behind the hostess desk. It was nice, because there was a wall so we couldn’t see the front door, and it also meant we only had a table on one side of us. I didn’t take pictures of our table, but here are some of the decor:

I loved the light fixtures!
The Florida mural above the kitchen was great!
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I wish I could tell you how many hours we spent on All Ears, reading the menus and planning out what we would order at each meal on our trip. We had come to the conclusion that Homecoming would probably end up being our most expensive meal, as there were so many things we wanted.

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We each decided to start with a moonshine cocktail, I had the moonshine mash: watermelon-infused moonshine, fresh watermelon, lime juice and simple syrup, $12

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Oh man. I’ve had moonshine before, and it typically has a very…strong taste. This was by far the smoothest moonshine I’ve ever had in my life, it was amazing! Luke hates watermelon flavouring, he gave this drink his approval as well – it was much more of a light, natural watermelon flavour. So good.

Luke went for the waitresses suggestion, and ordered the Bootlegger: Rumshine and dark rum, blackberry jam, house-made grenadine, simple syrup, lime juice, $12

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This sounded weird to me, but again – holy smokes! It was so amazing!

Luke decided to order an appetizer and went for the Church Lady Deviled Eggs: Homecoming-style whole deviled eggs, $10

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I’m not a huge fan of eggs, even at breakfast, so I didn’t try any of these. Luke figured he would just have a few, and then pack them up and eat them for breakfast the next morning. Yeah, that didn’t happen. He loved them so much he ate all 6 of them (keep in mind, we hadn’t ate much all day and were STARVING by the time we got there). He also loved the house-made hot sauce, and was a little sad when he found out he couldn’t just buy a bottle to bring home.

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For entrees, Luke ordered the Art’s Famous Fried Chicken – buttermilk brined for 24 hours then perfectly fried and garnished with our house-made hot sauce served with creamy mashed potatoes, a cheddar drop biscuit and love. $27

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Again, this place was impressive. This was a huge serving, and absolutely incredible. The chicken was so tender and juicy, and had been butchered so that there were no bones present on the plate.

I wanted to try something else, and went for the Chopped Pork BBQ Plate: Dressed with HFK sweet and spicy BBQ sauce, served with momma’s mac and cheese and a cheddar drop biscuit, $24. I’m not a fan of mac and cheese, so I asked to switch to mashed potatoes instead. This was no problem at all, and both of us also had our potatoes topped with gravy (which was a little spicy, but so good!)

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This pork was so good! And the BBQ sauce – ugh. I’ve run out of adjectives for amazing. The mashed potatoes were so buttery and smooth. I think I could live off those biscuits, it was incredible.

All of that food, and I still wanted dessert.

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I had my eye on one thing – that Shine Cake: Chef Art’s signature dessert. An adult-only butter cake soaked with moonshine syrup. Served with a seasonal fruit gastrique and a scoop of vanilla bean ice cream $10. This thing was so lovely, I had to take two pictures of it:

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What a way to end this perfect meal! This cake was so nice and moist, and you could taste the moonshine. I’m not much of a drinker typically, and I usually hate the taste of liquor, but for some reason this tasted fantastic to me. It was strong though – I see why it’s adult’s only! I honestly got drunk from eating cake. Now I want more of that…

Luke also ordered another moonshine cocktail to have with dessert, the Apple Pie a la Mode: Ole Smokey Apple Pie Moonshine, vanilla vodka, apple juice, cinnamon, house-made simple syrup and a dash of lemon $12. I forgot to take a picture of it, I was too busy shoving alcoholic cake into my face. I did try a sip, and it was ok. It was by far our least favourite of the three drinks we tried.

In case you couldn’t tell, we LOVED this meal. I think it was a combination of being really hungry, the first meal of the trip and just being an amazing restaurant. This is actually the current #1 choice for our wedding reception when we get married at Disney next year…

The total cost of this meal was $107, or $113.96 after tax. It was worth every penny!

Our waitress, Tricia, was also great here, very attentive without hovering, and very friendly. We left her a generous tip

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This is listed as a “make your own pasta – choose your pasta and sauce combination with choice of Beef Meatballs, Panko-crusted Chicken, or Shrimp”. I went for the penne pasta with chicken and marinara sauce, which also came with a breadstick and a side salad. For dessert I grabbed a chocolate dipped Mickey rice krispie ($3.99) and to drink I picked up a bottle of Coke ($2.99) to save for later, and then used my refillable mug.

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Luke went for the Hot Italian Sandwich with cucumber salad ($9.49), a Mickey rice krispie (one without chocolate) ($3.99) for dessert and a bottle of water ($2.75) for later.

My pasta was once again really impressive – I wasn’t expecting much from a quick service food court in a value resort, but it was nice to be wrong Luke enjoyed his sandwich as well, and said he would buy it again. He also ate his rice krispie treat and enjoyed it. I ended up taking my rice krispie back to Canada with me, ate some of it but threw most of it out. It’s never been my favourite type of treat, but I had to say I tried one!

We used our final two quick service credits for this meal. Total cost would have been $34.70 plus tax.

After our disappointing meal at Yay&Yeti Quick Serve, we went on the Safari, walked the Pangani Forest Exploration Trail and watched FOTLK before Luke decided to grab his last Dole Whip of the trip from Tamu Tamu Refreshments – this time with a shot of coconut rum!

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I didn’t order anything, but one of the cast members working there noticed my birthday button, asked me when my birthday actually was (it was the next day, January 13th), and then walked back over and handed me this She told me it was close enough to my birthday, I should start the celebrations a day early. It seriously made my day!

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We found a quiet spot to sit and enjoy our snacks. Luke of course loved his Dole Whip, and the coconut rum was a great addition! My elephant ear was also great! It was coated in honey I think, so it had a nice sweet taste. I couldn’t finish it though, but I did my best!

Total Cost: $7 out of pocket for the Dole Whip, the elephant ear was free thanks to some pixie dust from a CM

When we woke up, we had to check out of our hotel, so we had a few snacks from the stuff in our room before turning over our luggage to bell services and heading to Animal Kingdom. After meeting Dug & Russell and using a FP+ for Dinosaur, we realized we were hungry. We decided to stop at the Yak & Yeti quick serve location, and we were one of the first few people in line as they were opening for the day (at 11am).

I ordered the Teriyaki Beef Bowl ($10.99)

*photo credit to Disney Food Blog*

Luke went for the Korean Stir-fry BBQ Chicken ($9.99).

*photo credit to EasyWDW*

We were both getting so sick of desserts that we swapped out for a pork egg roll ($3.29) and a side of chicken fried rice ($3.99). I ordered a root beer to drink, and Luke had a Coke ($3.19/each).

*photo credit to a google search*

Honestly, this was by far the worst meal of the entire trip. The food tasted like microwavable frozen dinners – the beef in mine was tough and chewy, and both were seriously lacking in any sort of flavour. The chicken fried rice was just ok, and the same for the egg roll. I know some people will say “what did you expect, it was cheap”, but I just feel like Disney can do so much better! And I hear reviews all the time about how great the table service Yak & Yeti is, but it’s going to take me a few trips before I can bring myself to add it to my list. As for this quick serve location, I can’t see us ever returning.

I also dislike the paper straws you have to use in AK. I get the whole reasoning behind it, but I’m not a fan of using them.

We used one quick serve credit each, but it would have cost $34.64 before tax if we were paying out of pocket.

The best part of this meal was the sitting area. It was outside, and HUGE! There was a water feature where a bunch of birds were hanging out, so we sat and watched them for a bit.

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