dolewhipdreams
Counting days until my next Dole Whip
- Joined
- Feb 24, 2017
You know that gif of Pooh dancing while he eats? That’s me.
Today’s destination: Epcot.
The goal? Determine the limits of my stomach capacity via Food and Wine booths.
After an early morning I made my way to the TTC, through security, and onto the Epcot monorail. Then once I got to Epcot I had the joy of going through security once more. So everyone at Epcot that day should have felt extra secure (did I do something wrong or does everyone who goes to Epcot from the TTC have to do security twice?).
Once inside the park my first order of business was, of course, caffeination. Where better for such a quest than Fountain View? The answer is anywhere else. Literally anywhere is better than this Starbucks. I’m not sure why but this is the absolute worst Starbucks on Disney property (and anywhere, really). Not that the CMs are bad (they’re actually fantastic) but I generally associate it with horribly long lines, large and indecisive families, and various other obstacles which all come together and lengthen the time it takes for me to get my morning tea beyond what is reasonable.
Okay I’m done with my very entitled and 100% avoidable rant. On with the show.
The first stop on Ann’s Epic Tour of Food and Wine was Flavors from Fire. I got the piggy wings and corn beef dish. Both were absolutely delicious and the perfect start to my day
Here I got a little lax in my notes. Really all I have is a succession of F&W food photos with my own personal grading. So I’ll just go through those and hope the rest comes to me
Next up was the Ireland booth. I love all the food here but I’ve had it all before. I wanted to focus on foods (and drinks) I hadn’t tried on previous trips, especially since I knew I really only had one day to fit it all in. So at Ireland I only got the Bunratty Meade.
Fun side story- I went to Bunratty Castle in Ireland when I was 17 and their meade was one of my first tastes of alcohol. Naturally I thought it was absolutely horrid and vowed never to let it pass my lips again. So I wanted to try it again now that I’ve developed a taste (thanks college!) and it is delicious! You can definitely taste the honey.
My next stop was Japan for yet more alcohol. I tried the Fuji Apple Cocktail which was mega sweet. Usually I love super sweet stuff but this was almost too much.
And according to my photos, I watched the drum show while I sipped my drink.
I finally decided to put more food in my body, so I tried the kefta pocket from Morocco.
I know it’s Morocco so I shouldn’t have been surprised but my goodness that red sauce was SPICY. The rest of the pocket was flavorful without burning my tongue off so it wasn’t a complete waste, though.
After finishing the kefta pocket it hit me- no one taken my picture in HOURS. This was unfathomable and needed to be remedied immediately.
Thankfully my girl Belle was meeting right next door and since I was Disneybounding as her that day, she was the perfect break in my photopass dry spell.
[I look super thoughtful here. Probably thinking about how I went too heavy on the bronzer that morning]
I completed my first round of the World Showcase at Mexico with the short rib tostada and Loco Mariachi.
I got the Mariachi Loco because it had mango in it. It also had Chamoy in it but I didn’t know what that was. Turns out it’s nasty. I just googled it and yeah if I had known what it was I never would have ordered that drink.
Anyway, I sipped on the drink while resting by a trash can (because its F&W and that’s whatchya do) that looked over the little pond in front of the building that has the first aid station and I thought I saw a snake pop its head out of the water. By the time I focused on it, it was gone. So I kept an eye out and sure enough, it popped up again!
I went around the path a little bit to try to get a closer look and this time when it came up I realized that it was a bird, not a snake. Now I know you’re probably thinking something along the lines of “Wow Ann you sure are dumb to confuse a bird for a snake,” but let me tell you some FACTS that may make you rethink this whole thing:
And of course I don’t have a picture to prove it so you’ll just have to believe me.
After sending the wizard water bird video to my DH and throwing my nasty spicy margarita away, I went into the festival center to grab another drink and a magnet.
I got in what I thought was the line for the magnet and it was really long. Like wrapped around the entire middle long. Luckily someone came through the line and informed us all that it wasn’t the line for the magnet, but was the line for the cutting board. The line for the magnet was a little further on and thankfully much shorter.
Magnet in hand I moseyed (just now learned how to spell this. Don’t think I’ve ever written it down before) over to the mimosa bar and got a POG mimosa (because if it has POG, it’s in my belly). This was my favorite drink of the day, hands down.
Now I wanted to hit a lot of the booths at the World Showcase entrance, starting with the Cheese Studio for the maple boursin cheesecake -- which was divine – and the blueberry wine (which was good but not in a celestial way).
After dessert, I hopped over to Wine & Dine for the butternut squash ravioli. I’ve had this done other places so I was excited to see what the F&W chefs had decided to do with it. It would have tasted a lot better if it wasn’t lukewarm. The flavors were nice but everything was overshadowed by the temperature.
One more studio booth left- the Chocolate Studio. Of course I got the liquid nitro Tokyo drift 2 truffle 2 furious whatever it’s called. It was amazing, as per usual.
At this point my stomach space was negligible. But I had only a few booths left and I was determined to beat my PR for most food consumed in the shortest amount of time (previously broken by our Disney Cruise #freemickeybars). So I pulled up my big girl (elastic-waist) paints and soldiered on.
My last ‘country’ booth was Greece for the loaded Greek nachos. I used to shy away from anything vegan because in my head vegan = icky taste. But after being pleasantly surprised at some vegan restaurants in Montreal I’ve learned that just because it doesn’t have animal products doesn’t mean it’s automatically disgusting. And these nachos added to that. They were delightful.
Just a few booths down was something that I was really looking forward to- the banana almond sundae from the Almond Orchard. I got that and the spinach and artichoke dip as my final food dishes for the day and it was such an amazing note to end on.
I managed to lose the photo of the spinach dip but it looked like pretty much every spinach dip you’ve ever seen.
While walking around a bit I saw that Daisy was meeting in a super cute kitchen outfit so I stopped for some photos. She’s so sassy and I love her.
[Full disclosure- I put my birthday button on early because I really liked people telling me Happy Birthday ]
There was one last thing on my list of must-tries and it was in the Light Lab. After wasting my time in the wrong line (wrong but very cool. If you’ve never been in the light lab at F&W I suggest it. It’s very colorful and science-y), I finally had a cider flight in hand.
I love cider. It’s my drink of choice. I’ve never gotten over the smell (and therefore taste) of beer so I love getting to try new varieties of cider. These were all marvelous but unfortunately my stomach decided to close its doors about halfway through the second one. After sitting for about 15 minutes trying to finish the last one, I had to throw in my towel and just toss the rest.
RIP delicious cider #3
My original plan had been to cap my Epcot time off with a free birthday frozen Coke from Club Cool but I knew that if I couldn’t finish a beloved cider then a frozen Coke would go nowhere but the trash. So alas, I walked right past Club Cool on my way out of Epcot and to the monorail.
Today’s destination: Epcot.
The goal? Determine the limits of my stomach capacity via Food and Wine booths.
After an early morning I made my way to the TTC, through security, and onto the Epcot monorail. Then once I got to Epcot I had the joy of going through security once more. So everyone at Epcot that day should have felt extra secure (did I do something wrong or does everyone who goes to Epcot from the TTC have to do security twice?).
Once inside the park my first order of business was, of course, caffeination. Where better for such a quest than Fountain View? The answer is anywhere else. Literally anywhere is better than this Starbucks. I’m not sure why but this is the absolute worst Starbucks on Disney property (and anywhere, really). Not that the CMs are bad (they’re actually fantastic) but I generally associate it with horribly long lines, large and indecisive families, and various other obstacles which all come together and lengthen the time it takes for me to get my morning tea beyond what is reasonable.
Okay I’m done with my very entitled and 100% avoidable rant. On with the show.
The first stop on Ann’s Epic Tour of Food and Wine was Flavors from Fire. I got the piggy wings and corn beef dish. Both were absolutely delicious and the perfect start to my day
Here I got a little lax in my notes. Really all I have is a succession of F&W food photos with my own personal grading. So I’ll just go through those and hope the rest comes to me
Next up was the Ireland booth. I love all the food here but I’ve had it all before. I wanted to focus on foods (and drinks) I hadn’t tried on previous trips, especially since I knew I really only had one day to fit it all in. So at Ireland I only got the Bunratty Meade.
Fun side story- I went to Bunratty Castle in Ireland when I was 17 and their meade was one of my first tastes of alcohol. Naturally I thought it was absolutely horrid and vowed never to let it pass my lips again. So I wanted to try it again now that I’ve developed a taste (thanks college!) and it is delicious! You can definitely taste the honey.
My next stop was Japan for yet more alcohol. I tried the Fuji Apple Cocktail which was mega sweet. Usually I love super sweet stuff but this was almost too much.
And according to my photos, I watched the drum show while I sipped my drink.
I finally decided to put more food in my body, so I tried the kefta pocket from Morocco.
I know it’s Morocco so I shouldn’t have been surprised but my goodness that red sauce was SPICY. The rest of the pocket was flavorful without burning my tongue off so it wasn’t a complete waste, though.
After finishing the kefta pocket it hit me- no one taken my picture in HOURS. This was unfathomable and needed to be remedied immediately.
Thankfully my girl Belle was meeting right next door and since I was Disneybounding as her that day, she was the perfect break in my photopass dry spell.
[I look super thoughtful here. Probably thinking about how I went too heavy on the bronzer that morning]
I completed my first round of the World Showcase at Mexico with the short rib tostada and Loco Mariachi.
I got the Mariachi Loco because it had mango in it. It also had Chamoy in it but I didn’t know what that was. Turns out it’s nasty. I just googled it and yeah if I had known what it was I never would have ordered that drink.
Anyway, I sipped on the drink while resting by a trash can (because its F&W and that’s whatchya do) that looked over the little pond in front of the building that has the first aid station and I thought I saw a snake pop its head out of the water. By the time I focused on it, it was gone. So I kept an eye out and sure enough, it popped up again!
I went around the path a little bit to try to get a closer look and this time when it came up I realized that it was a bird, not a snake. Now I know you’re probably thinking something along the lines of “Wow Ann you sure are dumb to confuse a bird for a snake,” but let me tell you some FACTS that may make you rethink this whole thing:
1.The part that was sticking out of water was long and skinny, with no discernable head shape.
2. It went under water for a very long time. Like I would have died if I tried to hold my breath for that long.
3. I’m from Kansas. We don’t have wizard water birds in Kansas but we do have water snakes. And they look exactly like the thing I was looking at.
2. It went under water for a very long time. Like I would have died if I tried to hold my breath for that long.
3. I’m from Kansas. We don’t have wizard water birds in Kansas but we do have water snakes. And they look exactly like the thing I was looking at.
And of course I don’t have a picture to prove it so you’ll just have to believe me.
After sending the wizard water bird video to my DH and throwing my nasty spicy margarita away, I went into the festival center to grab another drink and a magnet.
I got in what I thought was the line for the magnet and it was really long. Like wrapped around the entire middle long. Luckily someone came through the line and informed us all that it wasn’t the line for the magnet, but was the line for the cutting board. The line for the magnet was a little further on and thankfully much shorter.
Magnet in hand I moseyed (just now learned how to spell this. Don’t think I’ve ever written it down before) over to the mimosa bar and got a POG mimosa (because if it has POG, it’s in my belly). This was my favorite drink of the day, hands down.
Now I wanted to hit a lot of the booths at the World Showcase entrance, starting with the Cheese Studio for the maple boursin cheesecake -- which was divine – and the blueberry wine (which was good but not in a celestial way).
After dessert, I hopped over to Wine & Dine for the butternut squash ravioli. I’ve had this done other places so I was excited to see what the F&W chefs had decided to do with it. It would have tasted a lot better if it wasn’t lukewarm. The flavors were nice but everything was overshadowed by the temperature.
One more studio booth left- the Chocolate Studio. Of course I got the liquid nitro Tokyo drift 2 truffle 2 furious whatever it’s called. It was amazing, as per usual.
At this point my stomach space was negligible. But I had only a few booths left and I was determined to beat my PR for most food consumed in the shortest amount of time (previously broken by our Disney Cruise #freemickeybars). So I pulled up my big girl (elastic-waist) paints and soldiered on.
My last ‘country’ booth was Greece for the loaded Greek nachos. I used to shy away from anything vegan because in my head vegan = icky taste. But after being pleasantly surprised at some vegan restaurants in Montreal I’ve learned that just because it doesn’t have animal products doesn’t mean it’s automatically disgusting. And these nachos added to that. They were delightful.
Just a few booths down was something that I was really looking forward to- the banana almond sundae from the Almond Orchard. I got that and the spinach and artichoke dip as my final food dishes for the day and it was such an amazing note to end on.
I managed to lose the photo of the spinach dip but it looked like pretty much every spinach dip you’ve ever seen.
While walking around a bit I saw that Daisy was meeting in a super cute kitchen outfit so I stopped for some photos. She’s so sassy and I love her.
[Full disclosure- I put my birthday button on early because I really liked people telling me Happy Birthday ]
There was one last thing on my list of must-tries and it was in the Light Lab. After wasting my time in the wrong line (wrong but very cool. If you’ve never been in the light lab at F&W I suggest it. It’s very colorful and science-y), I finally had a cider flight in hand.
I love cider. It’s my drink of choice. I’ve never gotten over the smell (and therefore taste) of beer so I love getting to try new varieties of cider. These were all marvelous but unfortunately my stomach decided to close its doors about halfway through the second one. After sitting for about 15 minutes trying to finish the last one, I had to throw in my towel and just toss the rest.
RIP delicious cider #3
My original plan had been to cap my Epcot time off with a free birthday frozen Coke from Club Cool but I knew that if I couldn’t finish a beloved cider then a frozen Coke would go nowhere but the trash. So alas, I walked right past Club Cool on my way out of Epcot and to the monorail.
Last edited: