by Beth Keating
Review
DisneyBizJournal.com
March 24, 2023
The first time we went to the Grand Floridian Café, we were expecting the dining room to match the rest of the Grand Floridian Resort – upscale and maybe too fancy for our theme park t-shirts. But we were new to Florida at the time, and hadn’t yet been able to get annual passes, so we had been making the rounds of the various Disney Resorts, getting a Disney fix without breaking the bank buying individual park tickets, biding our time until the annual pass sales resumed. Grand Floridian Café turned out to be a lovely evening, and so much more relaxed than we’d anticipated.
Now, a few years later, we were heading over to the Grand Floridian to take in the chocolate Easter egg display (see our article and video here), and we decided to check out the Grand Floridian’s lunch offerings. It was once again a lovely, albeit extended, meal.
The Grand Floridian Café does offer breakfast, lunch and dinner seatings, but there is a brief closure between lunch and dinner. The café is closed from 2:00-5:00 so the cast members can prepare for the meal switchover.
Lunch at the Grand Floridian Café is served as “Blunch,” as our cast member explained. It’s the opportunity to order lunch items, but breakfast items continue to be offered as well. It’s not a large menu, but the widely varying offerings include everything from Banana Foster Oatmeal, steak and eggs, avocado toast, quiche, pancakes, and Brioche French Toast, to Reubens, salads, burgers, salmon, and Lobster Benedict.
We were hoping the famed Strawberry Soup from the not-yet-reopened 1900 Park Fare next door was available, but alas, it wasn’t on the day’s menu. Instead it was a butternut squash soup ($12.00), which we skipped in favor of the Chilled Jumbo Shrimp Cocktail ($16.00) and the Heirloom Apple Salad ($13.00).
Normally, you would see a shrimp cocktail served draped over the edge of a stemmed glass, hovering over a splash of cocktail sauce. But this delicious appetizer was far from the ordinary presentation of shrimp cocktail. The Grand Floridian Café’s rendition featured five very large, very chilled shrimp, perched on top of a bed of greens and a layer of grapefruit sections, paired with a side of freshly sliced avocado. It was, indeed, served with the obligatory cocktail sauce, but the dish was so fresh and citrusy tasting that you really didn’t need it.
The Apple Salad was also an unexpected treat, a pretty substantial starter-sized salad of organic baby lettuce, tossed with heirloom apples and sharp cheddar, and topped with crunchy pecan brittle and a salty prosciutto. It was dressed with a sweet honey-apple vinaigrette that I would love to have again and again.
Our entrées had a delightful twist as well. I ordered the Buttermilk-fried Chicken and Waffle ($26.00), which came with two hand-breaded crispy chicken cutlets served with a sriracha-honey drizzle that was just delicious. The drizzle was sweet, with the barest hint of a kick from the sriracha, and it was expertly applied, because it was the perfect amount of glaze. The chicken wasn’t drowning in the sauce, but it also had an adequate amount that flavored the chicken without overwhelming the crunchy texture. But the big surprise was the malted waffle that was the centerpiece of the dish. It was one large waffle, fluffy and uniquely flavored… and in the shape of Mickey! How can you not love Mickey-shaped food at Disney World? My son, who was dining with me, thought I was nuts because I was so excited over the Mickey waffle.
My son chose the Lobster 'Thermidor' Burger ($26.00), a dish that the Grand Floridian Café is famous for, and it did not disappoint. A 7-oz burger patty topped by a creamy lobster-parmesan Thermidor sauce, the burger is served on a seared brioche bun, with a bonus cheese crisp perched on top. The burger came with a small handful of seasoned fries on the side. The Thermidor sauce was exceptional, and was happily more lobster than sauce. There were large, whole pieces of tender lobster, which made for a decadent feel to our lunch. It was more “luncheon” than “lunch.”
Sadly, we were so full by the time we finished that we did not make it to dessert, which was disappointing because there were several interesting choices, including a Key Lime tart, and a cookies n’ cream Mickey Dome.
The Grand Floridian Café is a good choice for lunch, with its very diverse menu, but for us, we were glad that we were not staring down Lightning Lane reservations at the Magic Kingdom for the afternoon. While the service was excellent, the kitchen was very slow, with an hour and a half meal time for us. To be fair, it was Spring Break week, and there wasn’t an open seat in the restaurant, and I suspect there were also conferences going on because we watched large trolleys of food trays heading down the sidewalks during our meal, but meals were slow to come out of the kitchen. It wasn’t a problem for us because we were meandering our way through the chocolate egg displays that afternoon, but just be aware that your yummy lunch may take longer than you thought. Take it as a sign that you should relax and stay awhile.
The restaurant itself was clean (in the care taken at the restaurant, as well as the architectural lines of the room) and bright, with lots of huge windows looking out on the beautiful grounds of the Grand Floridian. It was a lovely, peaceful meal, and I am sure we’ll find ourselves dining here again in the future. Especially knowing there’s a few Mickey-themed foods waiting for us!
_______________
Beth Keating is a theme parks, restaurant and entertainment reporter for DisneyBizJournal.
No comments:
Post a Comment