Magic Kingdom Food (Casey's Corner and Sunshine Tree Terrace)

It's been a while since I've had food at the Magic Kingdom. Since the last post on this blog was about Disneyland, why not write about the similar castle park in Florida.

Casey's Corner:

I've lived in Orlando most of my life and have been to the Magic Kingdom countless times, but somehow I had never been to Casey's Corner on Main Street. I've heard the restaurant hyped up quite often, so on my last visit to Magic Kingdom I finally had lunch there. I ordered the Chipotle Barbecue All-Beef Foot-long Hot Dog. It was a hot dog topped with pulled pork, coleslaw, and barbeque sauce. Good for Disney serving more than plain hot dogs. Toppings always make them more interesting.  This was fine. Not anything great that I'd go back for again though. As I write this, I'm realizing that this had very similar ingredients to the Ronto Wrap at Galaxy's Edge. Slightly different forms of the ingredients, but it was essentially the same thing.

Sunshine Tree Terrace:

I had the I Lava You Float. Orange Dole Whip topped with strawberry Fanta, passionfruit syrup, and Pop Rocks. This was a good dessert.

Ginther's Swirls Ice Cream in Orlando, FL

Today is apparently National Ice Cream Day. Hurray for made up food holidays! To celebrate, here's a Dole Whip from Ginther's Swirls located on International Drive near Sea World. Pineapple soft serve ice cream floating on a pool of pineapple juice. It's was just like getting the must overhyped Dole Whips at Disney without dealing with the Disney crowds!

Kelly's Homemade Ice Cream in Orlando, FL

I stopped for ice cream at Kelly's Homemade Ice Cream in Audubon Park. I had a waffle cone with two scoops: peach and pistachio. I enjoyed the pistachio most of the two flavors, although it was interesting that it wasn't the typical green color of pistachio ice cream. I'd return for more ice cream!

Abracadabra Ice Cream in Kissimmee, FL

I tried a restaurant called Abracadabra Ice Cream in downtown Kissimmee. Unlike the standard ice cream shop, Abracadabra served ice cream made with liquid nitrogen. You picked your flavors, they added them in a bowl with some cream, and mixed everything with liquid nitrogen to freeze everything.

I choose mango and raspberry as my flavors. The consistency of the ice cream was interesting. It wasn't as smooth as standard ice cream. It sort of reminded me of Dippin' Dots, only with larger pieces of ice cream and a much better taste.

I very much enjoyed the novelty of seeing ice cream being formed before my eyes in a misty cloud. I'd return to Abracadabra!

Austin Food #3: Brunch Haus, Threadgills, and Amy's Ice Cream

Continuing with food from my trip to Austin, we have some more restaurants which I tried. There's no breakfast tacos or barbecue in this post...

Brunch Haus:

I had breakfast one morning during my trip to Austin at a food truck park called Barton Spring Picnic. There were several trucks here, all centered around a central covered seating area. Of the trucks here, not too many were open for breakfast. There was a large number of people sitting here though, who apparently got there a couple hours early to wait for trucks to open for lunch. I noticed people like waiting for food in Austin.

The truck I ended up trying was called Brunch Haus. It didn't seem busy, but it took a good half hour to get my food. More of people not minding the waits for food in Austin.

I had their Stuffed French Toast. I hardly ever eat French toast, but they made this toast sound tasty. It was a thick slice of challah bread served in a cardamom-infused heavy cream stuffed with a strawberry jam, basil, and mint mascarpone filling. The whole thing was topped with syrup, powdered sugar, and sliced strawberries. The toast was really sweet, more like a dessert than a breakfast, but I enjoyed it!

Threadgill's:

I ended up at Threadgill's for dinner one evening. I liked this place. They served southern food and like Stubb's Bar-B-Que talked about previously, are known for live music. Apparently Janis Joplin played at Threadgill's frequently. I had their blackened catfish, served with scalloped potatoes and stewed okra & tomatoes. The catfish had nice spice in the blackening and both sides were delicious. I was there with a large group of people and they handled the crowd very nicely.

Amy's Ice Cream:

This is a chain of ice cream shops that I saw all over Austin. I visited their location in SoCo. I had two scoops, one coconut and one Mexican vanilla. It was okay. Nothing worth going out of my way to get again. I still don't know the difference between their Mexican vanilla and regular vanilla. The person taking my order couldn't answer what differentiated the two...

Polar Parlor at Sea World Orlando

I found myself at Sea World one evening and decided to get some ice cream. I was going to get the ice cream from a location in the back of the park but they didn't have waffle cones. I made my way up to Polar Parlor near the park entrance, and found that their waffle cones were cheaper than the regular cones elsewhere in the park. Weird.

I had strawberry and mint chocolate chip in a waffle cone. The portion of ice cream was huge, overflowing over the edges of the large waffle cone. Out of the two flavors, I preferred the mint chocolate chip. The strawberry flavor wasn't as pronounced as it should have been, while the mint chocolate chip tasted like I expected.

NY Street Food #3 (Halal Carts & Mister Softee)

Street food in New York City is fun. Some of my recent New York street food adventures started at a Halal cart at the foot of the Manhattan side of the Brooklyn Bridge...

Brooklyn Bridge Halal Cart:

I had a Chicken Gyro. Several pieces of chicken filled a pita alongside lettuce, onions, and the standard halal cart white and hot sauce. This particular sandwich left some room for improvement. The chicken had lots of chewy pieces of tendon/fat. Even with the sauce, it was also somehow lacked flavor.

Times Square Halal Cart:

I visited another halal cart a few blocks away from Times Square. I had the combination of lamb and chicken over rice, topped with white and hot sauce. Lettuce was served on the side as a salad.

Brooklyn Mister Softee:

I took part of a long distance unicycle ride from Manhatten to Coney Island. Somewhere in Brooklyn, the horde of unicyclists waved down a Mister Softee truck.

I ordered a Nutty Merlin, meaning a vanilla cone dipped in chocolate and topped with peanuts. The truck was out of the chocolate dipping sauce, so I ended up just getting the ice cream topped with nuts. They charged me the same price with or without the chocolate. Oh well...

Lu Lu's Ice Cream Shop in Winter Park, FL

Lu Lu's Ice Cream Shop is located in the parking lot of Eat More Produce in Winter Park. Lu Lu's is in a very small building. They actually appear to be in a shed. The shed is very nicely painted to look like a house. Regardless of their small size, they had a good selection of ice cream flavors.

I decided to try their blood orange sorbet on my last visit here. I was actually a bit surprised by the color of the ice cream. It lacked both the deep red of blood orange or the brighter orange of most orange sorbets. Instead, the sorbet was more of a tan color. This probably means Lu Lu's doesn't artificially color their ice cream, which is a good thing. The sorbet was very tasty, with a fresh orange taste. Citrus flavored sorbets are always refreshing to me for some reason.

I like the ice cream at Lu Lu's. I'll definitely be stopping here again sometime in the future...

Larry's Homemade Ice Cream in Washington DC

After getting pizza from Dupont Pizza in Washington DC, we stopped for dessert at a place called Larry's Homemade Ice Cream. This place had all sorts of interesting flavors, but unfortunately they were all out of many of the flavors that I wanted to try. I guess that's the downfall of going to an ice cream shop a few minutes before the closed.

Since they didn't have the exotic flavors left, I went with a more mundane flavor and ordered a cup of the strawberry cheesecake ice cream. It was good ice cream, with the flavors of both strawberry and cheesecake popping out. Little chunks of actual cheesecake mixed in with the ice cream were also a nice touch. The small cup of ice cream was a bit on the expensive side at almost $5, but it was homemade ice cream in a city. The high price was somewhat expected.

Captain Cook's Snack Company in Disney's Polynesian Resort

I visited with some relatives at the Polynesian Resort at Disney. While there, I decided to get a quick lunch from the hotel's main snack bar called Captain Cook's Snack Company. This quick-service restaurant mostly served sandwiches, salads, and flatbread pizzas alongside convenience store type items.

I ordered the Hawaiian Flatbread and a Dole Whip. The flatbread consisted of a rectangular pizza topped with tomato sauce, cheese, pineapple, ham, and red onions. The flatbread was good sized, slightly larger than I was expecting it to be with the corners hanging off the plate. It was tasty enough, especially since it was from a hotel snack bar. The pineapple didn't make everything else soggy on the pizza which is always a good thing on a Hawaiian pizza. My biggest complaint here was with the rectangular crust not being utilized. The corners of the flatbread were completely free of sauce, cheese, or any other toppings. Otherwise this was a good flatbread.

As for the Dole Whip, I don't quite understand those things. It's nothing more than pineapple flavored soft-serve ice cream. I've seen far too many Disney-centric food websites rave about the amazing qualities of Dole Whips. It's tasty ice cream, but nothing worth seeking out. If you do have a burning desire to seek out a Dole Whip though, at least get it inside the Magic Kingdom where you can get the Dole Whip Floats...

The Whip Ice Cream Truck in Orlando, FL

I watched the fireworks at Lake Eola this year on July 4th. While there, I bought some ice cream from a truck called The Whip. They served ice cream where they would blend vanilla with a large selection of flavors to come up with over 40 different varieties. Shaved ice was also available, but I stuck with the ice cream.

My flavor selection for the night was the blueberry cheesecake. A cup of vanilla soft serve was filled and a container filled with the flavoring was removed from a freezer. Both were taken to a separate machine where they were blended together into a purple tinted ice cream. The flavor wasn't as strong as I've had elsewhere. I could taste a bit of berry flavor but didn't taste much cheesecake. Regardless, the ice cream was good enough and it was an interesting process to watch how they got all those flavors out of one soft serve machine.

Sloan's Ice Cream in West Palm Beach, FL

I was in West Palm Beach and had some dessert at a place called Sloan's Ice Cream.

Sloan's was a very colorful place inside. There were intricate ceiling murals. There was a model trolley moving back and forth under the ice cream counter. I apparently missed the main attraction here. Sloan's has one of the top ten bathrooms in the world according to Travel Channel. According to what I read after the fact, the bathroom has glass windows that allow everyone to see in, that is until you lock the door and the windows become opaque. Worth returning for?

I had strawberry cheesecake ice cream in a waffle cone. The large serving of ice cream had big chunks of actual cheesecake mixed in, always improving any ice cream that calls itself cheesecake flavored.

Sloan's had good ice cream. I'd return and will hopefully have to use the facilities next time...

Pinkberry in South Beach, FL

I was enjoying the day in Miami Beach and as I was walking along Ocean Drive, I came across a Pinkberry. Pinkberry isn't new on this blog, but it turned out this particular Pinkberry was new and having their grand opening. That meant free frozen yogurt!

There were a huge amount of employees in here, all running around each other while putting together cups of frozen yogurt.

I ordered key lime frozen yogurt, topped with all the fruit they had. This included blueberries, strawberries, raspberries, mango, pineapple, and kiwi. I also had a waffle cone type cookie in the yogurt as well.

Mister Softee Ice Cream Truck

Mister Softee is an ice cream truck franchise that seems to be very prevalent in the New York/New Jersey area. These trucks are found all over the place, whether it be in a city park, street corner, or doing the traditional ice cream truck thing by driving around residential neighborhoods. Unlike many of the ice cream trucks that are found down south, Mister Softee serves soft serve ice cream rather than only pre-packaged stuff. On my various visits up north, somehow I always find myself making a purchase from a Mister Softee truck. There's really nothing exceptional about the ice cream, but I enjoy the novelty of ice cream trucks. Here's a vanilla cone dipped in chocolate from a Mister Softee that I waved down on Long Island.

Mister Softee trucks make it to the middle of the East River too. I found this truck parked on Governor's Island. I noticed the Mister Softee trucks parked in New York City parks have much higher prices than the trucks that drive around outside the city.

Mister Softee recently appeared in Orlando for a while. This Mister Softee truck was often found at the local food truck events and was occasionally spotted driving around neighborhoods. I'm not entirely sure if this truck is still around, but it has been a while since I've seen the Orlando Mister Softee Truck.

One thing that bothered me about the Orlando Mister Softee was that the people running it said it was impossible to dip a cone in both sauce (chocolate or cherry) and nuts. The Mister Softee trucks up north all do it, so I don't see while it would be impossible in Florida. Here's a cherry dipped vanilla cone from the Orlando truck when they were at Lake Lily in Maitland.

This discussion of ice cream trucks has become much longer than I originally intended when I started writing this post, but I enjoy ice cream trucks. I apparently enjoy writing about them too...

Operation Deep Freeze in Mount Dora, FL

I was in Mount Dora and decided to get some dessert from a ice cream shop called Operation Deep Freeze. The store is located downtown in a storefront that is covered in fake books. I'm assuming there was a bookstore here sometime in the past.

Inside, the place was decorated with lots and lots of pictures of Antarctica. Apparently the owner of Operation Deep Freeze lived in Antarctica on a military base before retiring and opening an ice cream shop in Mount Dora.

Operation Deep Freeze does four flavors of homemade ice cream daily. It seemed like vanilla and chocolate were standard while the other two flavors changed. I went with one of the changing flavors and had a cone of pistachio ice cream. There were plenty of nuts and had a great nutty flavor. This was honestly one of the best pistachio ice creams I can remember having in a while!