Steakhouse 71 at Disney's Contemporary Resort

I had lunch at Steakhouse 71 in the Contemporary Resort at Disney.

 I started with French Onion Soup.

I had the Gourmet Grilled Cheese for my entrree. This was toasted brioche filled with gruyere, smoked gouda, pork belly, arugula, and carnalized onion jam. I picked a Caesar salad as my side.

Jaws Food Booth at Universal Orlando

Universal Orlando set up an area of the San Francisco section of the park celebrating the 50th anniversary of Jaws. At one of their food booths, I tried the Lobster Taiyaki. The waffle was shaped like a shark and was stuffed with lobster salad overflowing onto the plate. 

Tangierine Cafe at Epcot

I ate at Tangierine Cafe at Epcot in the Morocco Pavilion. It's been several years since I've been here, and the menu has changed. I remember lots of pitas filled with various items, specifically falafel. On today's visit, I learned that now they have kababs. I tried the Grilled Chermoula Chicken Kebab with Carrot-Chickpea Salad and Garlic Aïoli. Pretty tasty, but the portion was very small. Seemed like a Epcot festival size menu item rather than something in a restaurant. Would have preferred a falafel pita.
 

HHN32 Food

Here's some of the specialty seasonal foods that I tried at Halloween Horror Nights at Universal Orlando this year:

Walking Taco: Fritos topped with taco beef, shredded mozzarella, black beans, queso fresco, pico de gallo, shredded lettuce, sour cream, and cilantro. 

 Lakeside "Meat" Stew: Beef Cheek stew with fingerling potatoes, wood ear mushrooms, tempura fried enoki mushrooms, and white rice

Cordyceps Corndog: Korean cheese dog with cordyceps, crispy potato sticks, trufle cream sauce, and diakon spouts

Universal Studios Hollywood Food

 I visited Universal Studios Hollywood twice in the past year. The initial visit was to see the park for the first time (alongside Disneyland). A few months later, my schedule and budget allowed me to go a second time to see Hollywood's version of Halloween Horror Nights. 

First food in the park was from a hot dog cart in the upper lot. I ordered the Californian. This was a Nathan's hot dog topped with guacamole, diced tomatoes, cilantro, and Takis. Very topping heavy. They were really generous with the guacamole and cilantro, which I won't argue with. 

When I returned a few months later, I walked by this same hot dog stand. All of the interesting hot dog toppings were replaced with basically one option: A 22" Chili Cheese Dog. Nowhere as exciting...

French Street Bistro:

I tried a brownie from the French Street Bistro. 

City Snack Shop:

I had this during Halloween Horror Nights. I had a Strawberry Spiral Croissant. This round croissant was partially stuffed with whipped cream, with some strawberries topping the cream. Pretty tasty.

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.

Disneyland Food (Rancho del Zocalo & Ronto Roasters)

I ate at Califonia Adventure the day before. Today was all about the food during my first visit to Disneyland:

Rancho del Zocalo Restaurante:

Had lunch at a restaurant called Rancho del Zocalo. This Mexican themed quick service was located next to Big Thunder Mountain and had an outdoor seating courtyard that overlooked the ride.

 
I had the Trio of Street Tacos. Each taco was filled with either beef, chicken, or cauliflower served in Corn Tortillas with Tomatillo Sauce, garnished with Onions and Cilantro served with Mexican Rice and Refried Beans. The cauliflower taco was the best. All of them were surprisingly good when thinking of the equivalent restaurants at Magic Kingdom which are notoriously bad (I said it. Disney adults, leave your angry comments).

Ronto Roasters:

This was my first experience in Galaxy's Edge. I guess I was eating simulated ronto meat, cooked by a droid by a repurposed pod racer engine. I had the Ronto Wrap, which was roasted pork, pork sausage, peppercorn sauce, and coleslaw wrapped in pita bread. Theming of this place was awesome, but I don't think I'd go out of my way again to get a hot dog wrapped in a slice of pork with some messy coleslaw dripping everywhere. It was food...

Blue Milk from the Milk Stand exceeded all expectations. This was delicious. 

Disney California Adventure Food (Pym Test Kitchen and Cozy Cone Motel)

I visited Disney California Adventure for the first time. This is what I ate:

Pym Test Kitchen:

Ate lunch at Pym Test Kitchen in the Avenger's Campus section of the park. The theme here was that foods were either shrunken or enlarged using Pym Particles seen in the Ant Man movies. Lots of fun sight gags around the restaurant, including growing pretzels, giant cans of soda, etc.

Had the Quantum Pretzel and the Pym-ini Sandwich. The pretzel seemed necessary since it was the centerpiece food seen being enlarged over the cash-registers. It was a good pretzel. The Pym-ini was salami, rosemary ham, provolone, and sun-dried tomato spread on focaccia. Served with marinara dipping sauce and arugula salad. The sandwich was tasty, but the gimmick of shrunken and enlarged food wasn't readily apparent on this one. Arugula was supposed to be larger lettuce leaves that were reduced in size?

Ordered the Proton Punch to drink. Because you have to get the specialty beverages at theme parks now. This was lemonade, berry purée, cherry boba and a grenadine-filled pipette. It was fine. Fancy pink lemonade.

 

Cozy Cone Motel:

Had dinner in Cars Land in the Cozy Cone Motel. This highly themed snack bar featured several giant traffic cones modeled after the real life Wigwam Motels.

I had the Chili Cone Queso. This was a bread cone filled with beef chili, cheddar cheese, and corn chips. I very much enjoyed this meal.

7 Seas Food Festival at SeaWorld Orlando

I ate some food from the 7 Seas Food Festival at SeaWorld Orlando. Here's a selection of the dishes I tried:

Cajun Shrimp & Grits from the Gulf Coast Market.

Moroccan Grilled Lamb Chop from the Mediterranean Market.

Korean Corn Dog from the Asian Market.

Lobster Mac & Cheese and Crispy Brussel Sprouts from the American Market.

Palermo Fontina Cheese Meatballs from the Italian Market.

Bratwurst and Chocolate Pretzel on a Stick from the German Market.

Lobster Roll and Prince Edward Island Shrimp Fritters from the North Atlantic Market.

Corned Beef Hash from the Irish Market.

Blaze Pizza in Disney Springs

Blaze Pizza has been around for a while now in the Orlando area, but they never made it onto this blog. I've eaten at a few of the Blaze Pizza locations in Florida, but these pies are all from their location in Disney Springs. 

Of the pizza chains where you pick what you want on your pie as it's being made, Blaze seems to be the most consistent. The proportions of crust, cheese, sauce, and toppings always seems to be just about what I'd expect from a pizza at Blaze. That's some good corporate fast food consistency...

Hard Rock Cafe World Burger Tour (Orlando, FL)

I was invited to the Hard Rock Cafe in Orlando to sample some new burgers from their World Burger Tour menu. As they described it, World Burger Tour is a limited-time offering of Hard Rock Local Legendary Burgers, inspired by the taste and flavors from cafe locations around the world. The World Burger Tour is available at participating Hard Rock Cafe locations around the world now through June 25, 2017.

The burgers being sampled from the World Burger Tour included the:

Seminole Cattlemen Burger (Florida, United States) – pay tribute to the tribe! This Legendary burger is a combination of zippy swamp cabbage, also known as hearts of palm, fresh tomato and tupelo breaded gator tail atop a seasoned Seminole beef patty and smothered in Seminole wing sauce

English Breakfast Burger (London, England) – a Certified Angus Beef patty topped with sliced ham, a sausage patty, a fried egg, a Portobello mushroom, arugula and garlic aioli and served with a side of baked beans

Kimchi Burger (Seoul, South Korea) – a tradition years in the making, Certified Angus Beef patty topped with Sriracha-seasoned kimchi, bulgogi sauce, fresh tomato and lettuce and Sriracha mayo

Jambalaya Burger (Louisiana, United States) – this big easy burger features spiced up Certified Angus Beef fixed with Cajun mayo, pickles, andouille sausage, pepper jack cheese and a jammin’ jambalaya rice cake.

The Jambalaya Burger was my personal favorite of the burgers sampled. The jambalaya rice cake was an interesting touch which I've never seen before. It looked like an onion ring from the outside, but was filled with jambalaya deliciousness inside.