Disneyhanna
DIS Veteran
- Joined
- Nov 29, 2017
Hello all! I am back from a fabulous six night trip with my mom starting on Thanksgiving Day 2022. I plan to write a full TR (at least, I took enough pictures for one) but anyone who has ready my TRs knows I'm not the fastest at updating and so I thought I better do a separate dining report while it is relevant since food changes at WDW so quickly.
I must confess, we both caught the big C for the first time following our trip, so I am sitting here pretty miserable next to a box of Kleenex. Nothing serious, but I do miss being able to breathe through my nose! I am more bummed as I am running Dopey in four weeks and this is basically peak training week, and now I am fully sidelined...better now than in January, I keep telling myself.
Anyways, on with the DR! I might go back and format this later but I am feeling lazy so nothing fancy for today. I am going to try just uploading pictures right to Disboards for this, usually I host elsewhere to get more photos per post (with higher resolution) but I keep having issues with that so 10 pictures per post it is!
We stayed 3 nights at the Dolphin and 3 nights at the Riviera, both new resorts to us. This meant lots of fun new eats for us! We usually do a mix of QS and TS, I am a foodie while my mom likes more simple cuisines, so it is always interesting finding places that have something for both of us.
Thanksgiving Day - Dinner at Trattoria Al Forno (10% AP discount)
We took the Mears Connect from MCO and were dropped of at the Dolphin about 6:40PM, and quickly checked in and headed to our room to drop off our luggage. After a few minutes of refreshing ourselves, we headed off to the Boardwalk to our 7:35PM reservation at Trattoria. There were a handful of Trattoria reservations that were showing up that night, it definitely is easy to sneak in there if you don't plan ahead, even on a holiday.
I checked into our reservation on the MDE app at 7:27 and we did not get called to be seated until 7:53. There is lots of seating around the Boardwalk and people watching to do, but I read that it is pretty common to wait well past your ADR time here. Given the holiday, no surprise to me!
The inside was much smaller than I expected, no wonder the wait can take a while! Tables are very close together.
I ordered a glass of white sangria, I'm not usually a sangria drinker but it was a warm evening so it sounded refreshing. I asked the CM what the difference between the white and red sangria was and she said "color" lol. Fair!
White Sangria - $12
Love the Mickey ears! This was very easy to drink, honestly I could not taste any alcohol so take that as you will. I'm not a big drinker in general so anything expensive is wasted on me. I thought this tasted like wine juice, or a less sweet version of Franzia moscato. Very refreshing but nothing special. I did not feel anything from this!
Neither of us were starving, so we ordered an Insalata Caprese and Lasagna al Forno to share. I must have been out of practice as I missed taking a picture of the little ciabatta rolls they bring out in a paper bag as well as the dish of olive oil with tapenade. They only brought two small rolls, which looked like nothing special, but they were actually very fresh and warm and perfectly crisp on the outside and soft and chewy on the inside. The olive oil was lovely, the tapenade didn't taste like olives to me at all (I did like it), we couldn't quite place the flavor.
Insalata Caprese: House-made Burrata, Ripe Tomatoes, Extra Virgin Olive Oil - $13
The caprese was a surprise hit for us, I always like a good burrata salad but this was exceptionally fresh. The tomatoes tasted in season (no sad refrigerated tomatoes) and the burrata was so creamy. The ratio of cheese to tomato was perfect, the only thing that would make this more perfect would be a little bed of greens underneath as well. It was a good size to split between two and we ate every last bite!
Lasagna al Forno: Blended Italian Cheeses, Beef, Veal, Pork, Herb Ricotta - $30
The kitchen split the lasagna for us, and judging from pictures online, they gave us each two pieces and the usual full portion size is three pieces. Very nice of them as it would be messy to share at the table. This was again a surprise hit for us. I read that the lasagna is quite popular and unique, and that proved to be true. I'd say the dominant flavor I got from the sauce was roasted red pepper! It was not spicy though, it had "zest" from the pepper but my mom finds medium salsa almost too spicy and she was fine with this, I think this was actually her favorite dinner of the trip. The lack of tomato/marinara flavor made this lasagna unique, there is a cream sauce as well and plenty of ricotta and meat inside. The filling is quite traditional, the sauce is what is so different. It was on the lighter side as there was no oily beef or layers of mozzarella like in a basic American lasagna. Neither of us were quite able to finish our portions, and we were very glad to have shared!
While the wait to be seated took a while and it did take a few minutes for our waitress to free up to take our order, once she did the service was very prompt. We got the lasagna within 20 minutes of being seated, and that includes time waiting to order and getting a drink, bread, and salad. Our waitress was good, she checked in a few times and made sure we had everything we needed.
We aren't the type to linger after a meal so we headed out by 8:35PM, and spent some time exploring the BoardWalk area resorts and their holiday displays.
The Fountain (Dolphin Hotel)
Back at the Dolphin, we stopped at the ice cream counter at the Fountain (open until 11, thankfully) for a single scoop of ice cream. You can get two flavors, so we got Minty Chip and Cookie Dough. The scoops are small but this was the perfect little dessert for us to end the evening.
Single Scoop Ice Cream - $7.50
The Dolphin has a grab and go convenience store called Fuel which has a small cafe inside and they also have self-serve fro-yo priced by the pound. Toppings are packaged up to go! We did not partake on this trip, but another nice option.
I must confess, we both caught the big C for the first time following our trip, so I am sitting here pretty miserable next to a box of Kleenex. Nothing serious, but I do miss being able to breathe through my nose! I am more bummed as I am running Dopey in four weeks and this is basically peak training week, and now I am fully sidelined...better now than in January, I keep telling myself.
Anyways, on with the DR! I might go back and format this later but I am feeling lazy so nothing fancy for today. I am going to try just uploading pictures right to Disboards for this, usually I host elsewhere to get more photos per post (with higher resolution) but I keep having issues with that so 10 pictures per post it is!
We stayed 3 nights at the Dolphin and 3 nights at the Riviera, both new resorts to us. This meant lots of fun new eats for us! We usually do a mix of QS and TS, I am a foodie while my mom likes more simple cuisines, so it is always interesting finding places that have something for both of us.
Thanksgiving Day - Dinner at Trattoria Al Forno (10% AP discount)
We took the Mears Connect from MCO and were dropped of at the Dolphin about 6:40PM, and quickly checked in and headed to our room to drop off our luggage. After a few minutes of refreshing ourselves, we headed off to the Boardwalk to our 7:35PM reservation at Trattoria. There were a handful of Trattoria reservations that were showing up that night, it definitely is easy to sneak in there if you don't plan ahead, even on a holiday.
I checked into our reservation on the MDE app at 7:27 and we did not get called to be seated until 7:53. There is lots of seating around the Boardwalk and people watching to do, but I read that it is pretty common to wait well past your ADR time here. Given the holiday, no surprise to me!
The inside was much smaller than I expected, no wonder the wait can take a while! Tables are very close together.
I ordered a glass of white sangria, I'm not usually a sangria drinker but it was a warm evening so it sounded refreshing. I asked the CM what the difference between the white and red sangria was and she said "color" lol. Fair!
White Sangria - $12
Love the Mickey ears! This was very easy to drink, honestly I could not taste any alcohol so take that as you will. I'm not a big drinker in general so anything expensive is wasted on me. I thought this tasted like wine juice, or a less sweet version of Franzia moscato. Very refreshing but nothing special. I did not feel anything from this!
Neither of us were starving, so we ordered an Insalata Caprese and Lasagna al Forno to share. I must have been out of practice as I missed taking a picture of the little ciabatta rolls they bring out in a paper bag as well as the dish of olive oil with tapenade. They only brought two small rolls, which looked like nothing special, but they were actually very fresh and warm and perfectly crisp on the outside and soft and chewy on the inside. The olive oil was lovely, the tapenade didn't taste like olives to me at all (I did like it), we couldn't quite place the flavor.
Insalata Caprese: House-made Burrata, Ripe Tomatoes, Extra Virgin Olive Oil - $13
The caprese was a surprise hit for us, I always like a good burrata salad but this was exceptionally fresh. The tomatoes tasted in season (no sad refrigerated tomatoes) and the burrata was so creamy. The ratio of cheese to tomato was perfect, the only thing that would make this more perfect would be a little bed of greens underneath as well. It was a good size to split between two and we ate every last bite!
Lasagna al Forno: Blended Italian Cheeses, Beef, Veal, Pork, Herb Ricotta - $30
The kitchen split the lasagna for us, and judging from pictures online, they gave us each two pieces and the usual full portion size is three pieces. Very nice of them as it would be messy to share at the table. This was again a surprise hit for us. I read that the lasagna is quite popular and unique, and that proved to be true. I'd say the dominant flavor I got from the sauce was roasted red pepper! It was not spicy though, it had "zest" from the pepper but my mom finds medium salsa almost too spicy and she was fine with this, I think this was actually her favorite dinner of the trip. The lack of tomato/marinara flavor made this lasagna unique, there is a cream sauce as well and plenty of ricotta and meat inside. The filling is quite traditional, the sauce is what is so different. It was on the lighter side as there was no oily beef or layers of mozzarella like in a basic American lasagna. Neither of us were quite able to finish our portions, and we were very glad to have shared!
While the wait to be seated took a while and it did take a few minutes for our waitress to free up to take our order, once she did the service was very prompt. We got the lasagna within 20 minutes of being seated, and that includes time waiting to order and getting a drink, bread, and salad. Our waitress was good, she checked in a few times and made sure we had everything we needed.
We aren't the type to linger after a meal so we headed out by 8:35PM, and spent some time exploring the BoardWalk area resorts and their holiday displays.
The Fountain (Dolphin Hotel)
Back at the Dolphin, we stopped at the ice cream counter at the Fountain (open until 11, thankfully) for a single scoop of ice cream. You can get two flavors, so we got Minty Chip and Cookie Dough. The scoops are small but this was the perfect little dessert for us to end the evening.
Single Scoop Ice Cream - $7.50
The Dolphin has a grab and go convenience store called Fuel which has a small cafe inside and they also have self-serve fro-yo priced by the pound. Toppings are packaged up to go! We did not partake on this trip, but another nice option.
The butter was a little too hard to spread easily, and it could have used some salt on top. But I wasn't there to eat bread, so I'll move on!
Neither of the two LTT waiters have been that great, maybe 3rd time will be the charm! We tried Bar Riva because of you, and loved it! I had the Tuna salad I love so much and it was nice to have it plated and in the open air on such a beautiful day.
