The Grand Floridian Cafe is the Resort’s less formal table service restaurant, situated on the 1st floor of the Resort. We’d eaten here before on our honeymoon and enjoyed the food, so decided to revisit, booking a table this time for 6:15pm.

We arrived early, at 6pm and were told it would be nearer our ADR time when we’d be seated. However it was closer to 6:30pm when our pager finally lit up.

As at quite a few of Disney’s table service restaurants, the tables here are way too close together which is a pet hate of mine. You feel like you’re dining with the people on adjacent tables, with no privacy for conversation.

The lady at the next table seemed to have some sort of dietary restriction and our server spent a long time talking to her about it, leaving us waiting for at least 10-15 minutes before he even came to introduce himself and take our drinks order. In the past I’ve seen the Chef come out to talk to guests about dietary restrictions, not the server.

We eventually ordered and then had another long wait for the food to arrive, by which time the kids were climbing the walls! Luckily we had some bread rolls to snack on and keep us going.

DH ordered:

Grilled Rib-Eye
with parmesan frits, seasonal vegetables, and Red Wine Sauce

The portion was a good size and he enjoyed it, although it wasn’t one of the best entrees of the trip.

I ordered:

Oven-roasted Half Chicken
with Braised Leeks, Fingerling Potatoes, Baby Carrots, and Chicken Jus

But I requested mashed potatoes instead of leek and fingerling potatoes.

I took a mouthful of the mash and almost spat it out. It had cheese in it which I absolutely hate. I tried some of DH’s fries which also tasted awful, I hadn’t realised they had parmesan on. Why do they put cheese in everything here?! When our server came back to check everything was ok I told him and he brought a bowl of ordinary fries for me, by which time DH had almost finished. There wasn’t much white meat on the chicken either.

DD has salmon and fries.

It was a long time after we finished our entrees before the server returned to take our dessert order, and even longer again before we received it.

I had the chocolate fondue which was good and easily the best part of the meal for me.

DH had the Tiramisu and enjoyed it.

DD had worms in dirt. I think the name must have put her off as she didn’t eat much of it!

It was around 8:30pm when we finally got out, after waiting another age to pay the bill. Not sure if this was just an off night, but the service was truly terrible and we tipped accordingly. It’s not somewhere we’ll return to in a hurry!

If we’d not been on the dining plan it would have cost $69.91.