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Coastal Eats has returned to its traditional home behind Creations with some equally traditional seafood favorites. While you won't find anything earth-shattering at this sea-centric spot, the classic dishes on offer are fresh and well-prepared. 👍 Roasted Warm Water Lobster Tail with garlic butter The lobster was so good this year that even I enjoyed it – and I typically steer clear of anything that swims. The flavor is quite mild, which I recently learned is a key difference between warm water lobster as compared to their cold water cousins. They also tend to have meat that is more tender, which was the other thing I enjoyed about this lobster dish. It tasted very fresh, which is likely due to this lobster making its home right here in Florida. While Maine may be famous for its lobster, I think I actually prefer their Floridian friends. My favorite part was how delicious it tasted when paired with its garlic butter dipping sauce. It was creamy, very rich, and tasted more like a light garlicky alfredo than a simple garlic butter. 👍 Jumbo Shrimp Cocktail with cocktail sauce There's not a lot to say about this one – it's pretty basic, but it does feature some very fresh shrimp. They're large, juicy and paired with a traditional but tasty cocktail sauce and a beautifully charred lemon, which is a nice touch that adds a little flavor from the grill. If you're in the mood for a high quality shrimp cocktail, you can find one at Coastal Eats. Want to discover more flavors from this year's festival? You can find a listing of all of our Epcot Food and Wine Festival reviews on the blog with this handy link , or just watch our video with reviews of ALL the food here:

This year, Disney is swinging for the fences with the Epcot International Food and Wine Festival. At the returning booths, the dishes that are repeats from previous years are almost all better than they have ever been. At the new booths like Forest & Field, the Disney food team is trying out bold new flavors that sometimes turn out to be home runs and sometimes strike out, but we're excited to see them making bold choices. 😐 Autumn Chili with Bison, Lamb, Pork Belly, Root Vegetables, Jalapeño Cornbread, Smoked Cheddar, and Crème Fraîche (NEW) We had mixed feelings about this dish. We loved the unusual spice choices for this autumn chili – it tasted more like the spice blend you'd use for dishes like pumpkin pie and thanksgiving dressing than what you'd find in a traditional Texas chili. Unfortunately, the bison and lamb give this a slightly gamey flavor and the pork belly adds a lot of grease. You can even see the grease pooling along the edges of the bowl in the photo – it was really fatty. That said, we loved the sweet jalapeño cornbread and the creaminess of the crème fraîche and we enjoyed the unexpected flavors from the fall spice blend. If you're okay with a little game and a lot of grease, it's worth giving a whirl, but it was not our favorite. 👎 Pumpkin Mascarpone Ravioli with sage-brown butter, pecorino cheese, and hazelnut praline (NEW) 🧀 The pasta on this one was surprisingly dry and tough. It's possible it may have been under a heat lamp for a bit too long and would have been better fresh from the pot. The second problem was the pumpkin mascarpone filling, which had a very mild flavor and didn't bring much of an upgrade to the leathery pasta. The bright spot was the sage brown butter and hazelnut praline. These were delicious and could have made for a phenomenal dish, but they weren't enough to save the mediocre ravioli. 👍 Burrata with seasonal fall fruit, spiced pecans, apple purée, and fig vinaigrette (NEW) This was far and away our favorite from the booth. Be sure to get a bite with everything because these flavors blend beautifully. You've got the creamy richness of the burrata, the bright crunch from the pomegranate, the sweet warmth of the spiced pecans and the fruity sweetness of the apple and fig – but the star is the surprising addition of the vinaigrette. It's that contrast of flavor that makes it so delicious. This is the perfect recipe to steal if you're planning a fancy cocktail party this fall. Want to discover more flavors from this year's festival? You can find a listing of all of our Epcot Food and Wine Festival reviews on the blog with this handy link , or just watch our video with reviews of ALL the food here:

We recently got back from an incredible whirlwind trip to Disneyland Resort and D23 Expo in Anaheim and Tokyo Disney Resort in Japan. Of course, we had to try out their flavors of Lightning Lane while we were there and we were surprised by how different the service was in Anaheim compared to here at Walt Disney World, even though they share the same name and branding. 1. It 's basically still Genie Plus. If you really miss the old Genie Plus system at Walt DIsney World, I have some good news for you. The Lightning Lane Multi Pass system is a lot more like the old Genie Plus system at WDW than it is the new sevice that shares its name and logo. You don't book three Lightning Lanes at a time. You can book your next Lightning Lane either after you use your current one or after you wait two hours. Sounds familiar, right? While there are some key differences from the old Genie Plus service at Walt Disney World, they are the same differences that were always in place at Disneyland, even back in the Genie Plus days. While the system got a complete overhaul in Orlando, all they really did was change the name and branding at Disneyland and California Adventure. 2. You can't pre-book Lightning Lanes – even if you're staying at a Disney resort. As with their old Genie Plus system, you can't start booking any Lightning Lanes until you physically enter the park. The good news is that you don't have to wake up at 7:00 AM to book your first Lightning Lane. The bad news is that you're probably still getting up at 7:00 AM or earlier to get to the park as soon as it opens if you want the best shot at the most popular Lightning Lanes. After covering all the changes to Lightning Lanes at Walt Disney World, we were excited to get the chance to pre-book some attractions for our Disneyland trip since we were staying at the Disneyland Hotel. Surprise, surprise! The only Lightning Lane Multi Pass benefit you get as a Disney hotel guest is that you can enter the parks early for Early Entry, which means that you can start booking your first Lightning Lane before everyone else – as long as you make it into the park during early entry. So much for sleeping in! 3. You still have a grace period on your Lightning Lanes, but it's a lot more strict. If you're used to the laissez-faire attitude a lot of folks have about their Lightning Lane return times in Orlando – with some people posting about how they show up hours late to their Multi Pass reservation – we have some bad news for you. While you can still tap in 5 minutes early for your Lightning Lane on the west coast, you might not have as much luck after it expires. According to Cast Members we spoke with when we were running a little late to our Roger Rabbit Car Toon Spin reservation, the grace period there is 15 minutes at the end of your Lightning Lane, and even then it is up to the discretion of Cast Member. If their Lightning Lane queue is really backed up (which happens a lot more often there), they may not allow you to use your Lightning Lane after it expires. Thankfully, they did let us use ours, but it was a good lesson learned on the first day of our trip. 4. You have more control over how you use your "bonus" Lightning Lanes. If you've ever gotten more than one "bonus" Lightning Lanes from attractions going down during your Lightning Lane reservation return window, you may have noticed that not all "Experience Redemptions," as Disney calls them, are equal. If you get a bonus Lightning Lane from Big Thunder going down, it will let you use it on a lot more attractions than one you get from Dumbo getting grounded. At Disney World and Disneyland, the system is supposed to use whichever is the most restrictive Experience Redemption that has access to the attraction you are uisng it for. So if you have those two bonus Lightning Lanes for Big Thunder and Dumbo and you use one of them at Mad Tea Party, it should use the Dumbo one and leave you the better Big Thunder Experience Redemption to use at a more popular ride. As with all things tech-related at the Disney Parks, sometimes a gremlin pops up and ruins the fun, which is why we recommend being extra cautious with how you redeem your Lightning Lanes in this situation. At Walt Disney World, you can go to one of the Cast Members at the blue Guest Experience umbrellas stationed around the park and have them turn your "better" Lightning Lane into an Experience Redemption that will only work at the ride you want to use it at. That way, it won't get accidentally eaten like a delicious crumpet during your tea time with Alice. At Disneyland, however, you have a lot more control without needing to speak to anyone – you can do it all yoursef. When you open up that Experience Redemption, you'll see a button that says "Redeem." Tap on that and a bar code will show up. This is because MagicBands are still very new to Disneyland, so all of their touch points at the different rides also include a barcode scanner that works with barcodes on the app or your park ticket. Just scan the barcode from the bonus Lightning Lane you'd prefer to use and that's the one that will get gobbled up. 5. There are a LOT more attractions that don't use Lightning Lanes (but it's still easier to book the ones that do). If you're used to pretty much every ride at Walt Disney World having a Lightning Lane queue, you may be shocked by how many rides at Disneyland Resort don't - including Lightning Lane must-haves like Peter Pan's Flight. Heck, even Pirates of the Caribbean just recently had a Lightning Lane queue added – it was standby only until they closed Haunted Mansion for an extended refurbishment and decided they needed to add another Lightning Lane to take its place in that area of the park. The reason for this is typically due to the size and scale of the attractions in Disneyland. There just isn't enough room to add the physical Lightning Lane queue, especially in Fantasyland where the attraction queues are adorably tiny. One of the most charming things about the original Disneyland park is how it retains much of the feel of how the park was when Walt was still spending the night in his apartment above the fire station. That means they're not bulldozing Pinocchio's Daring Journey to make a Lightning Lane queue for Snow White's Enchanted Wish next door. Of course, the preservation of that origial tcharm is what we love about Disneyland, so we are happy to wait in more standby queues during our visit. The good news is, this doesn't seem to make it harder to grab Lightning Lanes for the other attractions. Even on the busiest days that we have visited the parks, it has been a lot easier to grab great return times for Lightning Lanes than it is at Walt Disney World. You wouldn't expect this to be the case since there are a lot fewer attractions with Lightning Lanes available, but we think it likely has a lot to do with the guests who are typically in the park. At Disneyland, there are a LOT more locals visiting the park than at Walt DIsney World. In Orlando, you'll find a lot more guests who are on their once-in-a-lifetime vacation and they want to pack everything they can into their trip. That means Lightning Lane is a must. When we chatted with locals about using Lightning Lanes in Anaheim, most of them said they rarely used it and those who did typically only used it to skip the line on a few key rides like Guardians of the Galaxy – Mission: BREAKOUT. This means that while there are a few rides you'll want to get done early like Guardians and Indiana Jones, most of your day is going to be smooth sailing compared to the Lightning Lane rat race at Walt Disney World. For our complete guide to using the new Lightning Lane Multi Pass service at Disneyland, check out our new 27 Tips for Using Lightning Lane at Disneyland video over on our YouTube channel.

If you're looking for fall flavors, the booths in the new Harvest Hollow area will satisfy your craving for warming spices and comfort food classics. Our favorite in this new area is Milled & Mulled , which specializes in autumn-inspired desserts. Bramblewood Bites is serving up the main dishes, though the brussels sprout and root vegetable side dish may be the best of the booth. 👍 Grilled Cider-brined Pork Tenderloin with fennel apple slaw and apple cider gastrique (NEW) The pork tenderloin is beautifully plated and lives up to it's name – it is very tender and juicy. Often the roasted pork dishes at the festivals are on the tough and dry side, but this was perfectly prepared. While the fennel apple slaw was simple, we thought it added some bright freshness and a welcome crunch. Our favorite element was the apple cider gastrique that brought a welcome sweetness and tied all the flavors together. 👎 Grilled Bison with butternut squash purée, roasted mushrooms, and huckleberry gastrique (NEW) After the delicious pork, we had high hopes for the bison and it certainly looked delicious. Unfortunately, this one just didn't come together the way we hoped. The biggest problem was the bison itself - it was very tough and sinewy. The mushrooms were very earthy and overpowered the other flavors, including the bison itself. While we really liked the squash puree – it had a delicate truffle flavor and was quite nice on its own – it unfortunately got overpowered by the other flavors, particularly the mushrooms. The huckleberry gastrique added a little tart sweetness, but it didn't elevate the dish. Ideally, a dish like this with contrasting flavors will come together and become better than the sum of its parts. That just didn't happen with this one for us. 👍 Cast Iron-roasted Brussel Sprouts and Root Vegetables with dried cranberries, candied pecans, and maple bourbon glaze (NEW) This was my favorite item from the booth, though Erick preferred the pork. This dish is bursting with big, bold flavors, primarily the marinade that is described on the menu as a maple bourbon glaze but tasted more like a balsamic glaze that was loaded with fall-forward herbs and spices. There was also some sort of ground meat in the dish that we really enjoyed, but weren;t sure why it wasn't mentioned in the description. In fact, nothing about the dish really matched the description. We didn't taste bourbon, we tasted vinegar. It was called a brussel sprouts dish, but we had one half of a singe brussel sprout in our whole serving. We got this on the first day and part of me wonders if there wasn;t a mix-up somewhere – either on the menu or in the preparation of the dish. That said, I really liked it – it just wasn't really what was described. Want to discover more flavors from this year's festival? You can find a listing of all of our Epcot Food and Wine Festival reviews on the blog with this handy link , or just watch our video with reviews of ALL the food here:

Fall flavors are on the menu at the new Harvest Hollow area of the 2024 Epcot International Food & Wine Festival. While we didn't love everything at Bramblewood Bites next door, the dessert-focused Milled & Mulled is already on our short list for our favorite booth at this year's festival. 👍 Freshly-baked Carrot Cake with walnuts and cream cheese icing The first item on the menu may look familiar to you if you visited the American Adventure food booth last year. This is essentially the same carrot cake you remember, but it tastes even more moist and fresh this year. The cake itself is not overly sweet and studded with dried fruit and walnuts, but the generous coating of cream cheese icing brings a LOT of sweetness to the plate. If you like your desserts to be a little less cloying, you can request a less icing as they are iced-to-order. But for us, it's kind of the best part. 👍 Boursin   Fig & Balsamic Cheesecake with fig jam and pomegranate (NEW) 🧀 If you're planning to do Emile's Fromage Montage this year, this dessert belongs at the top of your list. Heck, even if you're not doing the Fromage Montage, you should still put this at the top of your list. It's an early favorite for best dessert at this year's festival. The Boursin cheese base makes for a rich and decadent cheesecake and the fig jam and pecans compliment it perfectly. While the balsamic flavor isn't strong, it balances everything beautifully. This dessert is a symphony of flavors that hits all the right notes. 👍 Pear and Almond Frangipane Pâte Brisée (NEW) We loved this rich and buttery almond-filled pastry. At any other booth, it would easily be the star of the show, but this one has some tough competition with that cheesecake in the lineup. Brisée means the pastry is made with all butter and there is no doubt when you bite into this flaky and delicate crust that it is loaded with delicious butter. We didn't get a strong pear flavor – it definitely plays a supporting role to the almond, but that was fine with us because the almond was so delicious. If you've ever had a magical almond croissant that is filled with sweet amaretto flavor – that's what this is. Best of all, it's served warm and would make a fantastic breakfast alongside a good cup of hot coffee. Want to discover more flavors from this year's festival? You can find a listing of all of our Epcot Food and Wine Festival reviews on the blog with this handy link , or just watch our video with reviews of ALL the food here: