The California Grill is located in the Contemporary Hotel right outside of Magic Kingdom. Supposedly, one of the most alluring features of this restaurant is not just its breathtaking view of the Magic Kingdom castle but also during the fireworks at night, when they pipe the music in and you can view it from afar. Unfortunately, there were no fireworks at night because of COVID, but that pushed us to give more attention toward the food.
This shop is located in the British area of Epcot. After you enter the park, steer left, and it’s your very first shop on the right. What’s nice about this area is there are some tables and seats that overlook the center fountain of Epcot. On a nice cool day, it’s quite pleasant to snack on this and enjoy the scenery. Keep in mind, we went when the park had 35% attendance, so it was way more spacious and enjoyable. Your miles may vary.
Nestled between the Yacht Club and Beach Club resort is this laid back restaurant that has American burger and dessert vibes to it. Note that you must make a reservation for this which was pretty annoying, but the food looked pretty good for an on-campus restaurant. We had just done a full day at Epcot and decided to finish the day with a nice dessert helping. The restaurant is very lively with a ton of kids. All the desserts are definitely sizeable and shareable.
The Be Our Guest restaurant is located in the Magic Kingdom park in the Beauty & the Beast section. When you enter the main hall, it looks similar to the movie but not as grand as I thought it would’ve been. To the left is a dark room where you can see the rose with falling petals, and to the right where we ate was the kitchen room. We had our expectations set reasonably given that there will be lots of kids here. Lastly, everything was served a prix fix menu – meaning we get 1 appetizer, 1 entree, and the trio of desserts.
This is the first restaurant we visited on our first trip together to Walt Disney World. Topolino’s Terrace is located on the 10th floor of the Riviera Resort in Walt Disney World. Outside on the patio, the resort pump’s French music which remind you that you are on vacation. While taking in that breath, you’re also viewing a breathtaking panorama of some parts of Disney World. There are some social distanced lounge seats that you can relax on while waiting for the restaurant to text you that your table is ready.
We were stoked that New York City has reopened indoor dining albeit @ 25% capacity. Yeah, some people say it’s not safe, but they are usually the same people that go visit their friends and family. The restaurants, believe it or not, do an excellent job sanitizing and giving space to diners and each other. Today was Valentine’s Day, and they had a few prixe menu options. We ended up going with Cupid’s Arrow Menu which we shared and was just a tasting of many of their items on the menu.
For New Year’s Eve, we were fortunate to book this restaurant in Midtown East at the very last minute. This was always on our list since outdoor dining was a thing as the pictures of its settings looked quite appealing. Most tables have their own electric heater that sat directly above the table, so it wasn’t too cold compared to other places. For what it’s worth, it was in the high 30s with some wind chills. We did dress warmer just in case though.
For this very special occasion, I had originally made a reservation for indoor dining at a Michelin restaurant. Unfortunately earlier this month, the governor and mayor disallowed indoor dining, so restaurants can only do outdoor dining for take out. This lovely night turned out to be around 31 degrees F (feels like 25F). They did set up heaters near each table, but it barely helps with the nasty wind chills. Despite this frigid day, let’s checkout the food we ordered.
Astoria has a lot of Mediterranean restaurants and is seldom appealing for its Asian food. However, in the last few months prior the pandemic, there have been several Korean and Chinese/Taiwanese restaurants that were opening, so it’s starting to make a presence. We’ve walked by this neighborhood Japanese sushi joint several times and were surprised about how low key it is. After looking at the menu, we decided to give it a try.
As we enter the end of the year and NYC indoor dining is forced to be shutdown due to a COVID uptick, we wanted to get some last fixin with Korean BBQ. Even though we have tried many of the major Korean BBQ restaurants near Koreatown already, this is one of the few remaining ones to try. When we visited, they check your temperature and had glass dividers between tables. We were fortunate to be seated in a little cubby hole meant for a party of 6-8.