NYC? WDW? UNI? Why choose, let’s do (or eat!) them all SEPT18 DAY 7 added

[disjunkie]

Originally Posted by Minnie Mum

Piccola Cucina looks lovely for lunch. 😊

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It was so good. I love finding little places like that which are unique to the area. Yelp is so handy for that as you get local as well as tourist opinions.

Originally Posted by 00swan

Lovely to see some non-chain places to eat - your NY food looks amazing

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Thank you. We tried to avoid chains as I wanted to eat at places we couldn’t in Orlando.

[disjunkie]

We started with the usual hotel breakfast again today, they rotate the hot food so I had sausage, eggs, potatoes. Then toast with Nutella and a pancake.

We visited some of the sites we’d missed so far (Chrysler Building, Rockefeller etc) then headed to Greenwich Village at lunchtime for our food tour.

I’d looked at several food tours when planning this trip but Nice Guy Tours got great reviews and seemed good value. We met at Molly’s cupcakes to begin the tour, this sign cracked me up, it’s the absolute opposite of Disney!

We started by going into a coffee shop just to learn about the place. The smell as you walked in here was incredible, they had so many different beans to pick from.

Our first food stop was Moumons Falafel, I love falafel and have had in several places, this was by far the best I’ve ever had. The red dipping sauce was crazily spicy so I stuck to the white sauce!

The next was a tiny little place called Pomme Frites, all they sell is chips and dipping sauces. The chips were pretty standard but the sauce were great, my favorites were the mango, roasted garlic and truffle.

Next was Artichoke Pizza, what you see here is a 3rd of a slice. This was really good but very rich pizza, I’m not sure I could have eaten a whole slice.

We wandered round Washington Square park next learning loads about the area and having a little break from eating.

We then went to Hudson Bagels and had ¼ of an everything bagel with cream cheese, really good but I forgot to take a picture.

We went to a deli called Faiccos Italian Specialities and had a piece of salami and a fantastic Arancini, so creamy and cheesy!

There was a bit of a wait at Bleeker Street Pizza so we had a bonus trip to the Doughnut Plant to kill some time.

We had a quarter of an ‘Everything Donut’, donut but with everything bagel topping. I did like this, but it just tipped over the edge into being too much savoury for a sweet item.

Than back to Bleeker street for traditional new York pizza. This was so good, the tomato sauce was incredible.

Final stop was back at Molly’s cupcakes where you picked your cake, frosting and topping and they made it up for you. I had banana cake with brown butter frosting and chocolate chips, Neil had vanilla cake with brown butter frosting and coconut. These were really good but we were so full by this point and the frosting was really rich that we couldn’t finish them.

Overall this was a fantastic tour, there was only 3 of us on it so it wasn’t a big group, we got a really good overview of the village, got to try some really authentic places I would have never found on our own and had some amazing food. It was $60 a person and worth every penny.

That evening we were still pretty full after the tour so we walked along to Maison Keyser for a couple of desserts. The mocha cake was $6 and very tasty, the chocolate croissant was enormous, tasted great and only $4.

We went down to the hotel bar for a drink, it was super quiet but I guess there’s no shortage of bars in New York. I had a red sangria which was excellent and Neil had old fashioned.

For a second round I tried the white sangria which was ok but a bit too melony for me.

And that it did it for our last night in NYC!

Overall we both really loved New York and will definitely return. Next up Orlando!

[disjunkie]

We just had the usual hotel breakfast today. Our flight to Orlando was at 11:50, but seeing the new York traffic we were taking no chances and grabbed an Lyft just before 9, getting to La Guardia easily by 9:30.

Our flight was delayed by 30 mins, so used the ipads at the gates to get a raspberry lemonade and coffee while we waited.

We flew with Delta first class and pretty much as soon as we sat down got offered a drink, I had red wine, Neil had Jack Daniels and coke.

My lunch was a chicken orzo salad which was actually really good, the vegetarian option was pretty terrible, literally just vegetables on a bun!

But we got loads of drinks, had a nice big screen to watch movies on and the time passed very quickly.

We stayed at the Hilton Garden Inn SeaWorld tonight. Dinner was at Seito Sushi on sand lake road. We had a reservation for 6:45, it was already very busy, and is obviously a popular place with locals.
To drink I had a Frose, frozen raspberry and lemon cocktail and Neil had a whiskey based cocktails. I think mine wins for cutest presentation, never had a cocktail presented in a take out container before! Neil’s was good though it looked a bit girly!

We booked here as they were participating in magical dining. If we’d known how big the portions were I think only one of us would have ordered from that menu and the other just got a sushi roll and shared.

My appetizer was pork bau buns good, these were good the buns were soft and the pork nicely flavoured.

Neil had BBQ calamari. This was so good and I’m not even normally a fan of calamari, the coating was crunchy with a mild spice too it and the calamari wasn’t at all rubbery. It was very moreish but a huge portion.

We both had 2 sushi rolls for our mains. I had sunset and soft shell crab, both were amazing.

Neil had the Hadouken and the Beauty and the Beast, again great but the Hadouken was scallops in a spicy lava source that was definitely spicy!

For dessert I had the ginger crème brulee which was very good, the ginger was just there as a background flavor and didn’t overpower the dish.

Neil had the Thai tea bread pudding which was also very good.

Overall we really enjoyed our meal here, $35 for 3 courses was excellent value, just too much food for us but will definitely return.

[Loobylou_82]

The sushi looks good. Really enjoying this report.

[Kidd McFluff]

Reading along with interest. We'll be there next Aug/Sept so Magical Dining sounds great.
Do you have to sign up to something to get the magical dining menus etc?

[disjunkie]

Originally Posted by Loobylou_82

The sushi looks good. Really enjoying this report.

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Thank you. The sushi was great, definitely worth a try if you’re in the area.

Originally Posted by Kidd McFluff

Reading along with interest. We'll be there next Aug/Sept so Magical Dining sounds great.
Do you have to sign up to something to get the magical dining menus etc?

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No, you just need to ask for the menu when you arrive at the restaurant. It’s a great deal, you can see the menus and participating restaurants in advance here: visitorlando/magicaldining/restaurants/ there’s loads partipate in it (including some on Disney and universal property) and can be a bargain.

[Loobylou_82]

Can you explain how the magical dining works as i have not heard of it before. I gather it's a different menu than the normal house menu?

[disjunkie]

Originally Posted by Loobylou_82

Can you explain how the magical dining works as i have not heard of it before. I gather it's a different menu than the normal house menu?

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Magical dining month is a promo that runs for September and sometimes some fringe dates, so last year it ran from August 24th until September 30th. During that time partipating restaurants offer a 3 course menu for $35, with one dollar from that going to charity.

The menus are more limited, with normally 3-4 choices for each course. Restaurants that are participating are normally announced around July, with menus being published around August. You just make a reservation as normal, then ask for the magical dining menu on arrival. Places that have participated in previous years are Bluezoo, il mulino, paddlefish, STK, Morimoto Asia, Sharks underwater grill at Seaworld, mama Dallas at portofino, kitchen at hard rock hotel and loads more offsite.

The Disney owned restaurants have only taken part once but there’s normally a fair few on at Disney springs. The visit Orlando website will have all the details for this year once it’s announced. Some of the places are very pricy normally so it can be a great deal.

[disjunkie]

Today was the day we were finally checking into the Polynesian (so excited!), but first Sea World.

When we checked in at the hotel yesterday there was no room booking for us, after looking for ages the very kind man on front desk found out Expedia cancelled our reservation (totally unimpressed with them and had to dispute through amex in the end) so I had to pay the Hilton directly for a room. As he couldn’t match the original rate he gave us vouchers for a free breakfast.

Breakfast was a buffet with plenty of choice. I didn’t fancy the usual eggs, etc so made a waffle with syrup and choc chips. Very nice.

Thanks to the dibb I had a great deal on Seaworld tickets with all day dining included. This was the busiest I’ve ever seen Seaworld, it was a Saturday and Praise Wave was on but it was still far busier than I expected. We used our included Quick Queue a couple of times which was great, but by lunchtime there were no lockers left at the big rides so even quick queue was no help. It was also incredibly hot today so we had an early lunch in the Expedition Café. I had orange chicken with fried rice which was really good. Non-meat options were pretty limited so Neil had a stir fry and rice which he said was ok. We split a piece of carrot cake which was very nice.

It was so hot we stopped for more drinks later on at Voyagers Smokehouse and got some cookies too. We then headed out of the park ready to get to Disney!

We took a Lyft to the Poly and arrived just after 2pm, luckily our room was ready so we were checked in quickly.

The view from the lounge was amazing and I was blown away by the amount of toiletries in the room!

We had a quick snack of crisps and cookies, along with cider and a beer. I loved that the beer/cider was just left out all afternoon here, rather than you having to request it before 5 at the other club lounges.

Around 5ish we headed along to the lounge to sample a couple of appetisers. This was pork belly, tuna tartare, pitta and hummus. All were really good. I tried the alcoholic punch which was ok, I think it was just fruit juice and wine so it was mimosa like.

For tea tonight we decided to go to Artist Point. We haven’t eaten there for years but when we heard it was becoming character dining we thought we should have one last meal there before it changes. The restaurant was very busy but we were sat quickly at a nice 4 top.

To drink I had the Northwestern Exposure, this was nice but was more creamy than I was expecting, probably a better poolside cocktail than a ‘with dinner’ cocktail but nice all the same.

Neil had a Manhattan which he enjoyed and I loved the wilderness lodge swizzle stick it came with.

My favourite dish here has always been the mushroom soup so that was my appetizer. Thankfully it was just as good as I remembered, smoky, creamy, tons of mushroom flavor and just amazing.

Neil had the ahi tuna. This was also really good but it was a huge portion for appetiser, tons of melt in mouth tuna, jasmine rice, topped with a rice cracker.

I was pretty full by this point and if I’d realized how big the tuna app was I would have just chosen that for my main. As it was I ordered the duck ragout pasta. I had one mouthful and realised it was inedible, I like salt but this was like someone had poured a whole salt shakers worth on one dish. I never send food back but I honestly couldn’t eat this, so had to send it back and get another one. The second dish was much better, the duck was tasty and the pasta had been cooked well but it was a very rich, heavy dish and just a bit much for me after the soup.

Neil had the Halibut Cioppino, this was very good, the halibut was delicious, there were plenty of clams and mussels in the dish and the tomato broth was flavourful.

I was too full for dessert but our server brought a little sweet dish to say thanks for dining with them. It was a chocolate from the Ganachery at Disney Springs and fruit pate, both were good.

Apart from my disappointing entree, we enjoyed our meal here.

When we got back to the Poly they were still serving desserts in the lounge so I grabbed a plate to share (along with a baileys!) The raspberry mickey tart was the best, the compote was really tart which paired well with the chocolate ganache underneath.