Teppan Edo: An Epcot Restaurant Review

Next up in my lineup of restaurant reviews is Teppan Edo. Located in the Japan section of Epcot, you'll want to check in outside and get your pager. Their pager works in the entire Japan section, so you'll have quite a bit to do while you wait. 

Once paged, you'll walk up a large set of cement stairs to the restaurant entrance. You'll be paged with the entire group of people who will be at your table. We have a local restaurant like Teppan Edo here, and they cram about 10-12 people at a grill. At Teppan Edo, there are 8 seats per grill, which gives everyone much more space. 

Once seated, a waitress (or team of two waitresses in our case) came to the table to get our drink orders, then brought us salads, soup for the kids and then beef rice. The salad was good, and typical of other Japanese teppenyaki restaurants I've been to. The soup they brought the kids was a miso soup and I thought it tasted like soap, but to each his own. The beef rice was DELISH! I loved it! I added some of the white sauce because I could drink that stuff, but Chris didn't and he still loved it. We placed our orders during this time and then the chef came out.


Our chef was fantastic. She started out with a oil Mickey. One major difference here is they don't light the grill on fire. All of the other similar restaurants I've been to do, so my kids were a little disappointed at that - but hey, they were at Disney for crying out loud. They'll live.  ;-)

Our chef was super friendly and funny and the kids loved her. Unlike most other grills (I feel like I keep saying that), the only things they cook live are the udon noodle/veggie mix and your meat. 

Sorry for the unattractive photo, but this was my dinner:

We were all pleased with the food. Although this didn't make our list of places to revisit, we did enjoy our dinner very much. Our table-mates were very friendly and had kids of similar ages, which was really nice.

The only thing I found lacking was their dessert options, but while you're in Epcot, there are so many other things you can go get! If you have the dining plan, you may as well use it to try something new, but if you don't like it, use your snack credits elsewhere for a great dessert. I'll share some of my favorites in another post.

Rose & Crown Review: An Epcot UK Restaurant

If you follow me on Instagram, or have followed my blog for awhile, you know I'm a HUGE fan of all things British. Chris and I are actually taking a trip to London and Scotland in a couple of months (I plan on blogging it). How I've made it four years without eating at the Rose and Crown in Epcot is beyond me, but we finally made it a reality!

If you have a reservation for the R&C, you check in outside and they'll give you a pager. I think we had ours for about 90 seconds before they buzzed us. 

From what I could see, there were two main dining rooms plus the pub area. We sat in this room:

And you walked through this one to get there. I probably would have requested this one had I known, but it really didn't matter. I just loved the roof. Very reminiscent of Hampton Court Palace.

We had lunch reservations, so I snagged a photo of the menu for you. You can always check the menus for all Disney restaurants on their website. 

This is a single table service credit restaurant for those of you who are on the dining plan. 

Brayden decided to be adventurous and have the children's banger and mash. A "banger" is their term for a sausage. I tasted it and it was really good!

Chris went with the corned beef and cabbage. He said it was alright, but not as good as my mom's.

Since we were there on a Sunday, they offered a "Sunday roast" which was not on the menu. This is very traditional in England - on Sunday they'll roast up a cut of meat, and serve it with vegetables and yorkshire pudding, which is like a popover that has deflated and is made with the drippings of the meat that is roasted. 

I opted for the Sunday roast as it was turkey. It came with roasted potatoes, yorkshire pudding, onion stuffing, peas and carrots and topped with gravy. It was spectacular!!

Since we were on the dining plan, and this was a table service restaurant, we got to choose a dessert. I went with the Jaffa Tart which had candied oranges with it. It was really good.

Chris had the sticky toffee pudding and loved it. I tasted it and it was delicious! 

If you're a bit of an anglophile, or just love good comfort food, I recommend trying out Rose and Crown. We really enjoyed the atmosphere and the food and can see ourselves going back again!

Raglan Road Review: A Disney Springs Restaurant

Every time we visit Disney, we try to eat somewhere new. We have our old standbys, family favorites that we have to eat at every time, but this year, we added a few new restaurants, including Raglan Road.

Raglan Road is located in Disney Springs (which is awesome, by the way). If you're on the Disney Dining Plan, you can eat here for one table service credit each. They also have a quick service restaurant called Cookes of Dublin, though we didn't eat there.

The inside of this place is so, so cool!! From the moment we walked in, we knew we'd found something special! There's a stage on the far right of the photo below, and a small, single person stage  below the left center chandelier. 

They have Irish singers and dancers, and they even picked a few kids to join them on stage. If you know my kids in real life, you'll know who ran up there and who stayed at the table. ;-) I'll give you a hint; Brody's nickname is Crazy (or Trouble...just depends on the day).


They bring Irish soda bread to the table to start along with a beer and oil dip. Chris liked the oil but the kids and I requested butter. The soda bread was so good!

For dinner, Chris had fish and chips. While it was very good, he prefers the fish and chips at Epcot in the UK. I had braised beef and it was outstanding. I loved the presentation!

Since we were on the dining plan, we also received dessert. I had the flourless chocolate cake. It was good but not great. I only took two or three bites, but in fairness I was pretty full from my entree.

Chris had the peach and apple crumble. It's totally not my thing, so I didn't even try it, but he said it was just okay. If you were paying out of pocket I would recommend skipping dessert here and instead getting something from Sprinkles Cupcakes or the Ghiradelli ice cream shop.

Overall, we will definitely be going back to Raglan Road. It has earned a place on our favorites list because it's just so cool! They have a bar that was directly behind our table that they brought over from Ireland and it's 195 years old! The food was pretty good, though not our favorite, but the atmosphere is what makes this place!

Resort Review: Disney's Grand Floridian Resort

As promised, next up is my review of the Grand Floridian!

We stayed here in November of 2015. See? We don't go every year! We skipped 2016! Ha!

Once again, we arrived at night, so my pictures are a bit dark. All of the photos from all of these posts have been iPhone photos as well, so they aren't perfect, but you get the idea.

The lobby of the GF is by far and away the most impressive of the big three. It's stunning. You're often serenaded by live piano music, and it all just feels so grand. For some, that has been a complaint - that it all feels too grand, and even a bit stuffy. Just something to keep in mind.

Once again, the bedroom has a similar layout to both the Contemporary and the Poly. I'll go ahead and tell you now that the GF was by far my least favorite. I know. There are people (many that I know!) who absolutely LOVE it. In theory, this should be my favorite hotel. But it's just not. It's not only my least favorite of the big three, it's my least favorite of all the Disney hotels that I have stayed at AND visited. I know. I'm sorry.

Take all this with a grain of salt. We all have different opinions. I'll tell you why it was my least favorite though. First, the decor is lacking. It's doesn't really feel Disney to me. It's very...sparse feeling. It also feels old and tired, even though it's been refurbished. They could have done a MUCH better job in my opinion. The mauve and taupe color scheme just isn't for me.

The lighting in the bathroom was really poor. If you're practically blind, like me, this is a much bigger deal than it sounds like.

The balcony seemed (and in fact, I believe was) much smaller than the other two. It also feels super closed off for some reason. Many rooms had big pine trees obstructing their view of the magic kingdom. 

For good measure, here's the hall and front door.

The pool was nice, and my kids enjoyed it. We had a very hard time finding anywhere to sit as people had places towels over most of the chairs and then apparently left the area (while still claiming their chairs). I've heard that this is a big problem on cruises as well. There also isn't much shade. That said, the pool is still leaps and bounds better than the one at the Contemporary.

Finally, I had to share this, because I love it. If you're there during Christmas, they construct a life-sized gingerbread house. They sell shingles in the store just around the corner and they're great! You can even get them dipped in chocolate!

I'll be sharing more reviews, including a review of our afternoon tea at the Grand Floridian, soon! Let me know if you have any questions, or topics you'd like me to cover!

Resort Review: Disney's Contemporary Resort

Next up is my review of the Contemporary. I knew we would either love it or hate it, and I was honestly afraid that we might hate it. Why? Because I stayed here twenty something years ago when I was in the 5th grade. I can't believe I'm old enough to say I did something twenty plus years ago. Insert crying emoji here.

Anyway, I was nervous because my mom still talks about how loud the hotel was and how the Chef Mickey music woke us up at 6am every day (which was like 3am for us because we lived in California then). 

The check in process for our split stay was smooth. They texted us that our new room was ready along with the room number, floor number and a map. We still stopped in at the online check-in desk anyway. They were very polite and a manager came over to say hello and to make sure we were all taken care of.  Fantastic customer service yet again! 

So, again, we had a theme park view room, and the layout was almost identical to the layout at the Poly. The room is a bit more spacious though, and those couple of extra feet really do make a difference in the feel of the room. 

Again, we had two queen beds and the sofa (and again, the boys had to take turns because they both wanted it). We also had a large desk area with a mirror which is where I dried and curled my hair.  

The bathroom layout was a bit different. Gone was the spacious countertop, which was replaced with two very modern sinks. We developed a wet/dry system. One was used for water, the other for my makeup, ha! I had to put it somewhere!

The toilet was also in it's own room here as opposed to being right out in the open.

The entry, which I didn't really show in my post of the Poly was actually the same.

One negative difference was how looooow the ceilings are here. I actually cut my hand while wildly gesturing around. Of course, I'm so accident prone that its debilitating so there's no real surprise there. I'm probably the only person in the history of this hotel to pull that off.

(Sidenote: If you've never seen the video of the Contemporary being build you should watch it! It's on YouTube. They slid the rooms in like pods. It's really cool!).

I don't know if this is typical or not, but when we got to our room we had this great little welcome platter! One strawberry is missing because Chris got to it before I could snap a picture. ;-)

And here is my number one drawback...After staying at the Poly, this view is a bit lacking during the day. If you try to sit outside on the balcony, you're flooded with traffic noise and noise from the conference center below. The busses all stop right below you, so you have the vehicle noise and the people noise from that as well. It's definitely not the peaceful experience you get at the Poly.

Speaking of drawbacks, I have to mention the pool. It's awful. Chris took the kids one day while I was packing (we were leaving the next day) and they came back pretty disappointed. It was small, cold and chockfull of leaves, which explains why they were the only ones out there. Literally - no one else was there except a lifeguard. 

But on the flip side, the nighttime view from the Contemporary can't be beat!! (No zoom with this shot!).

Gorgeous! Also, you get all the sound from Wishes too, so you feel like you're right there in the park!

Our room was #4737 on the 11th floor which is the highest non-club level floor there. It was dead center of the building, right next to the elevators (the noise wasn't bad from that...but we sleep with a sound machine on via an app on our phones).

We never heard a peep from Chef Mickey's which was awesome! The rooms farther down would have had an even closer view than this.

After I post about the Grand Floridian I will be sharing my favorite Disney hotel thus far. I'm also going to include some info about our previous stays and some hotels we visited this trip (Wilderness Lodge, Caribbean Beach and Port Orleans Riverside). Be sure to let me know if you have any questions!

Disney Review: The Polynesian Hotel

As the title implies, we visited Disney again this year! I posted all about it on Instagram but I received some requests for blog posts with more details than I could put on Insta, so I decided to do a series on our Disney trip to answer some of those questions. If you have any Disney related questions, you can send me an email or leave a comment on this post and I'll do my best to answer it! I have never been on a Disney cruise so I can't answer anything pertaining to those. ;-)

This year we did a split stay. We spent four nights at the Polynesian and three at the Contemporary. I will also be reviewing the Grand Floridian since we stayed there in November of 2015 and I never posted about it. These are the "big three" - the three hotels that are directly on the monorail that runs to Magic Kingdom and the Transportation and Ticket Center (where you can catch the other monorail line to Epcot).

I always check-in online prior to arriving at a Disney resort, and I had requested a specific building with a theme park view (since we had a theme park view room anyway). I found out that we didn't get the building I requested but I am SO GLAD! We ended up in the very best building they have (in my opinion). Here's a map with the layout of the Poly (I took a picture of it while we were there). 

We were put in Tuvalu, room 3414. I highly recommend this room. When looking at the map above, Tuvalu is the top left building and our room was the top right corner room. You'll see our view later. 

Back to check-in. This is the lobby at night, when we arrived. It's a beautiful lobby - smaller than the Grand Floridian or even than the Animal Kingdom Lodge (review HERE), but very pretty.  Check-in was a very smooth process, and they even gave both boys a Stitch! The night manager came over, and noticing the boys had their pin-trading lanyards on, gave them each a free pin!

I totally forgot to take my own pictures of our room, but these pictures from Disney's website are completely accurate. This is exactly what our room looked like on the inside:

We had two queen beds, a soft that folded out into a bed that our boys LOVED and took turns sleeping on, a deck (we were on the third floor, which is the top floor of Tuvalu) and a bathroom that looked just like the photo below.

There are two closets and a dresser under the tv with plenty of storage space for all of our stuff. Unlike most hotels, they actually provide plenty of hangers which is helpful!

The bathroom is also spacious with a good amount of counter space. The lighting is even pretty decent!

Our stay in Tuvalu was so peaceful. Chris took the kids to the pool twice in our four days there while I sat out on our balcony and watched the boats go by. It was so incredibly calm and beautiful. We watched the fireworks and the electrical water pageant from our balcony each night too:

Neither of these pictures are zoomed in! We really had a fantastic view from our room. The only views that would have been closer were from the bungalows and possibly Moorea - but their view would have been semi obstructed by the bungalows. 

Funny side note: We have never watched the fireworks from inside the park. I know. We're weird. But really, we hate crowds and the mad scramble to find a spot and then get out of the parks is just too much for me to be honest. We've always watched it from views like this instead. We actually have watched it twice from the monorail and once from inside Cinderella's castle.

Another thing I managed to not photograph is the pool (you can google it and see tons of great photos). It's a FANTASTIC pool! Our kids had a BLAST there! I stayed in the room most of the time when they went swimming because I burn easily and there wasn't a ton of shade. Also, I was battling bronchitis and really just needed to rest a bit! Once I did go sit in the outside seating area of the quick service restaurant which is located just outside of the pool area and I was able to watch them playing and going down the slide while I relaxed (Chris was with them). 

Another added benefit (of the silly variety) of staying at the Poly, is that you have access to the famous Dole Whip. There's a Pineapple Lanai right at the hotel (near the pool, no less) and yes, you can use snack credit's for them!

Also at the Poly are a couple of cute stores, a small grocery type store (they have refrigerated cases with salami, cheese milk, etc, and dry goods as well), and a variety of restaurants (our favorite being O'hana). I'll be sharing more about our dining experiences in another post.

If you have any questions about the Polynesian or requests of things for me to include in my upcoming Disney posts, please let me know! I'll be covering The Grand Floridian, The Contemporary, all of our dining, rides, park recommendations etc in upcoming posts. I may also include a Q&A post if I receive enough questions! =)

Five Five Star Books

We recently took a fun road trip (which hopefully I'll blog about later) and I took that opportunity to do some reading. This is the biggest streak of 5 star books I've had, maybe ever, so I wanted to share them with you in case you're in a reading rut.

#1 Harry Potter and the Cursed Child

I recently started reading Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone to Brayden and Brody (they love it), and then I remembered that I had heard about a new HP book. I looked it up and thought, eh, it's a screenplay, not a novel. But then, the night before it released I decided to just go ahead and pre-buy it for my kindle app. I ended up devouring it in about 4 hours. If you've never read a screenplay before (I have) it takes a little getting used to. If you can read it in one setting it will make it a lot easier. 

If you're worried about new characters and how that might make you feel, toss it out the window. This book is FANTASTIC. It's everything you love about Harry Potter. And to answer the inevitable question, NO, I would not read this without having read the first seven books. 

#2 Big Little Lies

This is a case (actually the only case I can recall) where I totally judged a book by it's horrific cover and nearly didn't read it. What a mistake that was. Big Little Lies was amazing and for those of you who like movie remakes, Reese Witherspoon and Nicole Kidman are making a series for HBO (Reese plays Maddie and Nicole plays Celeste). Some people are very against books that are told from alternating perspectives, but this one just works. If you didn't have that the ending wouldn't make any sense at all, so just stick with it! 

(Also, not on my list are several of Liane's other books: The Husband's Secret is very good and I also love Truly Madly Guilty).

#3 The Pecan Man
I don't even remember how I found this book. It might have been an Amazon recommendation based on other books I read. In any case, this book is generally not one I would pick up (read the summary on Amazon or Goodreads). It's not a subject matter that generally appeals to me, but it was beyond amazing. It's one of the most well written books I've ever read. The writing style is beautiful and I just could not put it down!

#4 The Girl on the Train
Okay, so I actually gave this book 4 stars on Goodreads, but I think I'm going to change it. It's sort of funny - awhile ago one of my Goodreads friends wrote me a comment and said something like "you just don't like anything do you?" because I had gone through a stint of really awful books (and I'm painfully honest in my reviews). That's completely not the case! I love to read but I was just in a rut of awful literature. The tables have turned for me though, and I've finally found some good ones!
So, back to the book. I think its just taking me awhile to process it, and now I'd give it 5 stars instead of 4. It was definitely creative. The mystery was intriguing and kept me guessing. This is another book that alternates narrators, and again, it works here. I will warn you that just about every character in this enter book is awful, but somehow, this book turns out to be a beautifully woven masterpiece.

#5 What She Left Behind
This is another book that Amazon recommended for me (those can be so hit or miss!) that really paid off. I didn't know what to expect but I was pleasantly surprised! It's told in alternating points of view and the story is about a woman who was institutionalized in the 1930's and a girl in the 1990's who has found her belongings. I really was kept guessing throughout the story. The author did her homework was well versed on the things that actually took place in institutions during that timeframe. It was a realistic look at life for those poor women. That might make it sound like a book you wouldn't be interested in, but give this one a try. I'm glad I did!

Greek Chicken with Zoodles and Greek Sauce (21 Day Fix Approved!)

Since I'm following the 21 Day Fix, I'm going to start posting more 21 Day Fix approved recipes! If you're not following the plan, these recipes are still great for you - they're healthy and easy! I literally dreamed this easy recipe up at midnight a couple of weeks ago, got up, typed it into my phone and fell back asleep. It's fast become a family favorite. 

If you don't have a spiralizer I would recommend looking for one on Amazon. I'm a prime member so I ordered a $7 one and it arrived 2 days later. Easy!

As always, I'm here to answer any questions about the 21 Day Fix, Beachbody and coaching. Feel free to send me an email at EmailJennasJourney@ Gmail . com anytime! 

Greek Chicken with Zoodles and Greek Sauce

Source: JennaBlogs.com
Serves 4

4 chicken breasts

2-4 zucchini, depending on size

1 yellow onion

1 cup greek yogurt

1/4 cup water

Evoo

Cavenders Greek Seasoning to taste

Drizzle chicken with EVOO and sprinkle with seasoning. Bake on a foil lined baking sheet at 375 until cooked, about 35 min. 

Use a spiralizer on your zucchini to form noodles. Boil for 2 mins and drain well on paper towels. 

Mince your yellow onion and cook over medium with 1 teaspoon EVOO. Add in about 1/2 TBSP of seasoning, reduce heat to low and stir in water and greek yogurt. 

Serve sauce over zoodles and you can also put it on the chicken.

2 red 2 green 2 teaspoons 

Eats in Destin, Florida

Edited: I forgot to mention that I don't eat seafood! I received some great restaurant suggestions in the comments, but they were places I ruled out because they didn't have anything that I would eat. ;-) However, if you're a seafood lover, be sure to check out those suggestions!

Hey all!

So, I've been taking a bit of a blogging break (I feel like I keep saying that, but summer has been SO BUSY that I can't keep up with blogging) but I'm back to give some recaps on our trip to Destin!

I'll include the pictures I have (which are all iPhone pics...I didn't feel like hauling my huge camera with me on this trip) and at the end I'll give some bullet point recommendations.

So, one of the coolest places we ate at was called LuLu's. There's also one in Gulf Shores (so I've been told).

This is what makes LuLu's so cool - the back of the restaurant is faces the bay (I think it was the bay).  They have this big sand area and the kids can go play out there. It's a really pretty view.

The food wasn't that great, in my humble opinion. I grabbed a snap of the menu for you! It's mostly burgers, salads and sandwiches. We arrived early because every place in Destin gets super crowded and we didn't want to wait three hours to be sat (yes, that did happen somewhere else!). Unfortunately, 4:45 must be shift change time and we lost our waitress and ended up with another and it caused mass confusion with our order which ended up pretty messed up.

Lulu's saving grace was their key lime pie. It was SOOOO GOOD!

One place that everyone told me to check out was The Donut Hole. Y'all. I was SO EXCITED. I mean, I never use the word y'all so that should tell you how excited I was.

And then I was disappointed. Majorly. I don't know if they were having an off day or what, but the food was awful. I had the french dip with onion rings and it was honestly no good. No one in our group (my in-laws were with us) liked what they had. The donuts themselves were just okay.

Another fun night out was at Uncle Bucks. You can go bowling here, which we did, and if you can't tell by the decor, it's owned by Bass Pro Shops. The food was decent and the kids loved the atmosphere.




 My very, VERY favorite meal was at The Back Porch. The view is phenomenal and they got us seated really quickly. We were on the second story deck and it came with an AWESOME view.

See what I mean? We watched a pod of dolphins playing while we waited on our food. I'm not even kidding. It was the coolest thing ever.



 The last place I have a pic of is Fudpuckers, not to be confused with Fudruckers. Two different things.

And why, you're asking yourself, doesn't she have a picture of the food? Well, because we waited THREE HOURS to sit down and eat, and by that time I was so ravenous that I forgot to take a picture.

So.

Fudpuckers is fun. You can watch a live alligator show, feed the alligators, visit the gift shop and they also have an arcade. All that should have been my first clue that there was a long wait ahead of us.

The food was standard, over-priced vacation fare. It was fine but nothing great and I certainly wouldn't do it again, but I'm glad we did it once.

 So, here's my list (some places aren't pictured) of recommendations:

Definitely go to:
The Back Porch
Bubba Gumps (I've been to several and this was one was by far the very best food)
The Beach House (if you're in Sandestin, it's a great place to eat when actually at the beach)
Fudpuckers - it's a good, one-time experience
LuLu's - if just for the atmosphere and pie

For food and fun:
Uncle Buck's

Not for me:
The Donut Hole