Epcot Food and Wine Festival 2019

There are three different dining plan levels at Disney World. All three dining plans come with a refillable souvenir drink mug that can be used at any of the resorts for unlimited coffee, tea, soda, juice, etc. Additionally, the Quick Service Dining plan gives each person two quick service meals and two snacks per night of stay, the Disney Dining Plan gets you one table service meal, one quick service meal, and two snacks per night, and the Deluxe Dining Plan gets you three table service meals and two snacks per night. Table Service credits can be used for quick service (although this is not a great value), but obviously not vice versa. 

These credits can be used in any way you want, and they are assigned per room, not per person, which is probably my favorite part of the dining plan. So basically, we stayed at Disney for four nights, so if we got a Disney Dining Plan, for example, we would have had 4 quick service credits, 4 table service credits, and 8 snack credits each. Our room would be linked to 8 quick service, 8 table service, and 16 snack credits total since there were two of us. So, if we wanted to do 3 table service meals and no quick service meals one day or we wanted to use all of our snack credits at the Epcot Food and Wine Festival (see below), we could. If Eric wasn’t as hungry as me (which is typical), I could use his meals or snacks for myself. It’s totally your call.

When booking my trip to Disney, I went back and forth a lot about whether or not to get the dining plan. Similar to Magical Express, I didn’t really think this option was for me because I don’t like to limit myself when it comes to my food. However, I also really wanted to research as much as possible. The dining plan is something that every client considers, and I really wanted to be able to speak from experience and understand the ins and outs of how it works. Unlike Magical Express, though, the dining plan is far from free (or “included), so it was a much bigger decision to make than whether or not to take a complimentary bus that wouldn’t miss me if I didn’t show up.

Also, we were going to be there during the Epcot Food and Wine Festival where almost every food item can be purchased using a snack credit, so the 16 snack credits would really allow us to taste a lot of different foods at the festival. So when I first booked the trip, I included the Disney Dining Plan. Bonus: You can also trade one quick service credit for three snack credits, AKA more Epcot tastings included in our plan if we wanted it!

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Then I started to make my reservations and realized three things: 1 – this plan allows you to order one entree, one dessert, and one drink for your table service meals. You cannot swap a dessert for an appetizer, and this does not work for me because I’m strictly a savory eater. I am a BIG fan of sharing multiple appetizers and cancelling dessert. 2 – I am also a foodie, and many of the restaurants I wanted to try were considered “Signature Dining” restaurants, which require the use of two table service credits per person. This is a bad use of dining credits, because although Signature Dining is more expensive, it is often not double the cost of other table service meals. And 3 – I realized that the trading of one quick service meal for three snacks only works if you are getting all three snacks at the same place, or in our case the same booth at Epcot Food and Wine. This seemed useless to me as I really just wanted to try one thing at every booth, and each booth only offers 2-3 things to begin with. So, after careful consideration, I canceled my dining plan.

Then, upon further review, I realized that I actually had enough signature dining reservations that it might pay to have three table service credits each day. I did some quick calculations, and looked further into the Deluxe Dining Plan. This plan comes with one appetizer, one entree, one dessert, and one drink with each meal, three meals a day. And of course, you still get your 2 snack credits per day as well, and this plan has less food and drink restrictions than the other two plans (read: almost no restrictions at all). This was a lot of food, but it was much less limiting. In the end, I added this on, and I’m so glad I did. We ordered more food than two people should ever consume, and we made a point of ordering the most expensive wines on the menu, and it was all so amazing. But that’s for the next post. This post is simply about how we used our 16 snack credits, and the foods we ate at the Epcot Food and Wine Festival. 

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We did not actually end up using all of our snack credits at the Food and Wine Festival, but we did use most there. As a rule, though, we didn’t want to waste any of these credits on anything less than $5 – $5.50. Therefore, we also used some snacks on some other things like Mickey shaped pretzels and churros. As another rule, I do not go to a theme park without purchasing a churro. I’m not a big pretzel fan, but Eric is, and it comes with some really disgusting cheese sauce as an added bonus. 

Other than that, though, the rest of our snack credits were used at the Epcot Food and Wine Festival, and I honestly think everything we ate there was delicious. When you get to the festival, you can pick up a passport which has a list of every booth and what they offer, along with stickers to “stamp” your passport with to keep track of what countries you visited. This came in handy to help me remember what we ate, so here it all is. 

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Hawaii: Kalua pork slider with sweet and sour DOLE pineapple chutney and spicy mayonnaise.

Australia (this was the only booth I got two dishes from – maybe it was nostalgia, because of my semester abroad in Australia. Feel free to read about that here, here, here, here, and here. Or maybe it was just because it was delicious. Or maybe it was my last booth before going home and I had two snack credits left. Either way, it happened.): 1 – Grilled sweet and spicy bushberry shrimp with pineapple, pepper, onion, and snap peas. AND 2 – Roasted lamb chop with sweet potato puree, bushberry pea salad, and pistachio-pomegranate gremolata.

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Islands of the Caribbean: Jerk spiced chicken with roasted sweet plantain salad and mango chutney yogurt. AND Frozen Mojito for Eric.

Mexico: Taco de puerco – shredded pork belly on a corn tortilla with salsa verde.

The Alps: Warm raclette swiss cheese with baby potatoes, cornichons, and baguette.

India: Korma chicken with cucumber tomato salad, almonds, cashews, and warm naan bread. AND Sula Chenin Blanc for me. Note: India is usually not the booth I’d choose to get my wine from. However, it was weirdly the only place that HAD wine that I saw in the first series of booths. The rest had an array of country specific drinks. They should really change the name to the Food and Beverage Festival. 

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Italy: Ravioli Carbonara – Parmesan and Pecorino Ravioli with egg yolk, cream, and bacon.

Japan: Spicy tuna and salmon roll topped with volcano sauce.

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Morocco: Spicy hummus fries with cucumber, tomatoes, onions, tzatziki, and chipotle sauce.

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Africa: Piri Piri skewered shrimp with citrus scented cous-cous.

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And of course, Belgium for dessert: Golden malted belgian waffle with warm chocolate ganache and whipped cream

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As far as adult only trips to Disney World go, I think there’s no better time to do it than during the Epcot Food and Wine Festival. I can’t wait to try all of the foods I missed next time.

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