Don’t Miss This Magic Kingdom Dining Gem: Dinner at The Crystal Palace

Readers, I am not one of those people who take pictures of my food. Really, I’m not. But in this instance, I sincerely regret NOT taking photos from our recent dinner at The Crystal Palace in the Magic Kingdom. A short review is below; don’t want to read it all? That’s OK – this place gets thumbs up from A Mom With Mouse Ears and A Dad With Mouse Ears AND the little Mouseketeer.

This buffet style restaurant offers a character dining for breakfast, lunch and dinner. The theme is Winnie the Pooh’s ‘Friendship Day’ and the characters you’ll meet are: Winnie the Pooh, Tigger, Piglet and Eyeore.

I will say that our little guy is often far more interested in watching YouTube kids than eating dinner; that was certainly the case here, even though he had a plate of macaroni and cheese and a few bites of broccoli and turkey, it certainly wasn’t $30 worth of food. That’s where the cheapskate in me gets really irritated. Hubby and I certainly got our money’s worth, selecting from different breads, salads, hot dishes and roasted/carved meats.

My favorite dishes were a cous cous salad and the salmon with sesame seeds. Hubby was a fan of the mini banana cream pie tarts. The icing on the cake (proverbially) was the soft-serve ice cream for dessert. Both kiddo and I had two bowls full…of course, I almost instantly regretted pumping my child full of sugar. Took about 30 minutes of running around the hub area for him to calm down.

The initial service was a little slow, took about 7-8 minutes for us to get our drinks and then we waited another 10-15 minutes for the chef to show up and walk me through the buffet to learn what was safe for kiddo to eat. After that, however, we were well taken care of.

Much to my surprise, kiddo was excited to meet the characters, giving lots of hugs and smiles. He’s not overly familiar with Winnie et al., so it was nice to see. The characters came around quickly, except for Eyeore, and there were several tables in our general vicinity that were waiting long after their meals were finished to meet characters. We were just about to give up when everyone’s favorite pessimist showed up and we snapped a photo.

I’ve put this restaurant on our itinerary for October; it really was that good. Next time, I’ll make sure that I have plastic bags and containers to bring back lots of tasty leftovers.