Boy, do we have a lot of work to do!

I have to admit … when I first wrote All in WDW’s poll schedule for 2014, I never guessed that our friends at Epcot would be so tardy this year.  I mean, they release “Food” & Garden’s 2014 “dinner menu” less than three weeks before the party is scheduled to start?!  Really!

Geez!  I barely have time to create my own pre-festival Top 10 dishes … or 15, or 20, or whatever!

2014 Readers’ Favorites Calendar

Let’s see a show of hands.  How many here remember our agonizing crusade through dozens and dozens of Food & Wine items last Fall as we labored to create an All in WDW Readers’ Pre-Festival Top 25?  Anyone?  Anyone?  Ah, there you are!  Well, on a much smaller scale, and in a week or so, we’re going to do it again!

You saw me introduce the dishes this past Saturday.  As I carved through them for the very first time, I counted up 25 items that we’ll call “qualified” for our “tournament” to determine an All in WDW Readers’ “Food” & Garden Pre-Festival Top 15!  Or, Top 20!  2013 was a Top 20.  I haven’t decided for 2014 as yet.  Anyway, the contenders are:

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Florida Fresh

Watermelon Salad
Shrimp and Stone-Ground Grits

Hanami (Japan)

Frushi
Temaki Hand Roll
Hanami Sushi

Jardin de Fiestas (Mexico)

Corn Tortilla Pork Taco
Mushroom and Cheese Quesadilla

Fleur de Lys (France)

Parisian-style Dumplings
Pulled Duck Confit

Lotus House (China)

Spring Pancake
Vegetable Spring Rolls

Pineapple Promenade

Sweet Potato Cinnamon Waffle

Primavera Kitchen (Italy)

Caprese
Three-Cheese Manicotti

Taste of Marrakesh (Morocco)

Lamb Brewat Roll
Harissa Chicken Kebab

Urban Farm Eats

Pickled Beet Salad
Land-grown Eggplant “Scallop”
Ghost Pepper-dusted Tilapia

The Smokehouse: Barbecue and Brews (American Adventure)

Pulled Pig Slider
Smoked Beef Brisket
Smoked Turkey “Rib”

The Buttercup Cottage (United Kingdom)

Potato and Cheddar Cheese Biscuit
Field Greens
Pork and Apple Sausage Roll

Then, at the same time, we’re going to take on Epcot’s 10 desserts!  No, we won’t eliminate any, but we sure can put them into a rank order!  They are:

Florida Fresh

Kumquat Pie

Hanami (Japan)

Puffed Rice Cakes

Jardin de Fiestas (Mexico)

Chocolate Flan

Fleur de Lys (France)

Orange Blossom Macaron

Lotus House (China)

Beijing-style Candied Strawberries

Pineapple Promenade

Pineapple Dole Whip
Pineapple Dole Whip with Myers’s Dark Rum
Pineapple Dole Whip with Parrot Bay Coconut Rum

Primavera Kitchen (Italy)

Lemon Cheesecake (Torta di Ricotta)

Taste of Marrakesh (Morocco)

Moroccan Pancake (Baghrir)

Finally, in closing, and before I get too much deeper into the chef’s cuisine, I have to clean up one little piece of business.  On Saturday, with regard to WDW’s Mark IV monorails, I asked, “With five cars each, and on two monorail tracks, how many trains were built for WDW’s Opening Day?”

The most popular response was “6”, but, in actuality, if you jumped back to the post on Disney Parks Blog, the correct answer was revealed in the photo they displayed.  It was “10”!