It's "All in WDW"

The Sudden and Surprising End of Parks Table Services? Huh?

Bob Sikon

No.  Not quite yet!  If you remember, as we forged through WDW’s Park Table Service offerings last week, I mentioned that … “[o]ver the course of this entire competition, we’ll, undoubtedly, choose a favorite from EACH park.”

Well, indeed, we DID anoint the restaurants with the highest overall vote totals for THEIR particular parks as our favorites!  To remind you, they were:

Magic Kingdom:  Be Our Guest Restaurant
Epcot:  Via Napoli Ristorante e Pizzeria
Hollywood Studios:  50’s Prime Time Café
Animal Kingdom:  Tusker House Restaurant

I thought it would be interesting to take a quick look at each park’s full list, with votes, in order to see just how close the competition was (or wasn’t).

In addition, we’ve essentially made up our ‘Top Recommendations’ lists by park.  In other words, if someone asks you where to dine in Epcot, we’ve drawn up a pre-populated list of options … in order!

As such, the All in WDW “super computer” has been crunching data for days!  So, since we’ve already mentioned it, let’s start with …

Epcot

  1. Via Napoli Ristorante e Pizzeria – 110 votes
  2. Le Cellier Steakhouse – 75
  3. Biergarten Restaurant – 47
  4. Rose & Crown Pub & Dining Room – 47
  5. The Garden Grill – 43
  6. La Hacienda de San Angel – 33
  7. Tutto Italia Ristorante – 28
  8. Chefs de France – 24
  9. Tokyo Dining – 15
  10. San Angel Inn Restaurante – 13
  11. Akershus Royal Banquet Hall – 12
  12. Teppan Edo – 9
  13. Coral Reef Restaurant – 8
  14. Restaurant Marrakesh – 8
  15. Spice Road Table – 5
  16. Monsieur Paul – 5
  17. Nine Dragons Restaurant – 3

First, some “points of order”.  Although tied, Biergarten beats Rose & Crown because it made it to the 3rd Round of the tournament.  The U.K.’s pub did not.  In addition, Mrs. All in WDW “broke the tie” between Coral Reef Restaurant and Restaurant Marrakesh.  She did the same for Spice Road Table and Monsieur Paul.

My comments?

When overall vote totals are compared, Epcot’s competition wasn’t even close.  Where Via Napoli lost to Le Cellier by four votes in 2013, “The World’s” best pizzeria destroyed Canada’s steakhouse by thirty-five (35) this year.  Not quite “apples to apples”, but still …

We’ve only been to five of Epcot’s seventeen options.  We’ve never been to Via Napoli.

I was surprised at how well Garden Grill did … landing in the park’s Top 5?  Is it because it’s a character dining spot?  Then, again, Akershus Royal Banquet Hall received a meager twelve votes and never left Round 1.

Tokyo Dining made it to the 2nd Round.  That surprised me somewhat, but I’m very pleased.  Our son and his fiancee’ will be visiting them on our next trip to Orlando.  I can’t wait to see their pictures and read their review!

Spice Road Table’s support was surprisingly disappointing.  That has to be because it’s brand new.  It will be interesting to see if it shoots up the rankings when we repeat this poll in 2015 … and after more of us have had a chance to dine there.

Nine Dragons Restaurant tied with the Animal Kingdom’s Rainforest Cafe for the lowest vote total in the entire tournament (3).  When I have asked people about China’s table service, they’ve typically commented that it’s the same as any local Chinese restaurant “you have at home”.  Maybe that’s a true assessment.

For us, we’ve been to:

I would rank them in that order.

We’d (I’d?) like to go to:

In that order.

Hey!  Come back tomorrow and we’ll address the other three parks. In the meantime, have a fun Sunday!