Chef Mickey’s, Disney World @ Orlando, FL

The last time we went to Chef Mickey’s was in 2020 for my daughter’s second birthday, right before the COVID-19 pandemic began. Two years later, we are back and the character brunch was definitely different due to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic.

Now, there is no more brunch buffet at Chef Mickey’s and the food is served family style. However, we were still able to order directly from the chef for my daughter’s allergy-friendly meal.

The above menu lists the allergy-friendly and not-allergy-friendly dishes that came out in family style portions.

Here are pictures of the not-allergy-friendly dishes that were brought to the table to share family-style:

 The chef came out to discuss the menu and I ordered my daughter the allergy-friendly Mickey waffles, tofu & plant-based scrambled eggs, and bacon.
And the chef brought out a special birthday platter with allergy-friendly cookies and cupcake topped with lit The Little Mermaid piece (to match my daughter’s Ariel dress).My daughter requested more bacon and Little Miss was given a big plate of crispy bacon, which she finished!

As we ate the delicious family meal, we enjoyed the ongoing visits from the Disney character chefs who posed at each table.


Overall, we had a delicious and magical time at this charactering dining place.

Have you attended a Disney Character Brunch during the pandemic?

Tony’s Town Square at Magic Kingdom, Disney World @ Orlando, FL

Over the weekend, we celebrated my daughter’s birthday at the Magic Kingdom, which is our annual trip to Disney World! 

Yes, I was so nervous going to Disney World again during the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic because of knowledge of the variants are keeping me busy at work and Little Miss’ age group hasn’t been approved for vaccination yet.

But we did our best again this year- we wore masks in crowded areas and during indoor rides, wiped down our hands & arms after every indoor ride and before/after meals, and social distanced when we could. Also, my husband and I are fully vaccinated and boosted!

I also noticed that Disney took precautions as well. I observed that the Disney Cast Members made sure everyone wore a mask in the indoor rides (they wouldn’t let the boats continue the ride if people were not wearing their masks). Also, the number of people were limited in crowded areas (i.e. the stretching room at the Haunted Mansion). We were still able to ride all our favorite Disney rides!

Last year, we ate at two places in the Magic Kingdom park. Check out the blog posts from last year’s visit- Lunch @ Crystal Palace and Dinner @ Be Our Guest.

This year, we enjoyed a delicious Italian lunch at Tony’s Town Square. We were seated outside and we were able to enjoy the passing parades while we ate, and waved back at the Disney characters at the nearby balcony.

The chef came out to take my daughter’s allergy-friendly order: spaghetti and turkey meatballs with a side of broccolini.

The chef also brought us some allergy-friendly bread (see above left plate) with our not-allergy-friendly bread (on right).

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My husband and I enjoyed an appetizer of fried mozzarella (and beer), a tasty Tour of Italy trio platter, and a yummy sausage pizza.

And the chef offered Little Miss a bowl of yummy chocolate Tofutti ice cream for dessert.

Overall, dining at this Disney restaurant was magical! The food was delicious and we had perfect outdoor seats.

Afterwards, we went next door to visit Mickey at his Meet & Greet in Town Square.

We had another magical time celebrating Little Miss’s birthday at Disney World this year!

       

Have you eaten at a restaurant in Disney World during the ongoing pandemic?

 

Magic Kingdom at Disney World @ Orlando, FL

Our favorite go-to and allergy-friendly snacks at Magic Kingdom, Disney World include:

Pineapple Dole Whip Float @ Aloha Isle

 

Raspberry and Pineapple Swirl Dole Whip float @ Aloha Isle

   

Mickey Pretzel at the snack cart near the Dumbo Ride

Popcorn in a Disney popcorn bucket  (Pictured here is the 50th Anniversary Mickey bucket)

Have you tried any of these yummy snacks at Disney?

I won! YumEarth x Abe’s Giveaway

Last month I entered the YumEarth x Abe’s Giveaway on the @YumEarth and @abesmuffins Instagram pages.

When I received a DM a few days later following my entry, I was so excited to learn that I won! @YumEarth and @abesmuffins are a few of my favorite vegan and allergy-friendly companies. I absolutely love their products and share them with my daughter who enjoys the muffins, new brownies, lollipops, and Giggles.

The giveaway package arrived right before Christmas; however, I physically received them early in the New Year since we were traveling for the Christmas and New Year holidays

. The two boxes were full of yummy goodies:


It was a lot more of goodies I expected in the giveaway, so a BIG THANK YOU to YumEarth and Abe’s Muffins. My daughter and I are enjoying all the goodies!

 

 

 

Yummy Christmas Candy

What is your favorite Christmas candy?

Mine is the classic candy cane. And when I found these @YumEarth candy canes, I was so excited to share my favorite holiday candy with my daughter.

She is still getting used to hard candy, but I do not have to worry about any food allergy reactions with these candy canes.

Have you tried the YumEarth candy canes?

Halloween Goodies 2021

   It’s almost Halloween and we are ready with the allergy-friendly candy: @YumEarth lollipops and candy corn & @EnjoyLifeFoods  assorted chocolate!

The Halloween @YumEarth lollipops will be distributed to my daughter’s PreK class for their “Fall Party”. And, I am so excited about the candy corns since they usually have egg whites, but now these allergy-friendly ones do not! Candy corns are my favorite Halloween candies, so now I can share them with my daughter! I bought these @YumEarth goodies from Whole Foods. Make sure to scan your QR code if you are shopping there in person and a Prime member!

I also ordered these @EnjoyLifeFoods assorted chocolates from Amazon! Mine and my daughter’s fave is the Rice Milk Crunch bar! 

What goodies will you be passing out this Halloween?

Disneyland and California Adventure Parks @ Anaheim, California

Last month (September 2021) we spent two magical days at #Disneyland to celebrate my birthday and our 6th year wedding anniversary! And we park hopped to the Disney California Adventure park on our last day. 


We had so much fun since it was @make_it_ranis and Little Miss’s first times going to Disneyland. And I have never been to Disney World nor DisneyLand during a holiday, so being at Disneyland during the Halloween festivities made this Disney visit super fun!

And I was so happy for my daughter who got to see and take pictures with her favorite Disney characters, with all the COVID19 precautions in place. 


As a public health professional, I was very impressed how the Disneyland cast members reminded everyone to wear their masks during the indoor rides and upon entry into a shop or restaurant. Also there were many hand sanitizers, especially at the ride exits. 
Overall, we had a magical time! 


Here are my favorite food pictures from our Disneyland trip, and several photos above are from using #DisneyPhotoPass (which I believe is totally worth it paying for the unlimited pictures taken by the Disney photographers). 

It was my daughter’s first time eating a pretzel, so she truly enjoyed this Mickey Mouse face-shaped pretzel! And you can find these vegan pretzels at various snack carts throughout the Disneyland park.

Another first was eating popcorn! My daughter had two bags of vegan popcorn during our two visits at Disneyland!

And the third “first foods” that my daughter tried was Dole Whip! Little Miss loves pineapples so she definitely enjoyed the vegan Pineapple Dole Whip float and soft serve we had during the two days at Disneyland!

It was pretty hot during both days at Disneyland so we stayed cool by indulging in these icy snacks-

This Minute Maid soft-frozen strawberry lemonade was great at California Adventure when the sun was blazing in the afternoon. You can get these yummy cups at any snack cart throughout the Disneyland parks.

This icy lemonade slush drink from the Edelweiss Snacks stand in Fantasyland was refreshing during a hot day at Disneyland:

 

During our last day at Disneyland, we park hopped to California Adventure. We enjoyed seeing the Coco movie theme area in the Paradise Pier area. Here we enjoyed the vegan hot apple pie and Mexican tacos lunch at Paradise Garden Grill:

        

Here’s a video when we ate lunch at  the Carnation Cafe in Disneyland, a few days after they opened up again since the COVID-19 closure:

See my post about our dining experience at the Carnation Cafe.

And here is a post of when we celebrated my birthday brunch at the Storytellers Cafe.

In the Downtown Disney area, we enjoyed going to Salt & Straw and Sprinkles. Both places had vegan desserts, yummy vegan ice cream flavors at Salt & Straw and vegan red velvet cupcake at Sprinkles, which we happily indulged in!

We cannot wait to go back to Disneyland in a few years. For now, it will be WDW more often (since it’s closer to us!)

Have you been to Disneyland and/or Disney World during Halloween?

Carnation Cafe @ Disneyland, Anaheim, California

When it was decided we were going to Disneyland, I was so excited to plan our activities! There are yummy fast food options at all the Disney properties. However since we had two days at Disneyland, I wanted to enjoy a nice meal at a nice sit down restaurant in the park.

I was so excited when I was able to book a character brunch at the precious Storytellers Cafe in the beautiful  Disney’s Grand Californian Hotel & Spa  (you can read the blog post here) and at the Carnation Cafe inside the Disneyland park.

The Carnation Cafe recently opened on 9/16/2021, which was a few days before we were at Disneyland, and they are known for their comfort foods. I was so excited because I wanted to try all the yummy dishes there, like Walt’s favorite chili and the  Chicken Fried Chicken. And we did!

We shared a cup of Walt’s favorite chili

This Chicken Fried Chicken plate was my husband’s, in which he enjoyed it but he wished there was more!

And I ordered the popular chicken salad, which I don’t normally order salads at restaurants, so it was nice to eat something different and healthy!

My daughter, who has multiple food allergies, was able to order some of classic comfort food favorites, which included an allergy-friendly burger (kid’s fun size), steamed broccoli (one of her favorite veggies), and a fruit bowl! And in good Disney fashion, we had no worries of food allergy reaction eating at this fine Disneyland eatery.

We were all satisfied and full after this delicious lunch and had a lot of energy to ride more rides at Disneyland, the Happiest Place on Earth!

Have you eaten at the Carnation Cafe before?

Storytellers Cafe in Disney’s Grand Californian Hotel & Spa @ Disneyland, California

Last month due to a COVID-19 surge in Hawaii, we changed our vacation plans to Los Angeles, CA. I only had like 2 weeks to book activities in California. Despite the change of travel plans, I was still excited that we planned to go to Disneyland, which the last time I was there (I actually ran through the parks) was in 2015.

One Sunday before our trip, I attempted to see if there were any openings for a character brunch….and there was! At the Storytellers Cafe in the beautiful Disney’s Grand Californian Hotel & Spa

It so happened to my actual birthday so I was so happy to be with my favorite Disney characters at brunch with my family! And even though there was still a pandemic going on, the characters visited our tables, standing at arms length!

When we arrived, we spoke to the chef of what they could offer my daughter with food allergies:  unlimited allergy-friend Mickey waffles, assorted fruit, sausage, bacon, and special potatoes from the back.

And my husband and I enjoyed everything from the brunch buffet!

Even the Disney gang stopped by several times!

Despite the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, it was great to spend my birthday at brunch in one of the nicest Disneyland resorts at  the #HappiestPlaceOnEarth!

Have you had brunch at the Storytellers Cafe?

 

 

Terralina Crafted Italian – Allergy-Friendly Pasta @ Disney Springs, Orlando, FL

When we were at Disney Springs in June 2021, we ate at Terralina Crafted Italian. I was hesitant at first because of my daughter’s allergies. However, the server was great about inquiring more of what my daughter can and cannot eat. But when I saw the description of the Wild Mushroom Rostini (asparagus, sun-dried tomato, toasted garlic, & olive oil), I knew my daughter would love it! This dish is actually vegan and gluten-free (we do not have a gluten allergy)

My daughter loved it! And so did I. I was actually sharing this dish with her and I tried not to eat it all!

Also, the fried calamari and table bread with olive oil for dipping tasted so fresh and delicious!

We will definitely come back here!