So, this its the day many of you have been waiting to hear about. Rin's Birthday. Rin had decided she wanted to do Magic Kingdom for her birthday, and eat at Jiko for supper. Fine by me. What she didn't know was that, for about 3 months, I had been dealing with Gifts of a Lifetime to set up a scavenger hunt around MK for her.
I'll give a bit of background, in case any of you want to use GoaL in the future. I first contacted them about 6 months in advance, sometime artound May. I didn't realize this, but they don't get back to you right away, so if you contact them way in advance like me, be prepared to wait. Once Jane (the owner) got back to me, she offered me a couple of choices based on the questionaire I had filled out. One was an Amazing Race style event at Epcot (that could be moved to other parks, or spread out over the course of several days), and the other was Peter Pan based. Essentially, Peter had bought Rin a gift, Tinkerbell was jealous, told Hook, Hook stole the gift, now Tinkerbell feels guilty, so she's helping Rin get her gift back. Rin loves Peter Pan, so it wasn't a difficult choice. Once that was settled, Jane told me the various locations they use, I helped come up with some clues for a few of them (I wanted to test Rin's knowledge), and then the big day arrived.
When we got up, we did the obigatory Lounge run to get some water and pastries, then drove out to MK. Yet again, we were just a touch too late for Rope Drop. One of these days we'll make it. The scavenger hunt didn't start until 10:00am, so we had a bit of time to kill, since it was just after 9:00am at this point. I didn't want to get in line for any rides in case the wait times were off, so we basically just wandered, took some pictures, and checked out some shops, including the kitchen shop between Liberty Square and Fantasyland. Some pretty cool stuff in there, but we didn't wind up buying anything.
When 10:00am rolled around, the opening clue would be waiting at the sleigh in front of the Christmas Shop (they usually use the Wishing Well, but it was blocked by the construction crane for putting up Cinderella's Dream Lights). I got Rin to hop on the sleigh so that I could get a picture, but she didn't find the clue. Odd. Jane saw me (they had pictures of us), said it was in the back, not the front (she had texted me about that, but it never came through), and offered to take a picture of the both of us. I had sent Rin away so she didn't see this exchange, so I called her back, we hopped in the back of the sleigh, got a picture, and Rin found her note. She told me that she almost started crying, but didn't want everyone to see.
I should mention that we only had 2 hours to finish looking for it, since Hook and Smee were on our tails looking as well. Oh no! We had to be quick, so we were off to the first location!
I think we had the most difficulty with the first clue. We were supposed to be looking near some flowers, outside of a shop. We got to the shop, and began our search. We thought it would be an 8x10 piece of paper, much like the first clue we got. Turns out the remainder were index card sized. So we looked everywhere around this shop, even the underside of the windowsill above the flowers. Finally, Rin noticed it in with the plants. Crisis averted. On the the next clue.
At one point we got a clue saying that the gift would be in a cannon outside of Pirates of the Caribbean (only in riddle form), and it had a pictue of Smee on it. Rin thought it was a trap, but it's all we had to go on. Turns out Rin was right, but Tinkerbell got rid of the trab and put our next clue. Apparently no one hides gifts in cannons. Another crisis averted.
Eventually, we were told to go to the ride that hosts 999 happy haunts, and stand as close to the middle of the room that grows as possible, and that the ghosts would give us our next clue. We got there, stood in the middle, and when the lights went off, Rin was 'crowned' - the ghosts had laid her next clue on her head with some ribbon attached. Nifty.
About an hour, maybe and hour and a half later, the scavegner hunt came to an end, and Rin found her prize - the Dooney and Bourke bag I had bought her. Jane came over and offered to get a picture of us again (Rin recognized her this time), and told us that was the first time anyone had ever looked under the windowsill for that first clue. Yay! We're special! I have a feeling that Jane usually wouldn't come 'ruin the effect' at the end if you're doing it for kids, but we liked being able to talk to her for a few minutes afterwards.
With the scavenger hunt done, the rest of the day was ours to do what we pleased. One of the clues had taken us to the Carousel of Progess, but we'd still never actually been on it. So, off we went. I honestly didn't have high expectations for this attraction, but I really liked it. I think it's in some need of updating though. The scene at the end just threw me off a bit.
I think this may have been the day that we did Space Mountain about five or six times. We started doing ‘odd’ ride photos again (we were sleeping in one), but none of them turned out well enough to justify buying. We did Splash Mountain too. Sadly, it was the only time we did Splash Mountain the entire trip. Still as fun as ever.
I forgot to mention lunch. We did lunch today at Tony’s Town Square. We were both really looking forward to this place for one reason: they have garlic bread. I don’t know why, but garlic bread (proper garlic bread, not bread sticks or something like that) seems to be impossible to find anywhere in the USA. Seriously, we would go shopping in Syracuse, about an hour from the border, and not a single restaurant we ever went to had heard of garlic bread. So, when we found a single restaurant at WDW with garlic bread, we knew we had to go. I’m happy to report that the garlic bread didn’t dissappoint. It wasn’t the best garlic bread we’d ever had, but it was good, cheesy and well toasted. The rest of the meal, well, that’s a different story.
Both Rin and I had Coke to drink so nothing exciting there. I had the Pollo Parmigiana (Chicken Parmigiana), which wasn’t that great. The breading was soft as if it had been prepared earlier in the day then left to get soggy. The marinara tasted like Ragu, just like any old canned sauce. The mozzarella was probably the main redeeming quality of the dish. Melted nicely without getting brown and hard.
Rin had Baked Ziti. She just didn’t like it. Again, she thought the sauce was bland, just like out of a can (I should mention that Rin makes her own sauce, so that's usually our basis for whether or not a sauce is good).
We’re both huge fans of Italian food, and we both usually enjoy pasta of all kinds, but I have to say, we both walked away from the mains a bit dissappointed. Well, maybe more than a bit. We hoped that dessert would be a good end to the meal.
For dessert, I got the Ice Cream Bomb, which was vanilla and chocolate ice cream which chocolate sauce. I want to say there was something special about it, but that’s all I can think of. It was good, but nothing mind blowing, from what I can recall.
Rin had the Cheesecake. Apparently, it’s the Chef’s Signature Cheesecake. It came with a neat little syrup drawing of Lady and the Tramp, and Rin though that it was the best part of the meal.
Final Thoughts
Am I Glad I Ate Here? -Well... I’m going to have to go with no. The garlic bread was good, and I’m glad we had it, but it wasn’t enough to make the meal ‘worth it’ in our opinion.
Would I Go Back? - No. I think it’s getting to the point that when we’re in MK, we’ll be eating at a Resort. Or maybe Epcot.
Rating: Me - 4/10
Rin - 5/10
Cost - $63.42
Once we were done at MK, we headed to Jiko. Let me say to begin with, Jiko was always a close runner against Narcoossee’s for first place. After our experience with Narcoossee’s earlier in the trip, I was expecting Jiko to jump to the front of the pack. I have to say, my expectations were not met. They were blown out of the water. I have fond memories of this place, having eaten here for my birthday in 2009. The service was excellent, the food was delicious, and I got a card signed by each Cast Member in their native language (Rin got one of these too, since it was her birthday this time).
This time, as soon as we sat down, I was overwhelmed with service. Patty, our CM for the evening, placed Rin’s napkin in her lap for her (I had already put mine in my lap, so she didn’t have the chance for me), gave us some water, made sure we were settled, and wandered away. She immediately came back with hot washcloths for both of us, and I have to say, these were an amazing start to the meal. I don’t know why, but it just felt so good, being able to wipe my hands off and just press the cloth to my face. I wasn’t sure if even Victoria and Albert’s would be able to beat this service, and we were only a few minutes in to the meal.
After our cleanup, we were each brought a complimentary amuse bouche. I can’t for the life of me remember what was in it, other than quinoa. It was nice, but cold, and I’m not a big fan of cold appetizers. Although admittedly, it was a ‘salad’, and I’m not a big fan of them either. Rin really liked hers though, found it nice and refreshing. And it was a perfect size for an amuse bouche, basically just a spoon sized salad.
For starters, I had the Wild Boar Tenderloin. It was delicious. I’d had wild boar before, but only in sausage form, so this was kind of new. I have to say, even the mealie pap that came with it was good.
Rin started with the Chicken Flat Bread. She had a similar chicken flat bread last time we were at Jiko, and has thought about it ever since. This one didn’t have the apple and bbq sauce that the original had, but it was still quite good.
For our mains, we both went with duck. Seared Barbarie Duck Breast to be more specific. I'm not sure why I went with duck, since I’ve become less and less impressed with duck over the years. Nothing has been able to live up to the Duck Confit I had at Narcoossee’s in 2009. However, this was good. My biggest complaint about duck is that it’s always paired with orange, or some other kind of citrus. This bugs me. Happily, Jiko’s duck had no citrus, although I found the port emulsion to be a bit overpowering (for someone who doesn’t drink, port is probably the worst thing to pair a dish with...).
Rin, for the first time, got her duck cooked *not* well done. She can’t remember much about it, but she remembers that she liked it (again, I apologize for waiting so long to write these...).
Finally, dessert. I heard about this dessert from a TR that I read, and as soon as I’d heard about it, I knew it was what I wanted. It’s called One Last Cup, and is Tanzanian Chocolate and Kenya Coffee Mousse with cinnamon mascarpone, nutty chocolates and "hot chocolate." The whole thing was just so cute, and being able to play with my food a bit is always fun. It wasn’t the best dessert I’d ever had (partially since I’m not a fan of coffee), but the presentation alone was worth getting it.
Rin had the Creamy Madagascar Vanilla Cheesecake, but can’t remember anything about it.
Final Thoughts
Am I Glad I Ate Here? - Yes, yes, and again, yes. That is all.
Would I Go Back? - Yep. Like I said (or, I think I did...), it’s now taken Narcoossee’s spot as number one for me. Although I would likely try something other than the duck next time.
Rating: Me - 9/10
Rin - 9/10
Cost - $136.73
I think that once we finished up with supper, we wandered the grounds of AKL a bit, then headed back to the room for some sleep. Tomorrow would be an early morning.
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