In addition to the many Pixar Fest specialty snacks and beverages over at Disneyland Park, Disney California Adventure is featuring six marketplace booths for a mini Food and Wine Festival experience! While we didn’t try every single dish, we did try at least one item from every booth and frankly, they weren’t all winners.
Our first stop was Gusteau’s To-Go based on Ratatouille, where we decided to try the Ratatouille Pizzetta for $8.
This very cute mini pizza is topped with mozzarella, eggplant, squash, zucchini, tomato sauce drizzle, and a wedge of fresh camembert. Unfortunately, the portion size is pretty small and both the tomato sauce and crust tasted like a pre-made pizza. The wedge of camembert was a nice touch!
Our friend also ordered the Le Critique Cognac Sidecar for $17. This cocktail is made with Cognac, apricot liqueur, house-made fig syrup, strawberry puree, and lemon juice, topped with sparkling wine. This was one of the best drinks of the day and was both well-balanced and refreshing!
Next up and right across the way is Elemental Table based on Elemental. We decided to order all the Fire Town-inspired menu items.
The food menu here is pretty limited but we did try the “Smoke Fire Wood” BBQ-Spiced Impossible Chicken for $8.50. This is topped with hot mustard sauce, pickles, and charred onions. Ryno and I both enjoyed this dish, purely because we enjoy the spicy Impossible nuggets! However, $8.50 for three nuggets is pretty steep, and we wish there had been more sauce and more pickles to make it unique.
I also had to try the Exothermic Margarita, which is made with tequila, ancho Chile liqueur, passion fruit nectar, lime, and grapefruit juices and garnished with a hard rock candy stick for $17. This was a solid margarita that wasn’t overly sweet or acidic. I do wish the spice had come through a little more, but hey, who doesn’t love a candy treat with their margarita? I would get this one again!
In my humble opinion, the best theming has to be the Turning Red booth, 4*Town Fav*4*its. Love this sign!
Here, we tried the Red Panda Bao for $9, served with Chile-garlic sauce. The bao was quite large and had a good texture. We also loved that it was quite literally turning red! The problem is that the pork filling was bland, but in contrast, the Chile-garlic sauce was way spicy. You would think this would even out the dish, but unfortunately, the flavor wasn’t right. The sauce was so spicy that it overpowered the garlic flavor it needed.
Right outside Voyage of the Little Mermaid is The Spark booth, based on the movie Soul. Before heading out to Disneyland, I was pretty excited about this menu since it combined soul food and pretty creative cocktails.
We had to try The Supper Club Chicken & Potato Waffles made with peach cobbler sauce and cinnamon-herb crumble for $8. This dish, in theory, combined many of my favorite foods, but it was wild! Even though I knew it would be a unique pairing, unfortunately, the flavors did not blend well together. Even when getting a bite with everything on it, it tasted like the confused dish it truly is. But hey, it’s chicken and potato waffles, so it’s still not too bad, and the serving size made it one of the better values!
Ryno also tried the Dust Bowl Brewing Company Porch Punch Imperial Fruit IPA for $15.25. Despite being a small pour, it does have an ABV of 10.4%, so fair enough! He liked the refreshing sweetness complimented by the heaviness of being an IPA. This was definitely not as fruity as some of the other fruit punch beers we’ve tried at Disney food festivals!
Also at The Spark, I had The Great Beyond cocktail made with gin, maraschino liqueur, violet & blue curacao syrups, lemon juice, pear nectar, and topped with butterfly pea flower tea. I so badly wanted to enjoy this cocktail since it was made with a lot of great ingredients and was very pretty. However, the butterfly pea flower tea overpowered the drink and gave it a really strange taste. It’s great that these festival drinks are all full-size pours, but this is one we couldn’t finish.
We then tried to forget our disappointing cocktail by visiting Portorosso Pasta themed after Luca. We tried the Silenzio Limoncello! for $17 and made with limoncello, Amaretto & Aperol Liqueurs, blood orange syrup, lemonade, and oregano tea. This was another winning drink that was both unique and perfect for summer in California!
Hanger Management, inspired by Inside Out, is near Club Pixar and the drive-in Pixar shorts. It makes a lot of sense that the mac and cheese booth is right between these two!
We saw a lot of people getting a combination of both the Joyful and the Angry macaroni and cheese but we went all in with the Angry Red Hot Mac & Cheese topped with spicy cheese crunch for $8.50. Whoa this was spicy! Ryno enjoyed it but I literally couldn’t get through more than one bite! Both the cheese sauce and the Spicy Cheetos on top made for a completely red dish making us wonder where the macaroni was at first!
To wash it down, we had the Mood Stabilizer Mule made with bourbon, watermelon liqueur, candied orange & watermelon syrups, orange & lime juices, topped with ginger beer and watermelon candies for $17. This was another winning Pixar Fest drink! The watermelon was not overpowering and the bourbon gave it a nice punch.
Overall, we would likely pass on much of what we tried in favor of our usual favorites at DCA! Watch our full review, here and let us know in the comments what food you’ve enjoyed at Pixar Fest!
