Tiana is bring some spice to Disneyland.
Disneyland today revealed the menu it will be serving when Tiana's Palace opens in the old French Market space, starting September 7. In keeping with Tiana's story from "The Princess and the Frog," the food here is straight from New Orleans, sometimes literally.
While Disneyland released the menu to the public this morning, it hosted a preview tasting event for invited reported yesterday, so I got a chance to sample a few of the new dishes, as well as to hear from their creators.
"I think you're gonna find this table-service-quality food in a quick service manner," Michele Gendreau, Disneyland's Director, Food & Beverage Experience Integration, said of the Tiana's Palace menu and operation. "It allows for more of our guests to be able to experience it. It allows for people who know New Orleans food to say, 'oh man, this is authentic.' It allows for people who've never been to New Orleans to experience it, to taste it, [and] to learn about it."
So let's get to that menu. Of the items we previewed yesterday, the head of the class was the Beef Po'Boy - slow-cooked beef in gravy, on lightly toasted French bread, fully dressed with lettuce, tomato, pickles, and Duke's mayonnaise. It is served with red beans & Carolina Gold rice, with house-made pickles also on the side.
That bread is sourced from New Orleans, Chef John State said. And it is delightful - soft inside, with just the right crisp on the exterior, and a tang of flavor throughout. That provides the backbone for the sandwich, completed with the tasty beef and crisp veggies. I found the consistency of the red beans & rice a bit thinner than I'm used to with this dish, but there was no dilution of flavor here, with andouille sausage providing a nice kick. And don't sleep on these pickles, either.
"An extra layer of the steps that we go to to ensure these pickles really stand out is that we salt the pickles first," Chef State said. "Salting them first ensures that the water is extracted [from the cucumber] and maintains that crisp."
Chef State said that Disneyland is using two types of vinegar in the pickle brine, along with sugar, bell pepper, and other spices. A pickle can be - and often is - a throwaway plate filler, but I ate all of mine and would have gone for more. All together, the Tiana's Palace Po'Boy is now my new favorite thing to eat at Disneyland, my go-to order for a lunch or dinner in the park.
We did not get a chance to try the muffuletta - mortadella, salami, and rosemary ham, with provolone, cheddar, and a house-made olive relish on toasted sesame seed bread, also from New Orleans. It's served with the same red beans & rice and pickles sides as the Po'Boy, so it's first on my to-try list when Tiana's Palace opens next month.
My next-favorite dish we sampled was the House Gumbo, with a deeply dark roux supporting roasted chicken, andouille, and more of that rice. This, along with the Gulf Shrimp and Grits, sparked a bit of a debate within the room about Disneyland's use of New Orleans spices in the new Tiana's Palace menu and how Disneyland guests might react to that change from the less-spicy versions of some of these dishes long served at the old French Market.
Disneyland is using both Tabasco and Crystal hot sauces in its Tiana's Palace dishes. Let me state for the record that I stand 100% on Team Crystal. I have very low tolerance for spicy food (gastroesophageal reflux sufferers, unite!), but I do love the taste of roasted peppers. Crystal hits that note for me, while Tabasco just screeches across my palate with a sting of vinegar.
Disney is using a 50/50 blend of the two on the Gumbo, while it's Tabasco driving the heat in the Creole sauce coasting the Gulf shrimp on the grits. So I found the shrimp hotter than the Gumbo, while others in the room felt the opposite. The roux on the Gumbo we sampled was the darkest I've ever seen, giving this a rich, almost chocolate-like flavor underneath the spices, which also may have helped balance the heat for me.
Tiana's Palace also will serve a plant-based 7 Greens Gumbo, including collard greens, mustard greens, spinach, and Swiss chard, along with okra. But there's no dark roux base here, and it's topped with roasted yams and sweet potatoes, so there are a slew of competing flavors that never came together as a unique whole, as with the House Gumbo. It left me longing for a nice bowl of collards, but the way I would want them would not satisfy Disney's need for a plant-based dish here.
And just let me note this - with a new menu that's got grits and collards and after that tropical storm blowing through earlier this week, Disneyland is feeling more like Florida now than the Florida parks are.
The other entree on menu, which we did not sample, was a Cajun-spiced half chicken, basted in a house-made barbecue sauce made with onions, garlic, three types of chilies - fresh and dried, plus cloves, coriander, molasses, chicory cold brew, and tomato for color, Chef State said. It's served with a square slice of baked macaroni and cheese as well as coleslaw.
Before eating any of this, though, we started our tasting with dessert, per Tiana's wishes. And that is a Filled Beignet, jammed with Lemon Ice Box Pie filling and topped with a lemon glaze.
This is a good beignet. I liked it better than the Mickey Beignets that will continue to be served at the Mint Julep Bar next door. But the Lemon Ice Box Pie filling and the glaze were too much sugar and lemon for me. The glaze alone would have given this a nice extra note of flavor. The filling just gilds the lily to the point where I didn't want to finish it. But if you're a fan of lemon pie filling or lemon custard, I suspect that you would love this, even if I didn't.
Tiana's Palace also will serve a Chicory Cold Brew from Joffrey's Coffee [$5.49], topped with sweet cream and a cane syrup sourced from New Orleans. Chicory is a New Orleans tradition in coffee, originally added as an extender, but many people grew to love the unique flavor hit it added. If you didn't grow up with that, you might not be a fan, but the cream and the cane syrup hit my palate harder than the chicory, anyway.
Tiana's Palace opens on September 7 in New Orleans Square. Mobile Order will be available. And sometime next year, the Tiana's Foods cooperative opens its biggest location yet, when Tiana's Bayou Adventure debuts as the replacement for Splash Mountain.
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Glaze on a beignet? No thanks...Powdered sugar ONLY, or maybe combined with a light drizzle (or side cup) of caramel like they serve at Café Du Monde.
I applaud Disney for trying to stay authentic with these dishes, but how long will they maintain their "bite" before they're watered-down for the masses (ala Flo's)? I do question the application of mayo on a po boy where the meat is already simmered and covered in gravy - it puts a lot of stress on the roll. Mayo can add moisture to otherwise dry beef, but if the meat is soaking in gravy with extra ladled on top, I doubt that even Duke's Mayo will really add much to the dish. Personally, I'd prefer to see this sandwich plain with perhaps a slice of melted swiss and/or gouda.
I assume that's a sample portion of shrimp and grits, because I wouldn't pay more than $10 for a bowl that size with what appears to be no more than 5 size 40 shrimp.
Are there any veggies served with the gumbo? That's a decent portion of pulled chicken and sliced sausage, but there should be some sliced peppers, okra, or diced tomatoes served with that.
I have updated with photos of our tasting samples, so you can see any differences between those and what Disney set up on the hero table for us to shoot.
And there were some veggies, including peppers and okra, in the gumbo, though they were pretty well cooked down in the roux.
As for the roll on the po'boy, I do not intend to allow that sandwich to sit long enough to get soggy before I devour it. Now, in a quick-serve, slide-tray environment such as Tiana's, the question is whether the sandwiches will be assembled to order or will be sitting for a while before you pick it up. That could determine how well these po'boys hold up.
Also, the chef said that other types of po'boys may come to the menu in the future. "We've got a lot in the vault," he said.
It does look really appetizing & huge kudos for presentaion , but I do echo Russell's thoughts about the longevity of the menu. I was a huge fan of Flo's original menu, but guests didn't bite, so it changed into more standard theme park fare.
It would be great if the menu could be successful, as it adds variety to the food offerings at the park. I applaud them for actually keeping it authentically New Orleans.
I do think the beef po boy sandwich may end up being a Disney fave. The beignet seems like it would be cool for splitting. A smaller portion size may just hit the spot!
Can’t wait to hear someone’s take on the muffaletta. In my opinon, it is to the sandwich what the brisket is to barbecue. Which is to say don’t even attempt it unless you’re planning on knocking it right out of the park. The bread has the right look, so I’m optimistic the rest will hold up too.
Looks delicious...should we have a countdown on the site to when pizza and fries will show up? lol
And yet again the single vegetarian entree comes with zero protein. I love greens and I love sweet potatoes, but without any protein you'll be hungry again in a flash. it's like they go out of their way sometimes to avoid putting protein in veggie dishes, and it would have been so easy with this dish.
And no sandwich for the non-meat crew. Same old story. Over consumption of meat is helping to destory our planet, but sure, let's lean heavy on the meat dishes, smart call.
To me, this looks like a solid menu that is thematically appropriate but might be a bit too upscale for a counter service eatery in a theme park. As nice as the dishes look here, I worry about inconsistency when they need to be rapidly mass produced in order to keep the lines moving, particularly with the non-sandwich offerings. At $15-20, entrees also seem a bit pricier than typical for counter service elsewhere at the resort, which generally seems to run $13-16 at most locations. I'm with several others above...Tiana's Palace will probably serve this menu for a year or two, then revert to something in the same vein but simpler akin to the French Market's offerings.
@thecolonel
Starchy vegetables and fiber packed vegetables leave u hungry after consumption?
Yeah, you ever eat just veggies and sweet potatoes? You're hungry in a flash, vegetarians need protein too.
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Mmm, the muff sandwich sounds delish.