Winnie the Pooh and Friends are carvorting at a socially safe distance elsewhere, but the “Friendship Day Celebrashun” is back at Magic Kingdom’s Crystal Palace restaurant, which reopened in December after a long pandemic-related hiatus.
We stopped in for lunch recently to see if, without the character interactions, this would be a good place to get a low-key sit-down meal at the Magic Kingdom.
Before the pandemic, Crystal Palace was home to Winnie the Pooh and Friends, where they were always in the throes of a “Friendship Day Celebrashun,” as the sweetly misspelled sign announced. Pooh, Tigger, Piglet and Eeyore would make their way around the restaurant, visiting every table and lingering with their friends. Highlights of the popular buffet meal included chicken fingers and mac and cheese. (Was there something else on the buffet? I’m not sure, because I could never tear myself away from the kiddie section. It was YUM.)
The “celebrashun” continues, but the only characters you see are the Winnie the Pooh topiaries in the restaurant’s entryway. The meal is now what I would consider modified family-style — the appetizer and dessert are served for the table to share, while each person orders their own entree.
The two of us were seated side-by-side on a banquet at a table for four. We saw this happen at other tables as well, even with larger parties. This was to give us the required six feet of distance from the next table.
The meal starts with a basket of homestyle buttermilk and cheddar bacon biscuits, served with three spreads: honey butter, caramelized onion butter and hot pepper jelly. This was a highlight of the meal for me; if I had had a backpack, I might have surreptitiously filled it up with these fluffy, warm biscuits. But there wasn’t time for that: The seasonal salad followed quickly. I found it an odd choice for a winter salad: greens with tomato and watermelon, blue cheese, candied walnuts and hot pepper jelly vinaigrette. Watermelon especially doesn’t exactly scream winter to me, and certainly it wasn’t as sweet and flavorful as it might be in July.
Entree choices include fried chicken, roasted prime rib of beef, brown sugar-glazed bone-in pork chop, and blackened catfish and shrimp. The veggie option is southern-fried cauliflower. Kids can choose one entree from a menu that includes roasted chicken leg, mac and cheese, seared catfish, and roasted prime rib. Each meal comes with two sides, and kids can choose from roasted potatoes, cheddar grits, green beans, collard greens, seasonal fruit and steamed carrots.
I opted to try the cauliflower; I remember fondly a cauliflower steak I had at a restaurant in Jersey City, N.J., years ago, so I thought I’d give it a whirl. The southern fried treatment was a nice touch, and it was tasty, but the cauliflower was dwarfed by a mountain of green beans on the plate. My husband ordered the fried chicken, which was served with mac and cheese and collard greens. It was fine but paled in comparison to the fried chicken at Chef Art Smith’s Homecomin’ over at Disney Springs. The mac and cheese was a highlight of the meal.
Finally, dessert also is served family style — a plate of sweets, including fritters (small donuts) with powdered sugar and chocolate dipping sauce; banana cream pie, hummingbird cake, and a “honey of a cupcake.”
Overall, we found ourselves saying “it’s fine” a lot. It’s also fast — if you’re looking for a leisurely meal, this is not it. They’re highly motivated to get you in and out of there in a hurry.
Magic Kingdom has always been my least-favorite park for sit-down meals, even with the ever-popular Cinderella’s Royal Table and Beauty and the Beast restaurants. In the summer, it also happens to be the park where I most need a midday break. I was hoping Crystal Palace would help fill that gap, at least until character dining eventually returns. But I don’t feel the desire to go back. I’ll stick with the Skipper Canteen, home of the not-so-secret Brazilian cheese bread and the “tastes like chicken” (because it is).
