I am SO excited!! Dessert!!!
Here’s the final post in our series based on the Food Network’s (very cool) show, The Best Thing I Ever Ate. As many of you know, due to some keen suggestions from readers we’re splitting our series up into different sections: breakfast, appetizers & side dishes, snacks & drinks, entrees (lunch & dinner), and desserts.
Today, we’re finallly taking a look at desserts! I’ve done my favorite brand of informal polling (i.e. posted questions on twitter and facebook 😉 ) to find out others’ experiences of the “Best Thing They Ever Ate” in Disney parks and resorts.
The following are the answers received from our readers about their favorite desserts! If your favorites aren’t here, please add them in the comments section below!
Yak and Yeti Cream Cheese and Pineapple Fried Won-tons: While I haven’t had the pleasure of trying these myself, you can bet Yak and Yeti is the first place I’m going when I arrive in September! (No kidding…it’s my first ADR…even before Liberty Tree Tavern lunch, and you guys KNOW how we feel about Liberty Tree Tavern lunch!)
Yak and Yeti Fried Cream Cheese Wontons.
Dole Whip: What better dessert than the Dole Whip!? This soft-serve loveliness won’t set your budget back that much — caloric OR financial! Better yet, you can get them in Disney World AND Disneyland!
Dole Whip Float!
Deep Fried Oreos: We can thank the legendary Chef TJ for these! Chef TJ spent a lot of time at Boma, and has since moved over to ‘Ohana (I’ve heard he’s moved to the Grand Floridian — can anyone confirm?), but he’s been known to create a plate full of delectable fried Oreos for many a Disney guest, myself included! Basically, these are simply Oreo cookies dipped in batter and fried so they’re warm and ooey-gooey inside. When we received ours one night many years ago at Boma, Chef TJ told us they were an old African recipe. 😉 Unfortunately, I don’t have a pic of these. If you’ve got one out there, send it along and we’ll post it!
Boma Zebra Domes: Nope, they’re not made of Zebra, I promise, but they do resemble the distinctive markings you see on these graceful African animals. Zebra domes are served at the Animal Kingdom Lodge’s Boma restaurant, and have been making a stir ever since their first appearance. With the main ingredient list including espresso, heavy cream, and Kahlua, you can see how decadent these taste and how addictive they are!
Animal Kingdom Lodge Zebra Domes.
Hollywood Brown Derby Grapefruit Cake: A famous confection from Hollywood’s glamorous past, the grapefruit cake was invented at the original Hollywood Brown Derby and has been recreated in the most recent Hollywood Brown Derby restaurant at Disney World’s Hollywood Studios. The story behind the cake was that it was made to fulfill a request for a “healthy” dessert by one of Hollywood’s renowned gossip columnists; at the time, the grapefruit diet craze was at its peak! The cake, with its cream cheese frosting and grapefruit sauce, has elements of tangy, sweet, and bitter, so it’s definitely a flavor symphony!
Grapefruit Cake!
Ghirardelli Gold Rush Sundae: This incredible ice cream sundae event can be found at Disney World’s Downtown Disney Ghirardelli shop. The sundae is made with vanilla ice cream, hot fudge, and melted peanut butter, and its topped with whipped cream, chopped almonds, and a cherry. If you like this, you’ll love the No Way Jose at Beaches and Cream — another confection created with melted peanut butter and hot fudge!
UPDATE: Please note that the Gold Rush Sundae is no longer being served at Ghirardelli’s as of March 2015.
Gold Rush Peanut Butter Sundae at Ghirardelli.
‘Ohana Bananas Foster Bread Pudding: This gorgeous dessert is worth the price of the meal. It’s served at the Polynesian Resort’s ‘Ohana“>’Ohana restaurant and comes along with an all-you-can-eat price, which means you can keep asking for more (yay!). The dish begins with a moderately sweet bread pudding with a big scoop of vanilla ice cream on top, but the real magic begins when you pour the little jug of bananas foster caramel sauce over the top. Outstanding, and simply one of my favorite desserts in Disney World.
Bananas Foster Bread Pudding at ‘Ohana.
Le Cellier Maple Creme Brulee: I’m not sure we can have a Best Of list that Le Cellier doesn’t feature prominently in! This time, a reader favorite is the Maple Creme Brulee. This creamy, indulgent dessert has a hint of maple syrup — one of Canada’s specialty ingredients, of course — but the sweetness isn’t overwhelming at all. If you’re a creme brulee lover, please, please try this!
Maple Crème Brûlée.
Boulangerie Patisserie Napoleon: Epcot’s Boulangerie Patisserie won our Bakery Throw Down, so of course it would get a mention from our readers in the Best Thing I Ever Ate series! These Napoleons are light, airy, and oh-so-decadent! But Napoleon pastry is mostly air…and whipped cream is mostly air…and all that air has to cut down on the actual calories, right?
New version of the Napoleon at Les Halles Boulangerie Patisserie.
Liberty Tree Tavern Ooey Gooey Toffee Cake: Another of my favorite desserts makes the cut! This fantabulous Liberty Tree Tavern concoction of vanilla cake, chocolate chips, caramel sauce, and ice cream seems like the easiest thing in the world, but the taste will have you craving more as soon as you walk out the door. It is an incredible dessert. I can’t say enough about this one. Easy, simple, but incredible.
Ooey Gooey Toffee Cake at Liberty Tree Tavern in Magic Kingdom.
Tutto Italia Profiteroles: If you put ice cream into pastry and cover it with chocolate sauce, I’m pretty much a happy AJ, and apparently I have a few fellow profiterole fans out there! These Tutto Italia specialties have an incredible taste and texture — the melting ice cream slowly seeps into the pastry, and when you scoop it all up with the chocolate it’s just amazing. They have a similar item on the menu at Les Chefs de France. Both dishes are highly recommended.
Profiteroles at Les Chefs de France.
Artist Point Berry Cobbler: This dessert has had several incarnations as the different chefs move in and out of the kitchen at Wilderness Lodge’s Artist Point, but almost every version has been a hit with guests. A very simple dish, the dessert usually consists of a heavy, cakey blueberry cobbler covered with seasonal berries like blueberries, raspberries, and blackberries and garnished with huckleberry ice cream. To read more and see my very own homemade version of the cobbler, check out this guest post I did over at Cookie Madness.net.
Berry Cobbler
Sunshine Seasons Strawberry Shortcake: Since I started writing the Disney Food Blog I haven’t stopped hearing about this Strawberry Shortcake at Sunshine Seasons in Epcot’s The Land pavilion! I’ve never tried it, but I can’t wait to dig into what looks like an incredible dessert/snack/breakfast… 😉
Strawberry Shortcake at Sunshine Seasons.
Now, this is by no means an exhaustive list of the delicious desserts available in Disney restaurants and counter-service spots — it’s just a snap-shot list from a few of our readers! If you didn’t get a chance to chime in with your favorite, please add to the list in our comments section below! Have you had a not-to-be-missed dessert in Disney? Let us know your “Best Thing I Ever Ate in Disney!”
For other posts in this series, check out these links:
The Five Best Things I Ate in Disneyland
The Best Thing I Ever Ate at Disney!: Breakfast
The Best Thing I Ever Ate at Disney!: Appetizers and Side Dishes
The Best Thing I Ever Ate at Disney!: Snacks & Drinks
The Best Thing I Ever Ate at Disney!: Entrees
Photo Credits — All photos were submitted to the Disney Food Blog Flickr Pool:
Berry Cobbler courtesy C. Relacion
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Seriously, you have to add the amazing tiramisu served at Via Napoli (in Epcot’s Italy Pavilion). Quite possibly the best I’ve had anywhere. It really is that good.
The best dessert ever was at Narcoossee’s, the almond encrusted cheesecake. Swore we would get back just for the dessert but will have to wait until November 2012. Illuminations, great service, added up to great romance for 30th anniversary dinner in 2010. I can’t wait to eat here again.
The best Dessert I had on my January trip was the Pistachio Creme Brulee @ Tonys in MK. I am a Creme Brulee NUT but pistachio not so much. I said what the heck were in Disney..I was in love with this! Honestly if there weren’t other families around I would have easily used my finger to clean the ramekin of this goodness.
Oh and I know Tony’s gets a bad rap alot of the time but our lunch was absolutely wonderful and worth a TS credit!
Thanks for sharing these. I am going to WDW in 2 weeks and I plan on trying some (most) of these desserts.
Anything from the Karamell-Kuche in epcot.
I agree with Sharon; the almond encrusted cheescake at Narcoosies is the absolute best dessert I have ever eaten. We always go back for a piece, every time we go to Disney. Even if we aren’t eating there on a particular visit (we go often), we order it to go. It is absolutely that good!
My favorite has to be the School Bread from Norway. It’s very simple, but that’s how I like my desserts.
I would love to try the creme brulee, napoleon, grapefuit cake, bread pudding, and gold rush ice cream sundae!
Oreo bonbons at Cape May Cafe are amazing!
the chocolate cake in the round dishes as part of the quick service meals is sooo fudgey and chocolatey- i love it!
The Kona Kone from Kona Cafe at The Polynesian is by far one of the best desserts I’ve ever eaten. The layers, ice cream, cotton candy, and syrup and it’s sheer size is just amazing!
The BEST EVER dessert I’ve had at WDW is, ‘Ohana Bananas Foster Bread Pudding. We go to Ohana every time we visit just so I can have OBFBP. One of my wonderful ‘Cousins’ even allowed me to have dessert first, then dinner and then a second round of OBFBP to put me over the top… what a sugar-dream experience!
The best dessert I have had at Disney (& possibly anywhere) was the Galaktobouriko at Kouzzina at Disney’s Boardwalk. The overall meal was great but this was amazing! It’a vanilla custard baked in phyllo dough it’s not super heavy and it’s got the most amazing vanilla flavor. I wish I could get it by mail!
After many trips to Walt Disney World, the one dessert that I absolutely loved was the chocolate lava cake at Liberty Tree Tavern in Magic Kingdom. It must have been 2005 or maybe 2004 that I had this. When I returned a year or so later, it was no longer on the menu. The cake with ice cream was soooo good and then in the middle of the cake, warm chocolate started oozing out. It was during the 1st free dinning plan offer and I was stuffed from the meal, but forced every bite of that dessert in. Can we petition that they bring it back? 🙂
The Oreo Bon Bons at Cape May are the stuff dreams are made of! They are always one of the highlights of every trip we take to Disney.
Oh definitely the bread and butter pudding at Raglan Road. I could eat ten of those.
My trio of favorites has to be: the doh-bar donut battered snickers at Cooke’s of Dublin, the carrot cake cookie at Writer’s Stop in DHS and the butterfinger cupcake at Starring Rolls.
Omg! Just SEEING the berry cobbler from Artist Point makes me drool – had that in January – Yumyumyumyumyumyumyum!!! 🙂
OOOOH, yumm….ok, Berry Cobbler from Artist Point, Ooey Gooey Toffee Cake, Strawberry Lemon Tart from Narcoossee’s, Grapefruit Cake from Brown Derby all tasty!
I do really enjoy the maple creme brulee at Le Cellier, BUT I have to say there is one creme brulee that just sadly gets overshadowed by another dessert at the restaurant. The Double Vanilla Bean Creme Brulee at Hollywood Brown Derby. Now I know most people love the grapefruit cake, but honestly we have NEVER been disappointed in this creme brulee. This one is the #1 creme brulee in our books (we’ve had a lot of them and this tops our list of creme brulees period), #2 would be the maple creme brulee. We agree both are amazing, but HBD wins out by just a little bit.
How I miss the Boma CocoMisu. Coconut flavored tiramisu with toasted coconut on top? HEAVENLY. Also very labor-intensive for home cooks, even with the recipe they provided. Sad! The stuff was creamy and Kahlua-y and coconut-y and fabulous. Dear departed dessert.
The Chocolate Wave at Coral Reef is excellent and the chocolate cheesecake at the Whispering Canyon Café at Wilderness Lodge is delicious as well!
The fried cream cheese wontons really are good! We liked the mango pie better, though. Very light, fruity, and delicious!
Starring Roles’ napoleon is freaking amazing! Awesome crispiness, perfect amount of cream, and over all awesome.
Not on your list, but the Boston cream parfait at 50’s Prime Time Cafe is surprisingly good! It’s not too sweet, and has just enough chocolate to satisfy all my dessert cravings!
YES, Zebra Domes ARE worth all the hype! We were staying at Pop Century resort, and made the journey to Animal Kingdom Lodge just to try them. First of all, the hotel is beautiful and we got lots of picture. Second, ahhhh zebra domes!! Definitely a must try!
Le Cellier’s maple creme brulee IS good, too! It’s only the second Disney creme brulee I’ve had (first being Blue Bayou’s vanilla creme brulee, which I do like better), but the maple flavor is subtle and not too sweet, as one may expect. I love the little chocolate “straw” it comes with too!
Next visit, I will be sure to try the berry cobbler, profiteroles, and other things I wasn’t able to do on this trip.
The chocolate creme brulee at Fultons is wonderful. It is the perfect combination of fudge brownie flavor with creme brulee texture.
Have to agree about Ohanas banana foster bread pudding. Rose & Crown’s Sticky Toffee Pudding is also one of my favorites. But there are sooooo many good desserts at WDW you can’t pick just one.
Pop Century’s Tie Dyed cheesecake is really fantastic! Maybe not everyone’s favorite but it is my favorite cold treat after a lot of walking done! I love the Ohana bread pudding just as much!
I’ve never had a dessert as good as the bread pudding at Raglan Road.
Hollywood Studios Prime Time Cafes warm apple crisp with vanilla ice cream reminds me of my childhood at grandmas house. Soooo good!
I hate that these are all recycled posts from years ago..
“THE CRONUT ALAMODE”. Just inside the World Showcase at Epcot. Towards Canada. If you like Hot, Soft Donuts(croissant )with Ice Cream YOU WILL LOVE THIS. MUST TRY.
What about the kitchen sink at beaches and cream? Amazing ice cream dessert! Huge and famous from man vs food?
Both of my favorites ended up on here! The dole whip and the Napoleons! They’re amazing. I’m going to look into the others on my next trip. As an honorable mention, the tiramisu at Tony’s in Magic Kingdom is the best tiramisu I’ve ever had.
Melissa — Thanks for your feedback! We don’t tend to “re-cover” things on the blog very often because we’re always trying to showcase new and updated items for folks planning their trips to the parks; so if we’ve already put something on the blog, many people won’t ever read about it unless they read all 4,000 posts we’ve done. These posts allow us to showcase some of our favorites again for people who are new to the blog or who are simply looking for all the best items in a category in one place. Also, just because we reviewed the item a while back doesn’t mean it isn’t still simply amazing to eat today. We re-sample everything quite regularly — especially our favorites — to make sure they’re still up to snuff. 😀 Hope that helps you to understand our process. We’re publishing at least 12 posts per week showcasing all of the new and updated menu items we’re finding at Disney World and Disneyland, and it’s our goal to not only let you know about everything new and noteworthy in Disney World and Disneyland on the food scene, but also to remind you of must-have cult favorites and hidden gems so you don’t forget about them on your trip.
Tia — That tiramisu is KILLER!! I love it, too, and I’m not a big tiramisu fan!
Katy — It IS amazing! We’re including primarily single serving size desserts here, but that one is a great option for a family to have together! (Or, I guess in the case of Man v. Food, it IS single serving ;-D)
Troy — YES!! Love that thing 😀
Barb – I always get that!!
Erin R. — It IS wonderful, isn’t it!?
Chris — It’s so much fun! I wish they still served it in wedges, though.
I used to love the Hercules ice cream bars at Hollywood Studios – then MGM. They were sold at the carts and were vanilla ice cream with caramel and dipped in chocolate. LOVED them. I keep hoping they will return, named as some other character.
I have to add the “Out of this World Turtle Cheesecake” at Sci-Fi Dine in Theatre at Hollywood Studios and the “Sticky Toffee Pudding” at Rose & Crown Pub in the United Kingdom Pavilion at EPCOT. So good I just want to eat there for these desserts.
Macaroon ice cream sandwich from Kayla’s Cake in downtown Disney, The Macaroon are great too! Mickey chocolate cover ice cream bar is The Best Dark chocolate ever!
The bread pudding at Raglan Road is one the best desserts I’ve ever had anywhere!