A cookie bar, a stellar view, and no park ticket required?! Disney World’s newest restaurant sounds like a dream come true!

We’ve been not-so-patiently waiting for Summer House on the Lake to open in Disney Springs ever since it was first announced, and with each update and sneak peek, we got more and more excited. But now, the restaurant is FINALLY open, and I stopped by on the first day to check it out for lunch! Should you visit Summer House on the Lake during your next vacation? I’m here to give you a full review.

Atmosphere

Summer House on the Lake is located in the West Side section of Disney Springs, across from Salt & Straw. It has a prime location right on the Sassagoula River.

When you arrive at the restaurant, those with a reservation can check in at the podium outside. From there, you’ll be directed indoors to be seated.

There are multiple dining areas throughout the restaurant. In the front, you’ll find an outdoor patio, a sunroom with a few high-top tables, and one of the two bars.

This section is open to the outside, as you can walk directly out onto the patio.

The main dining room is situated toward the back of the restaurant, and it’s MASSIVE. It’s laden with booths and tables, and decorated with lots of greenery and natural light.

Seriously, this room is BEAUTIFUL.

There’s a second bar in this section of the restaurant. Bar seating is first-come, first-serve — you can inquire at the podium outside.

And finally, there’s the back porch. This spot definitely has the best view!

I imagine sitting out here would be absolutely lovely on a day with nice weather. But seeing as it was windy, I opted to sit inside.

The other main part of the restaurant is the highly-anticipated Cookie Bar! Here, you don’t need a reservation — you can simply walk up and wait in line at the counter. (And even on opening day, there wasn’t a line!)

There were more than 15 different treats to choose from, many of them various flavors of large cookies.

This section of the restaurant is also home to the merchandise display. You can buy Summer House items like sunglasses, shirts, bottles, and more!

Now that you’ve got the full tour, let’s get on with the review!

Menu

So what can you order at Summer House? Well, the restaurant is a chain that’s California-based, and you’ll see those tastes evident in many of the menu items. The lunch/dinner menu begins with a selection of starters, including Signature Guacamole, Potato Salad Deviled Eggs, Truffle Fries, and Cheesy Dream Puffs. 

The Veggies and Raw & Chilled sections can also be counted as “starters” because they’re smaller portions than the entrees on the menu.

Once you’re ready to dig into the main part of your meal, they have a menu of salads, as well as sandwiches, tacos, pasta, pizza, and Summer Comfort. Prices for the entrees range from $16.95-$52.95, so they cover a wide variety of budgets.

The Kids Menu has several options for your little ones, from grilled cheese to pasta to breakfast to quesadillas.

And of course, there are desserts available! There are a few options on the main menu including Gooey Lemon Cake and 7 Layer Chocolate Cake.

However, the big draw is The Cookie Bar, and their flavors will change from day to day. When I was waiting outside the restaurant, an employee handed me a QR code with the flavor options for opening day. Here’s what was available.

There were more than a dozen types of cookies, as well as some dessert bars and crispy treats.

You’ve certainly got options for a sweet tooth!

Last but not least, there are plenty of beverages to choose from at Summer House. They’ve got a number of spritzes and specialty cocktails, as well as some zero-proof choices.

Now that we’ve covered the extensive menu, let’s actually start eating!

Eats

I began my meal by ordering one of the zero proof mocktails — the Strawberry Fields. It’s made with strawberry, sage, and lavender and costs $9.

It was bubbly like soda water, and had a strong strawberry flavor. It wasn’t very sweet until I got to the bottom of the glass, but it was nice and refreshing.

For appetizers, I picked up two choices — the Potato Salad Deviled Eggs and the Signature Guacamole.

The Potato Salad Deviled Eggs are $9.95 and come from the Slagel Family Farm. You get three eggs with your order, and instead of being filled with the traditional deviled egg filling, they’re filled with potato salad! If you’ve made both items, you know that the base ingredients are actually quite similar.

These were absolutely AMAZING. As an avid deviled egg fan and lover of all things potato, it was the perfect combination for me. They were fresh and bright with a little crunch from the relish — the perfect size to pop in your mouth and eat in one bite. You could definitely taste the potato, but it was blended into the mix really well. My one complaint is that you only get three half-eggs with your order. The serving size is pretty small for the price.

The Signature Guacamole is a larger appetizer, but it comes with a larger price tag of $16.95. It’s served with house-made tortilla chips, pico de gallo, charred tomato salsa, and habanero verde.

The guacamole itself was fresh and bright with a strong avocado flavor, but also a hint of lime and cilantro. There was a decent portion of it. The chips were nice and crunchy with ample salt — some of the better restaurant tortilla chips I’ve had, actually!

For the accompaniments, the pico de gallo was very light and bright from the tomatoes. There are some great textures in here, and it worked well when mixed with the guac.

The charred tomato salsa was earthier with a deep, rich flavor. It has a small amount of heat on the back end.

And finally, the habanero verde was the spiciest of the three, with a medium-level heat. It was still pretty bright, but packs a little bit of punch.

Now it’s time for the entrees! My second round included Ahi Tuna Tostadas and Our Famous Herbed Chicken Breast Paillard.

The Ahi Tuna Tostadas more accurately fit in the “starters” category because they’re served in small, bite-sized portions. They’re a bit pricier than the starters though at $18.95. They’re topped with hass avocado and Thai chili on a crispy corn tortilla.

I wasn’t too eager to try tuna with watermelon, but these blew me away! I was shocked at how well the two flavors worked together to create a watery (but not in a bad way) and light flavor. The avocado added some creaminess, while the chili gave everything the smallest hint of spice. These would be great for people with an adventurous palette!

For my true entree, I got Our Famous Herbed Chicken Breast Paillard, which turned out to be shaped kind of like the United States. (You see that, right? It’s not just me?!) It’s available for $21.95 and comes with arugula salad on the side — which was really just a lot of arugula.

The chicken was absolutely delicious and I totally understand why they’re famous for it! It was moist and herbaceous with a little bit of char on the outside that I loved. It comes with a lemon on the side, and I squeezed some on top to add a tart, fruity flavor. The lemon, arugula, and chicken in one bite was the way to go.

My main problem with this dish is the portion size. For more than $20, I would expect a side other than just arugula. There was a decent amount of chicken (it looks huge once it’s pounded flat), but someone with a large appetite or a person who was ONLY ordering an entree might be a bit disappointed.

Finally, we make it to dessert! I was jumping at the chance to try that cookie bar, and I found out that you can order treats from The Cookie Bar straight to your table. Simply tell your server your order!

I got a stack of six treats to try, starting with the Krispy Chocolate Chip Cookie for $5.45. It’s a chocolate chip cookie topped with pieces of their brown butter Rice Krispy treats.

This one was incredibly soft and had decent-sized chunks of chocolate throughout. The crispy treat on top was VERY sweet and added a fun textural element. It ended up being one of my favorite cookies!

The other cookie that I really loved was the Lemon Cookie for $4.95. It’s a lemon-flavored cookie covered in icing.

Of all the cookies, this was the softest, so soft that I had a hard time holding it without it breaking in half. It has a very tart, yet sweet, lemon flavor that was refreshing. 

But from there, things went a little bit downhill with the cookies. My next favorite was the Pinky Cookie for $5.45, but it doesn’t quite compare to the other two. It’s a sugar cookie base with pink strawberry frosting and rainbow sprinkles.

This one was a mess to eat! The strawberry frosting gets everywhere and stained my hands a bit. It has more of an artificial strawberry flavor to it that’s not bad, but not the best either. The sugar cookie base wasn’t very exciting — just a pretty typical sugar cookie, even though it was fairly soft.

The Fudge Bomb Cookie was $5.45. It’s essentially a sugar cookie topped with fudge icing. It was one of the treats I was most excited about (being a chocolate lover), but it let me down a bit!

Once again, that sugar cookie base isn’t really anything to write home about. Very similar to something you could make yourself. The fudge icing was really fudgy and had a good chocolate flavor, but it’s very rich! I was hoping for something like a fudge center in the middle of this cookie.

The last cookie I had was the Birthday Cake Cookie for $4.95. It’s just a simple sugar cookie with rainbow sprinkles.

I chose this one mostly for the colorful look of it, and the hope that it would actually taste like cake. There’s a bit of vanilla flavoring in the sugar cookie on this one, but not enough to save it. Of the cookies I tried, I think this one ranks at the bottom. It was just like one of those sprinkled cookies you could buy at your local grocery store, except bigger. Not quite what I was expecting from a self-proclaimed “birthday cake cookie.”

However, there was one thing that SAVED the reputation of The Cookie Bar for me! They have a Blondie available for $4.95 and it was STELLAR.

This was by FAR the best dessert I had. It was sweet and had a toffee-like flavor. Gooey and soft, it broke apart easily and had the slightest bit of chew. I would stop by to get this again and again!

UPDATE: Another reporter visited Summer House On the Lake and had a different experience with the Cookie Bar. They got the Lemon cookie, the Double Chocolate Cloud cookie, and the Orange Dreamsicle cookie, and they really enjoyed all three! The Lemon and Orange ones were light, sweet, and full of flavor, and that chocolate one was like a rich, decadent brownie just in cookie form.

Your mileage may vary at this spot, but don’t count it out! If you prefer these kinds of huge but flat cookies, you’ll probably like these cookies even MORE than the ones at Gideon’s Bakehouse.

That’s a wrap on everything I ate — so how does Summer House on the Lake fare?

Overall

There are quite a few important points to discuss here. Let’s start with the savory food! The appetizers and entree that I had were all quite good. I was particularly impressed by the tostadas and the deviled eggs, flavor-wise. You can tell that they put care into developing recipes for the items on the main menu.

The main complaint you may have with the food at the restaurant is the portion size versus the price point. It’s not exactly cheap to eat here, and you don’t get the larger servings that you might get at other places in Disney Springs (*cough cough* Homecomin‘). If you’ve got a big appetite, you might want to consider ordering a starter or getting dessert afterward.

The service here was really great, and I had a very attentive server! However, I could tell that they were still working out some opening-day kinks. Food was being delivered to the wrong tables and it took a while to receive my check because they were having issues adding the Annual Passholder discount. Even with that delay, this was a LONG meal. The people sitting next to me (who weren’t taking photos of everything they ate) were still there for over two hours. It’s not really a problem, it’s just something you’ll want to prepare for!

As for The Cookie Bar, I was sadly a little let down. I only really enjoyed 2 of the 5 cookies I got. The blondie was ultimately the saving grace. But with delicious dessert options like Everglazed and Salt & Straw right across the sidewalk, this might not be the hit we hoped it would be. And they likely won’t be overtaking Gideon’s Bakehouse anytime soon.

The restaurant atmosphere is absolutely stunning, and I would definitely recommend it for a relaxed meal with friends! The food during the main part of my meal was all spectacular and we’re definitely excited to have a new dining option in Disney Springs.

Nosh or Not?

Plan a “lakeside” meal if…

• You like inventive menu items. Some of the items on the menu that I liked the most were the ones that were a little “outside the box.” If you’ve got a creative palette, you’ll enjoy it here!
• You want to dine in a stunning atmosphere. The vibes of this restaurant are simply immaculate! All the natural sunlight and greenery makes for a great place to enjoy a meal in the middle of the day.
• You want a leisurely meal. The service was great and I didn’t feel rushed. Many people were there for 1.5+ hours.

Skip to another spot in Springs if…

• You want a fast or cheap meal. This restaurant is neither fast nor cheap, so if you’re in a rush or on a budget, it might not be for you.
• You have a huge appetite. The menu here seems to emphasize lighter fare, so if you want piles of heavy food or to leave feeling absolutely stuffed, this isn’t your place.

That’s a wrap on our first-ever visit to Summer House on the Lake! We’ll keep you in the loop with any more restaurant news from Disney World. Stay tuned to DFB for the latest!

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Are you planning a visit to Summer House? Tell us in the comments!