Food and Wine Festival 2012

The annual International Food and Wine Festival at Epcot begins this weekend (September 28).  We won't be able to make it this year (sadly) but if anyone going to the 2012 Food and Wine Festival is looking for some info on last year's offerings, we're here to help!

First, our reviews of the kiosks. It looks like this year they have most of the same kiosks as last year (Brazil and Portugal are not returning and are being replaced by Florida and Terra which sound pretty good). Not all of the food offerings are the same, but some of our old favorites are back! Here are our reviews (of the food, not the drinks, unless the kiosk only had drinks), with some notes on this year's changes in menu, thanks to Disney's awesome site.

Argentina
(All the same offerings)

Australia
(All the same offerings except the lamb chop now has mint pesto and potato crunchies instead of potato-goat cheese salad. Kind of sad since our favorite part of the lamb chop last year was the salad.)

Belgium
(The waffle and chocolate are the same, but this year the mussels are in Hoegaarden beer broth, instead of roasted garlic cream, a change that sounds awesome to us.)

Brewer's Collection
(Very similar to last year's offerings except this year there is Schofferhofer Grapefruit, which I am intrigued by.)

Goodbye Brazil kiosk... until next time (when hopefully the feijoada doesn't come out like hot dogs and beans)

Canada
(There is filet mignon (which looks like it's from their Le Cellier restaurant) instead of salmon, but otherwise the famous cheese soup and sausage + polenta are back.)

Caribbean
(Same offerings except the ropa vieja has cilantro rice instead of white rice and the jerk chicken has mango chutney instead of mango salsa (just different in name?). Hopefully this improves the dishes.)

Cheese
(Same offerings but different artisan cheeses)

China
(Only the pork pot stickers remain from last year's menu. Not sure how chicken satay is Chinese, but mango tapioca pudding sounds quite good.)

Craft Beer
(Mostly similar offerings)

Lemon chiffon, white chocolate macadamia mousse, and tres leches verrine dessert trio from last year

Desserts & Champagne
(Completely different set of desserts - A is most intrigued by the dark chocolate mousse with chili and salted caramel, and I can't decide whether I would prefer the yogurt panna cotta with orange cake, raspberries, and pomegranate, or the lemon custard verrine with blueberry compote - but we would most likely end up getting the trio if they offered that again)

Fife & Drum
(We had frozen Red Stag lemonade; this year it's regular Red Stag lemonade and Red Stag honey tea lemonade. This year's offerings sound good, but I can tell you which of the 3 would be the best on a super-hot Florida day.)

France
(All the same offerings)

Germany
(A new menu - I think I would choose the roast bratwurst in pretzel roll (although it is similar to something from last year) and A would pick the schinken nudel since he doesn't know where else he could get it.)

Greece
(All the same offerings plus spanakopita. Love spanakopita.)

Greek feast at a lagoon-side table. Spanakopita would look quite nice joining those dishes.

Hawai'i
(All the same offerings)

Hops & Barley
(All the same offerings except the lobster claw cuddler is chilled with herb mayonnaise instead of warm with butter, and there is a Maine home style clam chowder.  I think I prefer last year's, but A would pick this year's.  We both would go for the clam chowder, for sure.)

Ireland
(All the same offerings except the cheese selection is slightly different and the fisherman's pie is lobster and seafood, and not just lobster and scallop.  So it's basically the same.)

Italy
(The ravioli and cannoli are repeats, but they switched out the shrimp pasta for salsiccia e papacelli napoletani. Italian sweet sausage sounds like a winning dish.)

Japan (parts 1 and 2)
(They've changed up the offerings here - they still have the CA roll, but the spicy tuna & salmon hand roll, karaage hand roll, and the sukiyaki beef pan are new additions. Sadly our favorite - the tuna and salmon sensation (like poke) - is not returning.)

New Zealand delicacies ... I could go for one of those sliders right now!

Mexico
(It looks like they renamed the beef taco and that there is natilla de cajeta instead of flan, but otherwise the same offerings.)

Morocco
(Same offerings except the Harissa chicken roll (which I did like) was swapped out for merguez sausage with grilled peppers and onions. That sounds delicious. Merguez is yummy.)

New Zealand
(Same offerings except lamb meatball instead of lamb slider - should be the same except sliders are easier to eat, and who doesn't love sliders?)

Poland
(The golabki that we liked is gone, but in its place is zapiekanki - a toasted mushroom, caramelized onion and cheese bread - which sounds amazing.)

Last year's Portugal kiosk which is not making an appearance this year

Scandinavia
(All the same delicious offerings)

Singapore
(The beef rendang is back, and we're not unhappy to see the bland Singapore noodles replaced with a seared mahi mahi.)

South Africa
(Instead of the confusing bunny chow, there is a spinach and paneer cheese pocket, which also confuses us because that sounds Indian.)

South Korea
(We both loved the bulgogi last year, but they substituted a mung bean pancake with shrimp and kimchi sauce this year.  That sounds pretty good too.)

The 2 new kiosks list culinary offerings that sound incredible and I'm sad we're going to miss them.  Florida has an arepa (and, as you know, we love arepas) and a shrimp ceviche, while Terra has vegetarian chicken curry and chili. Sounds interesting.

Hops and Barley had some of our favorite dishes - the lobster roll and the pumpkin mousse were fantastic.

After we got back from the festival, we made a list of our favorites. The big winners among the kiosks were Scandinavia, Hops and Barley and New Zealand, along with a few others.

Some final tips (without having to buy any special tickets or do any special planning):

- If you can, avoid going to the festival on Saturday unless you want to drink around the world like all the other Saturday festival-goers. Lines are long, the park is crowded, it smells like alcohol everywhere, and if you just want to try the food, you're going to be waiting a long time for small portions and have nowhere to eat them.

One of the emptier areas of the World Showcase on drink around the world Saturday - you can see in the back how packed the pathways are

In the center of the World Showcase on Sunday afternoon... the crowds are gone. Could never have taken this photo on Saturday.

- Put your money on the reloadable cards that you can buy throughout the festival.  It makes paying very easy and you can wear your "cash" on your wrist.

- Get the festival passport and get the stamps from each kiosk. It's a nice souvenir. (And if it's the same as last year - don't forget the final stamp like this one!)

- Be prepared for good food but don't expect the most amazing food ever. (None of the dishes made our 2011 favorites lists.) It's still a theme park, it's still a festival, and you're still in Florida instead of some other country (although this year there is the Florida kiosk).  A Greek salad or grilled Greek cheese isn't going to be as good as the food in Greece, but it's still a fun adventure.

- If you're going to eat around the world like we did, go to the park hungry, don't rush and try everything! (And hopefully you're there for more than one day...)

We can't wait to go back to the festival another year and hope there will be lots of great new kiosks!