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Disney's California Food & Wine Festival

Wednesday, Mar. 4 2009 @ 12:00AM

By Edwin Goei in Food Festivals

Think I'm done talking about food festivals and restaurant weeks? Not yet. Disney wants to play too!

They're holding their event at California Adventure from April 24th to June 7th. The festival, in their words, will "showcase California's rich fusion of flavors." There will be free cooking demonstrations and complimentary wine tastings (with park admission, of course). There will be celebrities, including Guy Fieri, Tommy Lasorda, and John Lasseter, who not only is one of the bigwigs at Pixar and now Disney, but also a vitner.

The latter are "Signature Events" and cost about $185 per person, which include wine and apps, followed by a Q&A.

Lower wattage happenings, like their "Sweet Sundays" are $65, with demonstrations by such bakers as Bret Thompson & Dave Baker (yes, his name's Baker and he is a baker) of that oh-so-trendy L.A. bakeshop, MILK.

Other attractions are too numerous to name, but what about that "rich fusion of flavors" part? Well, they're also doing "World Celebration Dinners", which go for $135 per person (Theme Park admission included) where the food of Spain, Japan, France, Italy and Korea will be featured.

Noticeably absent from the roster? Vietnamese and Mexican....but hey, who's judging.

Interested? Then read all the fine print and details on their website.

Me? I'll probably just go to O.C.C Culinary School's Captain Table while it is still in session and partake on their $12 3-course Thursday lunches.

And oh yeah, in other Disney's California Adventure food news, word is that the now defunct Lucky Fortune Cookery will reopen as a new Mexican restaurant in June. To this I say, "When has the Lucky Fortune Cookery EVER BEEN open?"

To me Chinese food at a California Disney park is more of a myth than Walt's head being cryogenically frozen.

3 Comment(s) / Post a Comment

Christian says:

"Noticeably absent from the roster? Vietnamese and Mexican....but hey, who's judging."

I'm judging.

BTW, That'll be interesting for them to have another Mexican restaurant right there.

Posted on Wednesday, Mar. 4 2009 @ 1:22PM

Edwin Goei says:

Me too actually. But in thinking about it a little bit more, I figured the decision to leave out those two might be smarter than it appears.

Think of all the ribbing they'd get from you, me, everybody when they attempt to charge $135 per head for Mexican or Vietnamese grub -- not only two of the least expensive cuisines in Orange County, but also the most abundant and (your favorite word) authentic.

Posted on Thursday, Mar. 5 2009 @ 6:33AM

Christian says:

Yeah, "authenticity," the thing that's hard to firmly establish. I think in years past they had Mexican items as part of the freebies they were giving away. Also, they could do a Mexican or Vietnamese meal but charge perhaps $85 for it. There was a deleted segment from an Anthony Bourdain show where he went to a high-end Mexican restaurant in Mexico City. The owner said he knows a lot of great food comes from the little stands on the streets but he doesn't want people on the world stage thinking good Mexican food can only come from poverty-stricken conditions. But it's hard for people to get over that idea and it's probably the same in the Vietnamese realm. I try to purposely emphasize on my blog that we cover taco trucks to upscale dining . . . and everything in between.

Posted on Thursday, Mar. 5 2009 @ 11:20AM