Garden Grill is a character dining restaurant in Epcot’s Land Pavilion, offering all-you-care-to-enjoy family style dining. The restaurant opened with the park in 1982, originally named The Good Turn, before changing to Garden Grill in 1993. Ever since it opened, the restaurant rotates slowly in a circle, offering views of Living with the Land and the center of the pavilion. Garden Grill is part of the Disney Dining Plan as 1-credit and offers 10% off to Annual Passholders. In this post, we’ll review lunch and dinner at Garden Grill.

As you may have gathered from the name, Harvest Feast with Chip ‘n’ Dale features… Chip and Dale! Our favorite chipmunks (sorry Alvin) are joined by Mickey and Pluto. Mickey is dressed in his best farming outfit, with overalls and an old plaid shirt on underneath. The other characters aren’t as elaborately dressed, because chipmunks and dogs don’t need clothes but mice do. Obviously!

I’ll mention that our interactions with the 4 characters at Garden Grill were brief, specifically with Chip and Dale. I hesitate to bring that up because there’s no reason to think that’s the norm. Character meets at restaurants can just fall behind sometimes and then that means the interactions will be shorter. We don’t want our brief (and possible one-off) experiences to dissuade you from going to the restaurant. Despite the quick encounters, we enjoyed all of the characters and they all joked about wanting the food on the table.

Along with the characters adding to the atmosphere, Garden Grill is unique. It resides on the 2nd floor of the Land Pavilion, up above Sunshine Seasons, Living with the Land and Soarin’. As I mentioned, the circular restaurant slowly rotates as you eat there. I didn’t think I’d even notice this feature but we both definitely felt it by the end. Don’t get me wrong, Garden Grill wasn’t throwing us around like a ride on the Teacups but it does give a mostly fun, slightly off-kilter feeling to the experience.

That rotating also gives a few different views of The Land. The restaurant itself doesn’t have much to it – lots of booths, a few cool murals and the wait staff coming and going from the enclosed center. But the open nature of the restaurant (shorter glass walls and no windows) offers views of the center of the pavilion as well as Living with the Land. If you’re the world’s biggest fan of that attraction and have always dreamed of seeing the desert or old house from above, then this is a must-do. Weird dream, but I respect you.

The atmosphere as a whole is interesting. Garden Grill itself shows its age in places. But the characters and novelty of the restaurant end up winning out. This isn’t a top tier atmospheric restaurant like we see elsewhere in the park with Space 220 or Chefs de France but it is fun and has something for everyone. The one exception is if you really hate The Land Pavilion, you probably won’t enjoy this experience then.

While we’re on the subject, bonus points if you arrive early to your reservation and go for a ride on Living with the Land. Much of the food growing on that ride is where they picked things for your meal, which is a nice way of tying it all together. You don’t have to see how the sausage gets made but seeing how they grow the vegetables you’re about to eat is fun.

Being a character meal, we came in skeptical about Garden Grill’s food. Perhaps that was because we’d dined at Chef Mickey’s a week earlier? Character meals are hit and miss when it comes to the food offered so we thought our skepticism was warranted. On the other hand, this isn’t a true buffet so maybe our luck would change. Here’s a look at the menu.

The lunch and dinner starts off with the Harvest-inspired Garden Salad featuring Tomatoes, Olives, Garden Peppers, and Croutons. We had a nice vinaigrette on ours, giving it a lighter and fresh taste. There may have been a few too many things piled on top of the salad but you know the saying… If you grow them, flaunt them. That’s not a real thing. Made up sayings aside, this was extremely fresh and a great way to get some veggies at Walt Disney World.

The meal also starts with Cornbread and Honey Butter. This is less healthy than the salad but we got seconds on one of them and not the other. I’ll let you guess which one. The Cornbread was delicious, served warm and moist. There was a nice balance of sweetness in the bread, especially once the Honey Butter was added. I could go for another loaf of this right now.

That brings us to the main platter! The highlight here is the Backyard Grilled Steak with Chimichurri Sauce. This was cooked surprisingly well, tender and juicy with a nice seasoning. The sauce really bolstered the meat though making it stand out with a tangy and herb driven taste. In terms of the family style or buffet meals I’ve had at Walt Disney World, this was among the best meat. It’s not as good as some other table-service restaurant steaks but we were very impressed.

The other meat on the platter is Rotisserie-roasted Turkey served with a Pan Gravy. This was also surprisingly good! I’m not generally a big turkey fan but this stayed away from being too dry and paired well with the gravy and potatoes.

We came away impressed by all of the veggies included. Those just don’t come to mind often when thinking of an all-you-can-eat spot at Disney World. But everything we tried turned out very fresh and not over seasoned. As always, the mashed potatoes hit the spot too.

The two things off the platter that we requested more of were the steak and veggies, for what it’s worth. When we go back to Garden Grill it will because we want more of those. And the cornbread, of course.

The lowlight of the meal was the Macaroni & Cheese served with little goldfish Mickeys in it. The Mac & Cheese was just fine, a very average version of the dish. The goldfish crackers really didn’t add anything interesting. I think a good cheat code here would have been throwing some of the fresh veggies in to add some depth. I didn’t think of that until now though so I haven’t tried it. As it was, we didn’t eat much of the Macaroni & Cheese.

Dessert at Garden Grill is a Strawberry Shortcake with Whipped Cream. Melissa has a slight strawberry allergy so we had them served on the side but typically they come piled on the cake. This was another dish where we were very impressed by just how well it was made. They aren’t breaking new ground here, this is just a really good Strawberry Shortcake! Don’t mess with a classic.

I’m still in a little bit of shock with how much we enjoyed the food at Garden Grill. I shouldn’t overstate it, this isn’t a top tier restaurant at Walt Disney World. But if you just want a hearty but fresh meal, this really does the job. The vegetables were an excellent surprise and everything was prepared really well.

Before any discounts, the meal comes in at $62. Frankly, you could probably get a better meal elsewhere for that price. But the quality food plus the characters has this in a unique position where it offers something for the whole family. I wouldn’t call it a bad value despite the high price tag, and bigger appetites will definitely be able to get their money’s worth.

Garden Grill surprised us and ended up being a really strong restaurant among Epcot’s many options. We’re already interested in going back for breakfast and would recommend lunch or dinner to just about anyone. Some of our praise might have to do with us having low expectations but, credit where credit is due – this spot is among the best character dining in all of Walt Disney World.

Overall Rating – 8/10

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