Food and wine 2014

We should starting seeing more and more information in the coming month. If I remember correctly, booking for events starts in August. The Disney Food Blog has already started posting information on some of the booths.

I second JoAnn in that the Disney Food Blog is really the best place to get your pre-festival information. They have already started updating and will keep the new coming from now throughout the festival. They also have links to their last year coverage with pictures of everything.

http://www.disneyfoodblog.com/2014-epcot-food-and-wine-festival/

jhugo... It's our first F&W too and I am SO EXCITED I can't stand myself!!!! soooo, that being said...

I'm going to hijack this a bit instead of starting a new thread... For those of you who have been...

Are portions big enough to share?
How much should we budget per day?

I read there are 30 plus booths and we want to try as much as possible! I currently have 2 full days and probably a 3rd in Epcot.

When we were there in 2012, we spent 1.5 days at Epcot during F&W and easily spent over $150 on the booths, between food and drinks. I didn't find the portions were big enough to share as they are just tasting size portions. But I guess it depends on your preference.

Here are some pics from F&W 2012 to give you an idea of the portion sizes.

As far as budgeting goes, I suggest reviewing the menus before your trip and plan out what you want to try. If you are on the dining plan, you can use snack credits for the food.

More food pics....

Things are fine to share if all you want is one bite, some things are larger than others. If there is something that you think you're both really going to love, get two!

Honestly, you could spend hundreds on the food booths even just in one day. Sometimes an item will be $4 - sometimes $8 - I've paid as much as $11 for a glass of champagne. Read the menus online at DFB and get a good idea of what you want to eat. Then get an idea of what you want your food budget to be. Compare the two and figure out which bites and sips are most important. I always find it best to come up with a game plan of what I want to eat most before we go.

As Jan said, we experienced the tail end of F&W in 2012 (half Saturday and all day Sunday). My impression was that it was okay, but I did find the food portions quite small. Definitely not enough to share.

The food itself was good though.

I would recommend to try it at least once to see what you think.

Are portions big enough to share?

Sharing is great because it gives you the chance to try more things. But they're mostly appetizer-size portions, so really just three or four bites. So for things you absolutely adore, I agree on getting two. For things you just want to taste, sharing works fine.

How much should we budget per day?

Hah! Depends on your appetite and what you want to try. The last time I went a couple of years ago, prices per item ranged from less than $3 to more than $7. Alcohol especially tends to be pricey. If you can't live without lobster and champagne, you could bust your budget pretty quick. Same thing if you have a healthy appetite. I would say for two people who will eat nothing but festival food on a given day, budget at least $100 per day. More if you want that lobster and champagne I mentioned.

In 2013, the complete list of booths and menu items was posted on July 30th.

Awesome thanks all!!! I we have the DP and I have already acquired $300 in gift cards that I planned on using. I think we should be good (well, until I start on the drinks! LOL) I think we will share and if we really like it go back!

I also have us booked for LATE dinners for 2 of the Epcot nights as I want to try a couple places so I am sure we will do our best to pace it!!

Last year was our first trip to food and wine. We lucked into the Parisian breakfast and it was the highlight of our trip. I made the mistake of studying every booth and building it up to be more than it could ever be. It was nice but think of fair/carnival lines and prices with portion sizes for a bite or two. Great if your on a diet though. Still Worth experiencing.

We had a really good experience last year there was me and my mam and we both like our food and drink!

what we did was before we left we had the complete list of booths then made a list of things we definately wanted to try and others that if we had time we would try and what we did was we got 2 or 3 at each booth so we got to try everything we wanted to! if we really liked something we got individuals!

I will also say is we were there for 2 weeks and spent a LOT of time at EPCOT and we STILL didn't get around everything!!!!!

We are heading back this year and cant wait to see all the menus!!!!

When we went in 2012, we tried maybe 10 of the food items, but we got a drink from every booth. Sometimes we shared a drink and other times we each got our own. We did get our passport stamped at all of the locations over 3 days and we probably spent about $125-150. This is one of the things we are looking forward to the most with our honeymoon in Sept. I also downloaded the Food & Wine Fest app for my Android and it gave a listing of each country, the different food and beverages offered, and the pricing for each item. I do agree with looking ahead of time at what each country offers to make sure you hit the booths that interest you the most, then if you have time go back and hit some of the others.

In 2012 we budgeted about $75 a day for the two of us for both snacking and meals (lunch/dinner). We split everything so that we could try more items, but I wouldn't expect to get more then a bite or two of each thing if you're sharing. Have fun! We LOVED the F&WF!

I would also suggest getting one of the Food and Wine gift cards and preloading it with the amount you want to spend (if you're not using the dining plan). We did that last year and it really helped us to budget and not spend more than we wanted, which is easy when its all in $6-$10 increments. Plus its really easy because you can wear it on your wrist and don't have to worry about getting cash/credit card out...

Actually now that I write this I wonder if they will incorporate this into the magic bands somehow this year. That would be even more convenient!

I'm planning on getting one of the F&W gift cards this year. You can use your magic band to charge back to the room but I can see that being a dangerous thing if you're not careful.

I definately want to do a couple of the events this year. The Parisian Breakfast is on the list.

The gift cards were perfect for us. I did hit it just right and the black piece in the middle popped of so be careful. It was a quick repair but if I wasn't paying attention I could have lost it.

I concur with Emford' s comments. My DW and I probably spent $50-$75 a day (each) on average over a four day period. The alcohol can quickly eat away at that total, so if you plan on drinking while sampling food, I'd suggest adding another $25-$50 a day per person. Remember to get your passport and get it stamped at all the booths. I managed all but two booths last year.. I'm going for a totally complete passport this October..

LouisianaMike

More F&W news!!

http://www.disneyfoodblog.com/2014/07/16/news-2014-epcot-food-and-wine-festival-special-events-dates-and-prices-booking-begins-july-31st/

Disney Food Blog just piosted a bunch of info

I can't wait until I can book my F&W festival special events starting 31 July 2014.

October can't get here soon enough.

LouisianaMike

Would someone "in the know" tell me where we get these "passports" for each country? Sounds fun and our group of four may only use one since we sample off each other often. But still fun. I just printed the wine and beer flight ones on cool paper since I wasn't sure they were available there.

Thanks

We got our flower and garden passport in the festival center pavilion, the one between the energy pavilion and mission space

We got ours from the special shops they set up for the food and wine festival which are at the front of world showcase otherwise if you just ask any CM they should be able to direct you to some

Pick up a passport in the event center or behind spaceship earth there's usually a manned information booth and check off items as you go (and get the country stamps too) we made notes in the book as well. We went to every booth over the course of two visits. Then on the third day we hit up our favorites. We used our dining plan snack credits for the food booths and paid out of pocket for snacks/drinks at the other parks. Save your QS or TS meals you will not be hungry at F&W. DW and I shared pizza on the boardwalk for a very late dinner on Epcot nights. It freed up a signature or two reservation.

don't know if anybody else has seen this but DFB has this article on with more info and they are expecting all booths and menus to be confirmed this week!!!!!

yay!!!!

http://www.disneyfoodblog.com/2014/07/20/news-discounts-early-booking-dates-eat-to-the-beat-dining-packages-and-sneak-peek-at-menu-items-from-the-2014-epcot-food-and-wine-festival/#more-111075