charitycase20....Charity

Ok, I forgot a few things about our first night.
First of all, you can't roast marshmallows over charcoal...very well. We thought we would avoid the crowds and just do it at our site after we grilled the steaks.
Booo. They don't produce enough flame. Needed wood. Luckily, we were at the fort and there is wood everywhere.
It was all wet. So, we had warm marshmallows instead.
Lesson Learned: join the crowd and just do it at the campfire!
That sounded wrong. I meant roast marshmallows at the campfire. Let's keep it G rated here.
...
After the sing-a-long we headed to the beach to watch the MK Wishes fireworks. We had never seen them from the Fort so didn't really know what to expect. We actually enjoyed them, and the girls really enjoyed them.
I took my camera in hopes of getting some good pics.
I tried to get the boat in this pic, but the fireworks weren't bright enough. Would have been a good pic if the fireworks had been brighter.



Lesson Learned: Take a tripod to get good pics of fireworks.
Other Lesson Learned: Take a real photographer with you to get really good pics of fireworks.
While sitting on our lounges a family came up with a young boy to sit next to us. As I was fooling with different camera settings trying to get the best pics I could, he asked his mom, "Mommy, why do people take pictures of fireworks?"
There were so many things that came into my head at that point.
To remember them.
To show family.
To try to get a great shot to put in my TR.
Shut it, kid.
I chose to not say anything at all.
Lesson Learned: don't take pictures of fireworks unless I know what I'm doing and there aren't kids around!

This past Wednesday my dd13 and I went to check out F&W at EPCOT. We went for one afternoon trip last year before Halloween when our passes were expiring and were hooked. She's talked about it all year and wanted to try lots of new things.

dd13

me
So we head out on Wednesday and start at the Festival Marketplace, which we did not know existed last year. We wandered around a bit and bought our F&W swipe card so we wouldn't have to keep pulling cash out of our pockets. This is also the location where they hold many of the seminars and tasting events.


After purchasing our new mascot “Jean Ralphio” as my dd has named her vinyalmation (from the popular NBC show Parks&Rec)

we walked to World Showcase in time for opening of the countries.


On the way we saw the new Ocean Spray cranberry bog. Too cool. My dd wanted to go in and stomp cranberries.



Before I go on I want to let you know that we picked up the Discovery Passport this year and will stamp it in every country. My family jokes about this but I am an avid collector of stamps. On our journey out West last year they got tired of me asking where the National Passport stamps were located every time we entered a park. I also made my dd do every Jr Ranger book there was to be had. But enough on that, we were also going to use the passport to rank OUR opinion of what the food tasted like so if we wanted seconds later we would know what we liked.
Our original plan was to skip every other booth but that flew out the window when we were overwhelmed with all the food we could try. So we jumped from place to place until we were full.
First up was Hawaii. Since we have visited there 3 times I knew we would like the food so we tried the Kalua pork slider. In our ranking we gave it a 4. My dd was worried that the mayonnaise would be too spicy but she ate it all and said she would try it again. I think since the portion was smaller I enjoyed it but I don't think I would want a full size sandwich just because I don't go in for mayonnaise.


Next up was the Desserts and Champagne booth. We decided on the white chocolate Macadamia mousse with dark Chocolate pearls. We both gave it a 5. Really wished it were larger sized. But we will try this again. It has a nice chocolate flavor and the pearls were slightly crunchy.




Then we moved on to Greece, where we tried to Chicken Souvlaki with tzatziki. We gave it a 3. Mostly because it didn't taste like any chicken I've ever had. When I told my dh that it looked like sausage he informed me there is such a thing as chicken sausage. Who knew? I guess that's why HE does the shopping! It still didn't taste like chicken though.


We skipped Canada for now, but I know we will be back to try the cheese soup. I've heard good and bad about it this year.

On to Ireland...last year I was the only one who got to try the Lava Cake since dh and dd wanted to ride Soarin'. I got tired of waiting for them and went to eat instead. The wait for the ride ended up being 90 minutes. So this year I took my dd to all the parks one day a week before F&W and told her to ride anything she wanted to because during F&W we were there for the FOOD! Anyway, at Ireland we ordered the Lava Cake, the Kerrygold cheese selection and I got to try the Bunratty Meade Honey Wine. Cake was OK we gave it a 5, though I did give most of my half to my dd. I really liked the cheeses, I gave them a 4, but the chutney was way too sweet. My Meade was really good, I gave it a 4. Now looking to find out where I can get some. There was actually a lot of cheese so I put it in a container we brought in case we didn't finish something so we could eat it later.


Jean Ralphio enjoying the World

We skipped over France for now. Since we are local we are planning to make around 5 trips to F&W over the next month,so I'll think we will cover it all.
Next we hit Belgium. I'm not a seafood/fish eater so we skipped the mussels and we had the waffle last year, so this year we tried the Guylien Belgian Chocolate Seashell Truffles. I gave them a 2, my lowest rating of the day. First off they were boxed, like not made at EPCOT, meaning not fresh. Second they were pretty tasteless. I could not tell there was any chocolate in them. Hello, it's Belgian chocolate, shouldn't I have tasted something besides sugar. Dd liked them but she's a kid who loves candy. Just saying.


For now we skipped Portugal and headed for Morocco. We tried the Kefta pocket and gave it a 3. It was good sized and easy to share and not too saucy. The seasoning wasn't overdone but there was nothing to say Wow! about it.
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Next up New Zealand. Dd was excited about this since she hasn't ever tried lamb before. So we ordered the lamb slider with tomato chutney. We ranked it a 4. She did think the chutney was spicy on this one, and didn't finish her half. So I saved it for later. I think she didn't finish because of a combination of people smoking near us and we were getting stuffed since we aren't big eaters, mostly grazers.


We skipped the next few booths and ended up at Hops and Barley to try the Pumpkin Mousse. Dd loves cranberries and pumpkin so for us this was a 5. Once again the portion didn't seem large enough to us. But I am glad it was small as I could see myself eating too much of it.


Our last stop was in Germany but not for food. Our last visit here I bought the Wine Walk and wanted to try some German wine this time. While in the shop I noticed something on a sign called a Wine Flight. This is a sample of 3 wines of 6 that they offer. This would include a sample of ice wine, something I've been wanting to try. I was willing to pay the price but didn't want all 3 wines at the same time (since I was the driver and I'm pretty lightweight for a drinker-2 oz would be OK but not 6-8 oz). So I asked if it worked like the Walk where I could try 1 today and the rest later. Unfortunately it doesn't, you have to consume all at the same time. I'll have to save it until my dh is with us next time. For today I just got the small sample that went with the Walk.
So this ended our day at F&W, and we did collect all the stamps and went back to the Festival Marketplace for our completed stamp. Then I let my dd ride Mission Space and we rode Test Track together and gave away our 4 other fast passes to a family. We then went to Sum of All Thrills and designed a rollercoaster before we left. We departed F&W feeling full and we also had great weather today so it was a perfect day.