The Disney Parks and resorts have been a whirl of excitement lately, and that includes Disneyland! 

Paradise Pier hotel is slowly but surely being transformed into the Pixar Place Hotel. While this construction isn’t set to be completed until January 30th, 2024, visitors can already dine at the hotel’s new restaurant. Great Maple is a “Southern California-based modern American eatery” that serves upscale versions of traditional American comfort foods. The best part? You can eat here for three meals a day! We’re headed there now to check it all out, and even try a few of the dishes. Come along with us!

Atmosphere

This table-service restaurant is themed to all things American comfort with a bit of Pixar flair! Throughout the restaurant, you’ll find nods to Pixar movies and animation style. We’re getting ahead of ourselves, though! Let’s rewind and start outside the restaurant.

One of the best things about Great Maple is that you don’t have to enter the hotel to enter the restaurant. There is an outside entrance accessible to non-hotel guests.

There’s a menu outside, but you’ll also have paper menus at your table later on.

Spreaking of tables, there are several seating options within the restaurant. There are indoor booths.

Outside, there are more booths.

You’ll also find more standard tables both inside and outside.

And there’s also an outdoor sort of bar area!

At the table, you’ll have paper menus like we mentioned before, as well as a cloth napkin and silverware.

Let’s take a look at the menu! First up, here’s the all-day menu:

And here are the Mains, Sandwiches & Burgers, Salads, and Brunch options.

Now, it’s time for us to order!

Eats

Since we wanted to try some breakfast items, too, we decided to have those as a sort of appetizer. We started off with the Pancake Pops for $21, the Traditional Biscuit Benedict for $25, and the Cajun Shrimp Biscuit Benedict for $27.

The Pancake Pops are basically pigs in a blanket with pancakes serving as the blanket. They come with maple syrup, salted caramel, and whipped cream for dipping. These are super fun! The batter is nice and moist with a perfectly crispy outside. These were a table favorite!

Next up, we had the Traditional Biscuit Benedict. This is a white cheddar biscuit that’s been piled with Black Forest ham, poached eggs, and classic hollandaise, and comes with sour cream and onion scalloped potatoes. It was delicious! The hollandaise sauce is creamy and mild, and the egg was cooked perfectly.

Next, we had the Cajun Shrimp Biscuit Benedict. This is essentially the same dish but with shrimp instead of the ham, and the hollandaise has cajun seasoning. This one was our least favorite out of the two, but this was still good. The shrimp was fresh and it was an interesting take on the dish. Of course, you’d need to like cajun seasoning to enjoy this.

As for the main entrees, we had the Soda Pop Baby Back Ribs for $32, the Hot Honey Chicken Sandwich for $28, and the Turkey Bolognese for $27.

Let’s start with the Soda Pop Baby Back Ribs! These are baby back ribs that have been slow cooked and grilled and served aside hot honey slaw and a cheddar biscuit. The ribs were another one of our favorites! There was a ton of flavor, and the meat was cooked perfectly. We also really loved the cheddar biscuit that comes with the dish, but we did notice that it needed some honey to sweeten it up a bit. As for the coleslaw, it was pretty bland.

Next, we tried the Hot Honey Chicken Sandwich, which is buttermilk fried chicken, hot honey aioli, and melted white American cheese. It comes with a side of fries! We really loved this dish. The chicken was cooked well, there was a LOT of food, but our favorite part was the FRIES. These reminded us of McDonald’s fries in all their crispy, addictive glory.

Next, we tried the Turkey Bolognese. This is a pasta dish served with your typical bolognese meat sauce, but with turkey meat instead of the traditional beef or Italian sausage. We loved this one. It’s the definition of a comfort dish. It’s hearty, filling, and super tasty. There’s also a great ratio of the pasta to the meat of the dish.

For dessert, we tried the Famous Maple Bacon Doughnuts for $18 and the Seasonal Doughnuts for $18.

The Famous Maple Bacon Doughnuts are made to order, and they come with three doughnuts that have been topped with the restaurant’s original maple-bacon glaze. These are delicious! They’re dense, cakey, and definitely kicked our sweet tooth.

Next, we tried the Seasonal Doughnuts, which are apple-filled. We LOVED these and preferred them to the others. They’re hefty, and also dense and cakey like the others. They’re heavenly if you love that typical fall, cinnamon apple flavor. 

For drinks, we ordered the Blood Orange Margarita and the Maple Bacon Old Fashioned.

The Blood Orange Margarita is made with Tequila, Blood Orange, Agave, Lime, and a Chipotle Rim. This was HUGE. It was delicious, refreshing, and the kick from the rim was nice and added some complexity.

As for the Maple Bacon Old Fashioned, it’s made with Bacon washed Bourbon, Maple Syrup, Bitters, Thick Cut Smoked Bacon. This tasted like your average Old Fashioned mixed with maple syrup. For an Old Fashioned, there wasn’t much of a strong alcohol taste. It was smooth and had a maple after-taste. We liked it!

 Nosh or Not

So… should you dine here? Here are some pros of the restaurant:

• Convenient for hotel guests
• Has great twists on classic comfort dishes
• You get a LOT of food

Here are some of the downsides:

• It’s a bit out of the way for non-hotel guests
• There’s better park food elsewhere that’s more reflective of local flavor
• Picky eaters might not enjoy this because there are some complex flavors and spice added

Basically, if you’re staying at the hotel, you should totally try it. However, we wouldn’t go out of our way to eat here again. There are lots of great food options that you can grab inside the parks that taste virtually these same as menu items that you can get here. While these are takes on comfort foods, they’re bold takes for sure, so expect some spice and added complexity. This isn’t for the picky eater!

Overall

Overall, we were impressed with the amount of food we received, the amount of flavor, and our service. The Cast Members were kind and helpful, and we enjoyed our experience here. We’d recommend it to anyone staying at the hotel or anyone who doesn’t mind the trek to the restaurant from the parks.

We’ll be sure to keep you updated with more Disney news and food reviews, so make sure to follow along for more so that you’re always in the loop!

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Which of these items would you most like to try? Let us know in the comments! 

The post REVIEW: The ONE New Disney Restaurant You Should Visit for Comfort Food With a TWIST first appeared on the disney food blog.