Dinner at Hook’s Pointe

Hook’s Pointe is a “casual” table service restaurant at the Disneyland Hotel – as you can tell from the name it has a slight “Peter Pan” theme to it – there’s a map of Never Land painted on the ceiling and some of the tables have views of the Never Land Pool area. It specializes in mesquite grilled meat and seafood.

Hook's Pointe dining room

Pomegranate Splash

On a recent Friday evening we had a 6:40 Priority Seating time – we arrived on-time and were seated immediately. Even though the restaurant wasn’t crowded (and at no time during our meal were all tables occupied, or even close) we were seated at a table not with a view of the pool, but a lovely(?) view of the Croc’s Bits and Bites snack bar next door. Our server Roberta quickly arrived to introduce herself and take drink orders – they have an amazing variety of cocktails (or “foofy drinks”, as we call them). It had been a hot day and I wanted something crisp and refreshing and she recommended the Pomegranate Splash – which had pomegranate juice, cranberry juice, grenadine and several other things – and it was excellent.

Though the same could not be said for the water…we both opted for “regular” water instead of Pellegrino or some other fancy expensive bottled stuff – but it really tasted odd. Which is odd in and of itself, since water isn’t supposed to have any flavor! It tasted a bit salty to us, though our server assured us that it was filtered.

Our server brought us a basket of warm sourdough bread – it was delicious! Crisp and crusty on the outside but soft and chewy inside with that yummy sourdough bite to it. I had to be careful not to fill up too much on the bread!

Inland Salad Crab dip and pita wedges

For our appetizers we split the Inland Salad – fresh greens with blue cheese, apples and candied walnuts and a delicious apple cider vinaigrette – and Hook’s Crab Spread – a crab, spinach and artichoke dip served with pita bread. I’m not a big fan of crab and didn’t really care for the latter, since it had a lot of crab, and I would’ve preferred more spinach and artichokes!

Pork Chop

I selected the River Boat Pork Chop for an entree – Kansas City pork chop grilled with a sweet balsamic sauce, braised cabbage and garlic smashed potatoes. I thought the pork chop was a bit dry and tough to cut, but the sauce was tasty, as were the mashed potatoes.

Mahi mahi

Lee ordered the Fish of the Day – Mahi-mahi that was grilled with Cajun spice and served with a couple of jumbo shrimp, mashed potatoes, fresh vegetables and a caper sauce. It was very good – the mahi was very nicely cooked and not dry or fishy-tasting (I often find that mahi tastes fishy to me).

Chocolate cake

For dessert I ordered the Year of a Million Dreams Chocolate Cake – this was a chocolate cake with five different layers of cake and filling. It looked delicious but it was strangely tasteless – I could barely discern any chocolate flavor at all in the cake or the fillings. It was pretty disappointing.

Chocolate chip cookie

Lee ordered the Fresh Baked Chocolate Chip Cookie – our server warned us this needed about 10 minutes to prepare since the cookie was baked to order. It’s definitely worth the wait, though. Although square like a brownie the “cookie” was crunchy on the outside and still warm and gooey inside just like a fresh cookie should be. Yummy. It was served with a scoop of vanilla ice cream and chocolate sauce, with a cookie wafer “sail”. And it was quite large – it would easily have been enough for both of us.

Overall I have to say that we were both underwhelmed with dinner – the food was fine, and the service was very good (much better than the Vineyard Room a couple weeks before), but there was nothing very special about the experience – it wasn’t really any different than eating at an Applebee’s (except for the price!). Actually my favorite thing about the restaurant was something they had for the kids – kids’ meals came with a straw that had a light-up figure on it, with their choice of Tink (green) or Hook (red) – I wanted one of those!

There was nothing wrong with the meal, but it’s not a place we’ll return to anytime soon.

The menu is available HERE.

Bon appetit!

Laura

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Laura Gilbreath is a native of San Diego, CA. She has been making the trek up Interstate 5 to Disneyland since she was a small child and terrified of talking tikis and hitchhiking ghosts. She and her husband Lee enjoy trips to Disneyland and Walt Disney World, as well as sailings on the Disney Cruise Line.

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