REVIEW: Plaza De Coco Restaurant on the NEW Disney Treasure Cruise Ship

By Lydia Storks
Posted on Posted on December 13, 2024

We just set sail on the Disney Treasure, and we’re taking you along with us!

During our sailing, we got to check out the ship’s new dining, entertainment offerings, staterooms, and more! The ship is set to make its maiden voyage on December 21st, 2024, but we got to check it out a little early thanks to a media preview. And now, we’re sharing our experiences onboard, including our thoughts on the dining options!

Like other Disney Cruise Line ships, the Treasure offers rotational dining each evening for dinner. One of those options is Plaza de Coco — a restaurant themed entirely to the hit Pixar film Coco! We got to check out this dining spot during our sailing, and now we’re taking you along.

Background

Plaza de Coco is part of the Disney Treasure’s rotational dining. If you take a cruise on the Treasure, you’ll actually dine here two nights, with the first night being a festive gathering of family, starring the Riveras. The second night celebrates Dia de Los Muertos after Miguel is reunited with his great-grandparents.

As we mentioned, the restaurant takes inspiration from Coco, so everything from the food to the setting has been well-thought-out with that in mind.

Atmosphere

When you step inside Plaza de Coco, you’ve stepped into the world of Coco and the town of Saint Cecelia: Disney spent five years working on this restaurant and its concept. One notable detail in this restaurant is the elaborate Rivera family Ofrenda dedicated to celebrating those family members who have passed.

There’s also a wall of handwritten letters, song lyrics, and music.

So many more details can be found by exploring the restaurant.

Hector Rivera’s guitar sits in the center of the dining area. This is the magical guitar that allows Miguel to reunite with his ancestors.

Seating is family style with close tables and chairs because this is one big family-oriented setting.

Even the plates fit in with the theme.

Of course, there’s also entertainment. Disney reached out to Mexican performers to cast the shows here.

The performance begins pretty much right when your appetizers are served, so you’ll want to make sure to get to the restaurant early.

So, the vibe and the entertainment are incredible, but let’s talk about the food.

Food & Drinks

As you probably guessed, the food here is inspired by Mexican dishes, and the menu reflects that with a choice of appetizers, entrees, and desserts.

A kid’s menu is also available.

We started with the Beef Birria Empanada, which is a baked pastry turnover with pulled beef brisket, Oaxaca cheese, pico de gallo, and birria consommé. Although the pastry had a nice flaky texture, the filling was dry and bland. There just wasn’t enough flavor with this appetizer.

The Celeriac, Herb Guacamole, and Blue Corn Chips come with jalapeño chile, cherry tomatoes, and lemon crema. The guacamole wasn’t bad, but it wasn’t great either. The chips, though, were soggy, like they’d been stuck in the dip for too long. You also only get three chips, which isn’t enough for the amount of dip you’re given.

The Red Chicken Enchiladas have Guajillo spiced red enchilada sauce and Chihuahua cheese. We’ll be honest — we thought these were pretty standard typical Mexican restaurant fare. We’d rate this as just a step up from Taco Bell. At this point, we’re seeing that flavorful food with true Mexican heat is not going to be something we’ll get at this restaurant.

However, the Chipotle Black Bean Soup with cilantro, lime, purple onion, and Mamá Coco’s pork tamale had a hint of heat that we liked. The soup had a good flavor, although the pork tamale didn’t wow us. We would’ve been fine just having the soup by itself.

For our entrees, we ordered Ernesto de la Cruz’s Grilled Seafood and Tomato Rice, which is made with jasmine rice, grilled shrimp, calamari and Scallops, Castelvetrano olive, caper, pinto bean, green Onions, and tomato. This was another bland dish with rice that was way too chewy. The tomato sauce was too sweet, too. Even though the seafood was somewhat flavorless, we can say the scallops were perfectly seared.

The plate of Michoacán Carnitas with crisp pulled pork, pickled red onions, cilantro-lime rice, guacamole, and salsa roja asada is basically a plate to build your own carnitas. This was recommended by our server, and we found the traditionally crisped pork tasty. However, seasoning was still lacking, which seems to be the theme at this restaurant.

We then tried Imelda Rivera’s Roasted Chicken Breast Mole with roasted chicken breast, cacao mole sauce, red rice, pickled onion, sesame seeds, and a soft flour tortilla. Mole is one of our favorite kinds of sauces, but this one didn’t deliver. Again, it needed more flavor. The chicken was cooked well and was moist, but it just needed more going on for it.

However, the Rib-Eye “De Corte Grande” was the one entree we liked. It’s served with  Oaxaca-Monterey Jack cheese double-baked potato, buttered broccoli, sweet honey-roasted carrots, and tamarind port wine Sauce. The steak had a great flavor, and we loved the sweetness of the carrots and the freshness of the broccoli. Although we generally love a potato side, the one on this dish was our least favorite thing on this plate.

Okay, let’s talk dessert. We had to try Miguel’s Churros Calientes, which are  Sugar Spiced Churros served with Warm Cajeta Caramel. The churros had an odd chewy texture, although they had a nice sweet flavor, especially when dipped in the sauce.

The Grand Central Station Pecan Tart, though, blew us away. It’s made with roasted pecan nuts, brown sugar custard, and salted caramel creme, and it has a lovely nutty flavor that isn’t too sweet. It’s like pecan pie, but not so much the sweetness overpowers everything else. The roasted pecans on top also had a nice flavorful touch.

We’ll never say no to coffee and cheesecake, so we got both with the Cappuccino Crème Brûlee Cheesecake, which is a baked vanilla cheesecake with caramelized coffee crème brûlée. This was good, but we felt it was missing that coffee flavor — we just couldn’t taste it. If anything, it reminded us of a basic chocolate flan.

Our favorite dessert, though, was Héctor Rivera’s Sundae with dulce de leche ice cream, banana bread, cinnamon fried tortilla, and whipped cream. The ice cream is SO wonderfully creamy and we love how it combined with the crunchy cinnamon tortilla. We didn’t get much flavor from the banana bread, but it honestly didn’t need anything else.

Magic or Tragic?

We hate to say it, especially with how much we love Coco, but we expected something a bit more authentic with the food at this restaurant. We understand that with it being part of the Treasure’s rotational dining, Disney wanted to keep the food mild, but a little extra seasoning would have taken many of these dishes up a notch. The atmosphere, though, really made us feel like a part of the world of Coco, and the entertainment was extraordinary.

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