REVIEW: Why Disney Adults Keep SPLURGING on This Theme Park Restaurant

One of our favorite parks for food at Disney World is Disney’s Animal Kingdom. There are lots of delicious options, and we are always taking the time to review restaurants so you can make the best decisions when it comes to your meals.

Disney’s Animal Kingdom

We know all the ins and outs of Disney World restaurants — including where you should definitely eat, and where you should skip. We recently stopped by Tiffins Restaurant in Disney’s Animal Kingdom and are bringing you our FULL review! Should this restaurant make your list of must-eats?

Background

You will find Tiffins Restaurant on Discovery Island at Disney’s Animal Kingdom. The restaurant celebrates the art of travelling and offers a diverse menu drawing from a variety of cuisines that inspired the creation of Animal Kingdom.

Tiffins is a signature table service restaurant at Disney World, so you will notice that the prices are on the higher side. However, we have found this restaurant to have delicious food in our past experiences. Will the restaurant still impress us? Let’s find out!

Atmosphere

Tiffins Restaurant celebrates traveling and encourages exploration. While the restaurant has a more relaxed atmosphere than other signature dining experiences at Disney World, we think the highly themed atmosphere is such a fun experience. The restaurant has three different dining areas, or galleries, and each one is inspired by an area of the world that was incorporated into the creation of Animal Kingdom.

You will find an Asia-themed room called the Trek Gallery, an African-themed room called the Safari Gallery, and a room covered in animal art called the Grand Gallery. While you will only be dining in one of the galleries, you are encouraged to take the time to explore all the artwork on the walls throughout the restaurant.

Tiffins is filled with photograph collages, paintings, and sculptures that were inspired by the field notes and sketches of the Imagineers who developed Animal Kingdom. As you dine, you will be surrounded by earth tones that provide a warm and inviting atmosphere, while highlighting the artwork on the walls. The restaurant is on the dimmer side, with spotlights on the artwork.

Now that we have explored the restaurant a bit, let’s take a look at what we are eating!

Food & Drinks

We couldn’t stop by Tiffins without grabbing one of our favorite appetizers here: the Tiffins Signature Bread Service. You can get this for $18 and it features Thai red curry milk bread, Pão de Queijo, papadam, coconut-curry sauce, guava sauce, and ginger-pear chutney.

We loved the sweet and strong guava sauce here, the crispy bread to go along with it (but it’s fluffy on the inside!), and the guava works really well with the cheese bread! The Papadam is closer to a chip versus bread, and the ginger-pear chutney was bright, had a lot of herbiness to it, and was pretty chunky and crispy.

The Thai red curry milk bread was fluffy and on the sweeter side, and the coconut curry sauce was creamy and really heavy on the coconut flavor. Overall, this was enjoyable for sure, but our favorite is still over at Sanaa.

We also grabbed another appetizer, the Pineapple-glazed Pork Belly for $15. It is pineapple-glazed pork belly with guajillo chili sauce, chicharrónes, and spice pickled vegetable slaw.

The pork belly almost tasted like it had an almost coffee coating in it, and we didn’t get much of the pineapple. It had a great char on the outside while still being smooth as butter on the inside. The chicharrones added a crunch to the dish, but we do think it is a little hard to eat with the pork belly.

For our entrees, we got the Oaxacan Pork Duo for $48. This dish features Grilled Pork Chop, Salsa Macha, Plantain-Chipotle Sauce, Fresh Corn Tamal, Smoked Pork Shoulder, Salsa Verde, Cabbage Slaw

The pork was slightly on the chewy side, but we didn’t mind it. The entire pork chop is covered in spices, which we really enjoyed, and it had a good sear on the outside with an almost smoky flavor, but the inside was still juicy. The creamy plantain-chipotle sauce was great with the pork. It was a great balance to the pork!

The slaw is very tangy and acidic and was still pretty crunchy, which we enjoyed. The tamal is also delicious and sweet! It has a soft texture, is very moist on the inside with full kernels of corn. It was our favorite part of the dish!

We also grabbed the Moroccan Short Rib Tagine for $54. It is Turmeric-scented Couscous, Golden Raisins, Grilled Artichokes, Roasted Carrots, Marcona Almonds.

The short rib is SO tender, it was literally like butter to cut, but it does mean it’s fattier than other cuts. It has a good char on the outside and is juicy on the inside, and while the couscous is on the sweeter side, but works really well with the meaty short rib. The kernels had just a bit of bite to them, which we enjoyed as well.

You can’t skip dessert! We started with the Harvest Maple Cheesecake for $14. It is maple cheesecake mousse with cherry gelée insert, molasses spice cake, molasses-chai ice cream, pecan crumble, poached pears, maple tuile, and cherry sauce.

Now, if you’re expecting a true slice of cheesecake, you might be a bit disappointed in this one. However, it was our favorite dessert and definitely one we would get again. The cheesecake itself is lighter and reminded us more of a mousse. It has a piece of gelee in the middle of it that adds a tart and bright cherry flavor. The cheesecake mousse has a decent amount of maple flavor that works well with the cherry flavor, but one of our favorite components of the dish was the refreshing chai ice cream! The pecan crumble below was crispy and slightly spiced with fall flavors, so consider us big fans.

We also tried the Champurrado Chocolate Bar for $15. It is made with spiced chocolate ganache, Modelo Negra mousse, Dulce de Leche, passion fruit-lime sauce, and chili meringue.

This meringue did not taste like chili — it had a slight bit of chile taste to it, but wasn’t spicy. However, this is FULL of chocolate flavor and is very rich. If you’re looking for a chocolate dessert, look no further, this one is packed with it. It’s topped with some Dulce de leche swirls, which are your small bit of reprieve from chocolate. We definitely think it’s shareable, so you may not want to tackle it yourself!

Magic or Tragic?

This Disney World restaurant is a must-visit if…

You’re looking for unique menu options
You want a great sit-down meal in Animal Kingdom
You need a meal you can enjoy at a leisurely pace

You should skip this Disney World spot if…

You’re on your first trip to Disney World and/or have a full agenda
You’re a picky eater
You’re looking for cheaper dining options

Overall, this is such a high quality meal, you likely won’t feel like you’re eating at a theme park restaurant. We love the creativity of the restaurant as well and all the incredible details, but we will say we don’t think it’s a great choice for a hot day with all the heavy dining options.

In the meantime, we’ll be on the lookout for more restaurant updates from Disney World and beyond. Make sure you stay tuned to AllEars for the latest Disney news and more!