REVIEW: We Ate 20 Different Items at Disney World’s Newly Reopened Restaurant

Who’s ready to go down the rabbit hole and try new teas and treats? We sure are!

We’re following the White Rabbit all the way down to Disney’s Grand Floridian Resort to try the newly reopened Garden View Lounge — Tea Experience. It finally reopened for the first time since the 2020 closures, and we’re taking you along with us to try everything.

Background

For the menu here, you’ll pay $79 per adult and $49 per child ages 3 to 9, plus tax and gratuity for both. The experience will allow you access to tea and the Afternoon Tea Tower, and then there are add-ons if you want a little more. There’s a great selection of Twinings Loose Leaf Tea…

…and the Afternoon Tea Tower is all themed to Alice in Wonderland with treats like the Flamingo Croquet Choux, Tea Party Tart, and Caterpillar Cucumber Roll.

Children’s Afternoon Tea, which is meant for children, can be added on to the adult tea for an additional $49. This tea features treats geared more towards little ones, such as a Queen of Hearts Cheese Toastie and a White Rabbit Cupcake.

There are options for Plant-Based eaters…

…and those who prefer Gluten/Wheat Allergy Friendly options.

For the add-ons, or Enhancements, you can grab the Seasonal Cheese Selections for $21 and Royal Ossetra Caviar for $120. You can also grab Cocktails, Champagnes, Sparkling Wines, and Non-Alcoholic Specialty Teas for an additional price.

You’ll want to make Advanced Reservations, especially in the beginning, since it’s so popular. You can make those reservations on the Disney World website or app.

Atmosphere

The whole space has been refurbished, and it’s even more stunning than before. Disney incorporated many elements from the Grand Floridian lobby, which also underwent a recent refurbishment.

We fell in love with the massive windows, which brought in gorgeous natural light, and there was plenty of comfortable seating with pillows and cushions.

The stained-glass was also a fun detail! It has birds on it, which are connected to the bird cage themes in the lobby.

Don’t forget to look for Hidden Mickeys!

So let’s talk about the food and drinks!

Food & Drinks

After we were seated, our server brought us rose-scented towels to clean our hands. This just set the tone for everything that lies ahead. Even the presentation of the towels was spot on.

You have a choice of teas, but don’t worry, the server will let you smell each tea and will give you a description to help you decide which one to try. Our server was so knowledgeable and really helped us choose the tea for our experience.

Then we were greeted with Cranberry-Orange Scones and accompaniments. The scone is perfect; it isn’t too dry, but it has a nice buttery, crumbly texture to it. The cranberry and orange flavors really come through, adding a nice tartness to the scone.

The scone was served with Whipped Butter, Orange Marmalade, and Devonshire Cream. We LOVED the Devonshire cream, which is very creamy and a touch sweet. This is also known as clotted cream and is what you would traditionally have with a scone in the U.K. with afternoon tea. The Orange Marmalade pairs with the orange flavors in the scone really well, too. The Whipped Butter is also nice if you just want a simpler flavor to pair with your scone.

With the price, you get the Afternoon Tea Tower, which comes with three tiers of food.

We started with the Curried Chicken Salad Playing Card Tart, which is savory curried chicken salad filling topped with cherry gelée. This is a wonderful savory treat. The chicken salad has a touch of curry flavor, but not so much that it overpowers it. The crust of the tart is nice and buttery, and then you get a slightly sour and sweet taste coming from the cherry gelée.

Then we tried the Footman’s Feast, which is a Wonderland Salmon Crisp with a salmon rillette on a miso brown butter crisp. This is also delicious, and that’s coming from a reporter who doesn’t really like salmon. There is a hint of fish flavor, but it’s not a lot. It’s more smoky and salty than anything. The miso brown-butter crisp adds a bit of texture, as well as more saltiness.

We also had the Tweedledee Egg Salad Sandwich, which is a traditional egg salad on beet bread. This is a standard egg salad sandwich, but it gets a bit of sweetness, thanks to the beet bread. It also has some crumbled bacon, which adds saltiness. This is pretty messy, though, and overall, it didn’t impress us as much as the other items on the tower.

The final savory treat we tried was the Caterpillar Cucumber Roll, which is a combination of butterfly pea-infused cream cheese and cucumbers on pumpernickel. This is a unique take on a cucumber sandwich with a fantastic presentation that tastes fresh. The cream cheese has a lovely floral taste, but we do think the roll is missing some herbiness because it tasted a bit watery.

For the sweets, we started with the Matcha Mad Hatter, which is a sponge cake with apricot jam and yuzu buttercream. We’ll warn you that this will turn your fingers green, but you might not mind. The cake is dense, and the matcha flavor is subtle, so it’s not super grassy. The apricot jam and yuzu buttercream add some nice fruitiness. There’s also a lot of icing. And again, the presentation is perfect.

Then we had to try the Tea Party Tart, which is a vanilla tart, coffee custard, and chantilly cream. Just LOOK at it, though. It’s a little boring flavor-wise, with standard chocolate flavors (we didn’t get much of the coffee flavor), but the custard is good, and the chantilly cream is light.

We also dove into the Flamingo Croquet Choux, which is filled with passion fruit cream and raspberry crunch. So much thought was put into how these desserts look, and we really appreciate that. This tastes like a standard cream puff, but you get that passion fruit flavor really coming through, although we wished it had just a touch more of that. The pastry itself is fluffy, though.

We finished up the tray with Painting the Rose, which is an Earl Grey-flavored teacake painted tableside. The server poured red sauce on top as we watched, but we thought it might’ve been better if we’d been able to do that ourselves. The sauce tastes like strawberry, while the teacake itself tastes like buttercream frosting with just a hint of rose. The bottom is like a nice crumbly shortbread.

We also tried the Seasonal Cheese Selection for $21. You get Stilton Cheesecake, Goat Cheese Tart with Tomato Confit, Truffle Whipped Brie with Oregano Bloom, and Comte with Quince Paste, along with figs served on the side.

This was one of our favorite parts of the tea service. The Stilton Cheesecake is creamy with just a hint of a pungent aroma.

The Goat Cheese Tart is creamy and smooth.

The Truffle Whipped Brie has a strong truffle scent, but the flavor is mild.

The Comte with Quince Paste was our least favorite, but it is still nice and mild. It also pairs well with the apple and pear in the paste.

The cheese also comes with some super crispy crostini that has hints of a garlic butter flavor.

Now onto the Children’s Afternoon Tea! The selection is a bit smaller, but we fell in love with how cute the treats were.

We started with the Queen of Hearts Cheese Toastie. It’s a homemade cheese cracker with pimento cheese spread inside. It tastes like those extra toasty Cheez-Its. This one is sure to please kids, but it pleased us, too.

Then we tried the Fanciful Turkey Wrap. This is just a slow-roasted turkey wrap with tomato and lettuce, so it’s a pretty boring offering, but it’s something kids and picky eaters will like. It tastes fresh, but there aren’t a lot of flavors going on here.

This Sunflower Seed Butter and Jelly Bun was such a fun treat to try, too. It’s shaped like a mushroom and has a bit of saltiness from the sunflower seed butter. We liked how the jelly added some sweetness, though. The bun is dry, but again, this is a great choice for picky eaters.

Obviously, we fell in love with the Cheshire Cat Raspberry Macaron. It might have tasted like every other raspberry macaron we’ve ever had, but the presentation really sells it. It’s mild with a hint of vanilla flavor. The raspberry filling is sweet and tart.

We also had the Chocolate Brownie Branch. The outside is nice and crunchy with loads of chocolate flavor, while the brownie is chewy and dense. If you love chocolate, you’ll love this. We’re still not 100% sold on the presentation, though.

We ended with the White Rabbit Cupcake. This is your regular run-of-the-mill vanilla Disney World cupcake. It’s pretty much the same cupcake you’ll find all over the resort, so it’s not anything special.

With that being said, though, kids will probably love it. But we still think we would have loved to see as much effort put into the kids’ tea service as we saw with the adults. But again, this plate was probably designed with pickier eaters in mind.

Drinks

This is a TEA after all, so of course, we had some tea things to drink, starting with the Orangery of Lady Grey Tea. This is very similar to a standard Earl Grey with hints of orange. It’s light and fragrant, and perfect if you want something like a classic black tea.

We also tried the Exotic Mango and Ginger Tea, which is SO fragrant with a lovely blend of mango and ginger flavors. It’s got that exotic and tropical flavor with some fruitiness, but the tea makes it light.

We wanted to also give one of the herbal teas a taste, so we got the Lemongrass & Peppermint Tea. It’s caffeine-free, so a great option if that’s a concern for you. It has a nice citrus and minty combination of flavors.

We also wanted to try one of the specialty drinks, so we grabbed the Curiosi-TEA Refresher, made with Twinings Refreshers Strawberry Raspberry Herbal Tea with some shimmer. It has a lovely fruity flavor that is both sweet and tart. This is a drink that kids might love if they’re not into tea.

There are also some cocktails available, like the Mar-TEA-Ni, made with Drumshanbo Gunpowder Irish Gin, Twinings Earl Grey Tea, Lemon, and Honey. This is a wonderful concoction of lemon, honey, and Earl Grey flavors. It’s a bit fruity and a bit tart with a tea base.

Finally, we also had the Mint Tulip made with Old Forester 1870 Original Batch Kentucky Straight Whisky, Twinings Refreshers Peach Mango Herbal Tea, and Mint. It’s like a peach iced tea, but mixed with a mint julep.

You get a touch of that whiskey flavor on the first sip, but then the fruitiness of the peach comes through, followed by the tea. It’s complex, but wonderful.

Magic or Tragic?

You need to check out the Tea Room if…

• • You’re celebrating a special occasion — Because this is an elevated experience, it can be great if you’re celebrating! From bachelorette parties to special birthdays and anniversaries, it can be a relaxing and sweet place to enjoy with your friends and family.

You should probably skip if…

• • You don’t love tea or just want a quick afternoon beverage and snack. If you don’t like tea, this experience will probably be lost on you. It’s also a fancy experience that offers way more than just a quick snack and drink. If you just want that, you might be better off going to Starbucks.

Overall, we think this is a great experience that really makes you feel special, but we’re not completely sold on the value of what you get. It’s almost $80 per person, and although you won’t leave hungry, what you’re really paying for is the experience more so than the food. It would be nice for a special occasion, and if we had to pick between this and the pricier tea at The Cake Bake Shop, we’d probably choose this one.

Here at AllEars, we’re bringing you all the best food reviews and other tips and tricks you need to know before going on your Disney World vacation.

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Do you plan to go to the Grand Floridian Tea Room? Tell us what you’re looking forward to in the comments. 

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