Vegan & Vegetarian Eats at Disneyland Resort Food & Wine Festival 2019

Disclosure: I attended a media event for Disney California Food & Wine Festival but all thoughts and opinions are my own.

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Vegan & Vegetarian Eats at Disney California Adventure Food & Wine Festival 2019

The tastiest time of the year is back! Disney California Adventure Food & Wine Festival is now open until April 23, 2019. On opening day, I visited and tried the vegan and vegetarian food offerings this year. You can take a look at my must-have food picks from their vegan and vegetarian offerings, ways to make the most of your visit during Food & Wine Festival, as well as every option and where to find them throughout Disney California Adventure! And with 60% of the food options new this year, there’s a lot to try. Now who’s ready for a tasty read?

 

Make the Most of your Food & Wine Festival 2019 Visit

If you want to make the most of your time and your money, here are a few tips to take advantage of:

• A Sip & Savor Pass: I can’t recommend this enough! This year, both Annual Passholders as well as regularly ticketed guests can purchase a Sip & Savor Pass. This pass allows you to have eight food or non-alcoholic beverage items of your choice at a flat rate of $49 (about $6.13 per item) for Annual Passholders, $54 (about 6.75 per item) for non-Annual Passholders. It’s a great way to save some money and try lots of items!
• Skip Booths With Long Lines: Something you can do at Food & Wine to skip long lines, and a more secret “hack” is that you can purchase any food item from anywhere! Each booth has a seperate line to pay for items, and a line to bring your receipt up to the booth to pick up your food. So say if there’s a long line at Avocado Time but you want that Impossible burger slider, you can pay for the slider at a booth with a small line and then just go to the redemption line to pick it up at Avocado Time, skipping the cashier line! It’s also great if you know you want a few items from a few different booths, you can just order them all in one place then pick them up at their redemption windows.
• Secret Items: Throughout the festival, keep an eye out for food carts and churro carts, as a few of them this year have “secret” Food & Wine Festival offerings that aren’t listed in the tasting passport, that you can even use a Sip & Savor Pass for. If a cart has an offering, they will have a sign out indicating its a Food & Wine Festival offering. An example of this is the Chocolate & Peanut Butter Churro at a churro cart near the Monster’s Inc. ride.
• Small Portions at Paradise Garden Grill: Paradise Garden Grill has some menu items that are available only during Food & Wine Festival. While you can purchase full portion meal sizes there, they also offer smaller portions of the menu items that you can use a Sip & Savor Pass credit for.

 

My Must-Have Food Picks

I tried most all of the vegan and vegetarian options, and of them all, these were my top 5 must-have picks for food options:

1. (Vegan) Impossible No “Meat” Submarine with Marinara Sauce, topped with soy cheese and kettle chips – From Paradise Garden Grill: This sandwich has some Mickey-shaped cuteness to it, with a little Mickey stamp on top of the bread no matter what portion size you order. You can get a full size, or you can use your Sip & Savor Pass for a smaller version of it. It’s a great, hearty vegan meal! It tasted like a real meat ball sub, I was incredibly impressed! This is one I will probably get on each visit during Food & Wine Festival.

2. (Vegetarian) Californian Artisan Cheese Selection with Fiscalini White Cheddar – From Uncorked California: Last year, the cheese plates couldn’t be redeemed with a Sip & Savor Pass but this year they can! I loved the variety on this cheese plate. The wine-infused cheddar is great, but I really loved the assortment of dried fruits, grapes, and walnuts on the plate as well.

3. (Vegetarian) Ghost Pepper Mac & Cheese with Chili Cheese Corn Chip Dust – From Peppers Cali-Ente: So full disclosure, I’m not a Mac & Cheese fan. However, I love spicy food so wanted to give this a try. As someone who doesn’t typically favor Mac & Cheese, yet put this in my top five picks, shows how good it was! Don’t let the term “ghost pepper” scare you off from it – it had a good amount of spice, but not overly spicy and still had a lot of flavor. The corn chip dust on top added a nice crunch to the texture which I liked.

4. (Vegetarian) Petite Impossible Burger with Guac and Pepper Jack Cheese – From Avocado Time: Last year, Avocado Time was the most popular booth, and the avocado slider was the most popular item. So I was super stoked that this year, they made it with Impossible Burger so us vegetarians can enjoy it! This little slider is very hearty, and the patty is of course delicious (I just love a good Impossible Burger).

5. (Vegetarian) Corn Nuggets – From Off the Cob: This item actually comes with bacon, but you can ask them to make it without bacon! The nuggets aren’t greasy at all, they’re very light and fluffy. Think of a lightly fried corn cake – it was very tasty, and the perfect snack.

If you’re looking for a sweet treat, my top picks for dessert were:

1. (Vegetarian) Creamy Oikos Yogurt Cheesecake – From Nuts About Cheese: This has a nice light whip cream on top, and raspberry jam. The cheesecake is very creamy, but not too rich or dense. A perfect dessert with a great combo of creamy and tart.
2. (Vegetarian) Fresh California Berry Pie – From Berry Patch: (pictured above) This pie has got to be the most Instagram-worthy dessert! With a sponge cake, custard, and berry filling, topped with raspberries, strawberries, and blueberries; then topped with gold flakes! It was very fresh and delicious!
3. (Vegetarian) Chocolate Crunch Cake – From Garlic Kissed: I love a good semi-sweet chocolate cake, and this one fits the bill perfectly! I love the different layers of texture and flavor, and tasted more on the dark chocolate side which I enjoyed.

 

Vegan Options at Disney California Food & Wine Festival 2019

Paradise Garden Grill:

• Impossible “No Meat” Submarine with marinara sauce, topped with soy cheese and served with kettle chips. Both regular and smaller portion sizes available.
• Large Soft Pretzel with no Beer-Cheese

Veggie, Veggie, Fruit, Fruit

• Cauliflower Ceviche with Chile Corn Crumble and tortilla strips

Berry Patch

• Blue Diamond Almond Breeze Almondmilk (Also gluten-free)

Avocado Time

• Suja Organic Pineapple Passionfruit Kombucha (Also gluten-free)

Cluck-A-Doodle-Moo

• Watermelon Lemonade with Watermelon Garnish

Off the Cob

• Peach Tea with Peach Garnish

Food Carts Throughout the Park:

• Harvest Snap Peas (Also gluten-free)

 

Vegetarian Options at Disney California Food & Wine Festival 2019

Nuts About Cheese

• Fiscalini White Cheddar Lager Soup served in a Mini Boudin Sourdough Bread Bowl
• Creamy Oikos Greek Yogurt Cheesecake

Uncork California

• California Artisan Cheese Selection, choose from either Point Reyes Blue cheese or Fiscalini White cheddar

Citrus Grove

• Meyer Lemon Blue Diamond Almond Macaron (Also gluten-free)

Berry Patch

• Strawberry & Coconut Rice Frushi with Sweet Oikos Yogurt Wasabi Sauce (Also gluten-free)
• Fresh California Berry Pie

Peppers Cali-Ente

• Ghost Pepper Mac & Cheese with Chili Cheese Corn Chip Dust

Veggie, Veggie, Fruit, Fruit

• Cauliflower Ceviche with Chile Corn Crumble and Tortilla Strips (Also vegan)
• Duo of Lime and Strawberry Frozen Fruit Bars

Avocado Time

• Petite Impossible Burger with Guac and Pepper Jack Cheese

I <3 Artichokes

• Fried Artichokes with Blue Diamond Almond Breeze Lemon Aioli
• Artichoke Toast with California Olive Tapenade
• Blue Diamond Almond Cake with Butter Streusel, Apricot Compote & Brown Sugar Creme Fraiche

Garlic Kissed

• Creamy Mac & Cheese with Garlic Bread Crumble
• Chocolate Crunch Cake

Off the Cob

• Esquites Sweet Corn Nuggets (request without bacon)

Golden Dreams

• Anaheim Chile Relleno Bites with Salsa Verde
• Chocolate-Peanut-Caramel Parfait (Also gluten-free)

Paradise Garden Grill

• Impossible No “Meat” Ball Submarine with Marinara Sauce, topped with Soy Cheese and served with Kettle Chips (Also vegan)
• Large soft Pretzel with Beer-Cheese Dipping Sauce

Food Carts Throughout the Parks:

• Harvest Snap Peas (Also gluten-free, vegan)
• Häagen-Dazs Ice Cream Bars
• Chocolate Peanut Butter Churro

 

Menu Pictures & Prices

Below you can scroll through the gallery of images of the menus that have vegan and vegetarian items, to see the pricing!

And there you have it! A look at the vegan and vegetarian food & beverages from Disney California Adventure Food & Wine Festival 2019, happening now until April 23rd! Take a look at some of the best Disneyland travel deals during that time here, and stay tuned for more posts about the Food & Wine Festival festivities! If you want a look at more of the food offerings outside the vegan and vegetarian offerings, you can visit Tiff Mink’s tasting vlog here.