Maya Grill:
Food is not just about providing energy to the body, but on occasion, can enhance the creation of a memory, an experience or state of mind. One of those times was when I took my husband Ben to the Maya Grill at Walt Disney World’s Coronado Springs Resort. This place will always hold a special place in my heart. For you see, we were celebrating Ben’s birthday and my completion of a 9-month internship with the Walt Disney Company…bittersweet. This birthday will be memorable for the both of us because we were celebrating living under the same roof again! I knew my husband and family were excited that I would be home again soon. It made me so happy to make my husband’s birthday special and just be able to hang with him. Ben is my best friend and THE BEST travel companion!
Anyway I digress, let’s get back to the food!
I wanted to make our last Disney outing special, so I booked us a room for the weekend at the Coronado Springs Resort. We had walked through the resort and immediately fell in love with the Old World tile, Mayan/Ancient Mexico theme this hotel was decorated in. Once we checked in, we decided to walk around and check out the resort.
After walking around we came across the Maya grill’s sign, it was massive and inviting.
Also, I LOVE it when places post their menu’s just outside the restaurant. It allowed us to drool over the food we wanted to try. While we were there we made a reservation for dinner time. Glorious! Could not wait.
The time for our reservation came up and boy were we glad we made the reservations! The place was packed. After a short, but important discussion about the differences between ARC-170’s and X-wing fighters (Star Wars Reference) we were shown to our seats. The atmosphere was really great, it felt romantic but low key. There was a guy playing live Spanish guitar and who doesn’t love live music. We sat down and decided to start with a bottle of red (it is Ben’s Birthday after all) and an appetizer.
The wine was from Mendoza, Argentina it was a Malbec (year 2012) and it was delicious. Also, our appetizer came; we had decided to go with the fried tomatillos.
Appetizer at Maya Grill:
As you can see in the picture above, the food was plated beautifully, the fried tomatillos had avocado, shrimp, fancy cocktail sauce and microgreens on top. Sooooo Yummy! I also like the idea of fried tomatillos, I’ve had fried green tomatoes before and they always fell apart before they got to my mouth, and these were firmer and oh-so-delicious. After that deliciousness I was ready for the entree, we decided to split one of their signature entrees, the Parillada “Del Grill”. It comes with New York strip, spanish style chorizo, chicken and grilled veggies, as well as rice, beans, flour tortillas and something called esquites.
While we waited for our entree, the server brought us their version of a bread basket, it had these large crackers with two types of sauces to try with it and the best Jalapeno Cornbread I have ever tasted, ever (it was so good I forgot to get the photo, sorry guys)! We also sipped on our wine and listened to the live guitar, which started playing Hotel California, Sweet Child of Mine, Boston…Spanish guitar style! It was awesome!
The Meal:
Then our food came….
Sooo good, it was nice that it was fajita style because we mixed and matched the meats to get different flavors and made us feel like we were tasting a little bit of everything.
After dinner, we finished our wine and could not decide if we were getting dessert. I mean it was Ben’s birthday but then we were so full….and then something wonderful happened.
Dessert Surprise:
The server noticed that it was Ben’s birthday (probably from his ID when we ordered the wine or when we made the reservation with our magic bands) and brought him a dessert surprise!
It was so nice of them, you just gotta love Disney. 🙂 All-in-all it was a wonderful experience that we will remember forever and I think my husband had a very satisfactory birthday which he completely deserved for keeping up with our household while I chased my dreams.
So I’m dying to know, have any of you been to Maya Grille? and if so what was your favorite part?
Interested in more travel eats? Check out my post on the Taste of Chicago!
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