REVIEW: Coastal Eats – 2017 Epcot Food and Wine Festival

Over to my favorite corner of the Epcot Food and Wine Festival and we’re trying the NEW Coastal Eats booth!  Of course here they focus on seafood, which is great for us since we love seafood!  Everything stands out to me from the menu at first glance, including: Lump Crab Cake, Seared Scallops and the Baked Shrimp Scampi Dip!  I have high hopes for this one so let’s dig in and see how it weighs in against the competition in this Coastal Eats Review: 2017 Epcot Food and Wine Festival….

Co0astal Eats Booth:

Coastal Eats is nestled into the garden area of Future World West and shares the courtyard with Earth Eats and Active Eats.  This area is so relaxing and it has a beautiful area with tables where you can enjoy your food, which isn’t the case in some parts around World Showcase:

Tables with umbrellas:

Can’t beat this spot imo:

Coastal Eats Menu:

Again here if you aren’t a seafood lover you might want to skip it, but if you are you’ve come to the right place!  Not bad prices either for fish:

Food:

• Lump Crab Cake with Napa Cabbage Slaw and Avocado Lemongrass Cream – $5.00, DDP Snack Credit  *Ziggy Recommended
• Baked Shrimp Scampi Dip with Sourdough Baguette – $5.50, DDP Snack Credit  *Ziggy Recommended
• Seared Scallops with Roasted Corn and Butterbean Succotash and Chili-Chipotle Butter Sauce – $6.00, DDP Snack Credit *Ziggy Recommended

Beverages:

• Erath Pinot Gris, Oregon – $6.00
• Soter Planet Oregon Pinot Noir – $7.00

Menu Review:

So we started with the Lump Crab Cake with Napa Cabbage Slaw and Avocado Lemongrass Cream.  In my household we are very critical of Crab Cakes as my dad is a self proclaimed master chef  when it comes to crab cakes, so we’ve seen every kind.  This honestly was really, really good.  Especially when I think of the fact that we are in a theme park, crab cakes this good shouldn’t be here.  It tasted amazing, golden brown outside, and perfect inside which is hard to do.  I hate when the outside is burned and this wasn’t at all!  Very moist inside and not dry at all either.  It’s also not a skimpy portion, but really big for $5.00!  Only thing I’ll make a very minute complaint about is I’m not a big avocado guy, so I could have done without the sauce, but if you like avocados then this is perfect!

This next item had me hooked from the moment the menus came out and I saw it.  Baked Shrimp Scampi Dip with Sourdough Baguette.  Oh mamma is this good!!  I’m going to warn you, this is very garlicky, I mean it’s potent!  If you are a garlic like me and don’t worry too much about whether your wife can still breathe or not then you will love this!  Full of small sized shrimp swimming in that buttery, garlicky scampi sauce, this is hard to beat!  Bread was standard baguettes, slightly toasted.  Only complain is we could have used another slice or two as it wasn’t proportioned to the amount of scampi, but that didn’t stop us from getting a spoon and just digging straight in!!  LOVE IT!

Ever since the Scallops in Scotland a couple years ago, I’ve been waiting for a new one here at Food and Wine that would really knock my socks off, and the Seared Scallops with Roasted Corn and Butterbean Succotash and Chili-Chipotle Butter Sauce is very close!    First again is a great sized portion for $6.00, with 3 pretty good sized scallops.  Honestly I, some fancy restaurants around WDW give you about 4 scallops slightly larger and charge $40 for them, so this is a steal in comparison!  And dang were they good too!!  Not over-cooked or spongey at all, they cut right away with a fork…super tender.  Melt in your mouth good!

The sauce used is definitely different from your normal way scallops are served and I like it as a change for once.  Tastes of the chili and butter in the sauce is great(not really spicy), with the succotash is quite nice.  It’s to like that creamed spinach, cheese and bacon that I’m still dreaming about….but it’ll do just fine! 🙂

This is going not only on my Top NEW Food Items from the Festival list, but on my overall Top Food Items from 2017 Food and Wine for sure and an absolute MUST TRY!

Call me old school, but I think of the two wines available at Coastal Eats you have to go with the White, so the Erath Pinot Gris is definitely the choice for me.  It has hints of pear, fig, and honey and is really smooth going down and great with the dishes here.

 

 

Booth Summary and Grade:

Well our trip to Coastal Eats surpassed the already high expectations we had at the outset!  I loved everything we tried from the Crab Cake, Shrimp Scampi Dip and most of all the Scallops, which I’m always a sucker for!  They’ve set the bar really high, and I really hope they return next year because this was by far one of my favorite booths all year!

If you have to get just one thing: Seared Scallops

Grade:  9

Take a look at all of my 2017 Epcot Food and Wine articles.  I have a 2017 Epcot Food and Wine Info Guide with a complete Index of the Food and Wine Menus, The Top NEW Items for 2017, Top Food and Wine Booths and more…I want you to be able to have the best info on the Festival so you have a great time and don’t waste your time!

Your Thoughts:

I want to know what you think of my Coastal Eats Review 2017 Epcot Food and Wine Festival.  What did you think of the booth?  Which was your favorite item?  Let us know in the comments section below!

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