Dining in Mexico

It seems like every time I hear about the restaurant in the Mexico Pavilion, its people complaining about how expensive it is. That’s always surprised me. How many things in Disney World are cheap? When it comes to quality food, cheap and Disney are two worlds that cannot be used in the same sentence (most of the time). With that in mind I’m going to throw cost out the window and do a review of my experience in Mexico.

Mexico was the first dining experience we had in Disney World on our last trip. We checked in at the Contemporary and headed over to Epcot. We rode Soarin’ and then went to Mexico for our 11:30 lunch reservation….oh sorry ADR.

Walking into the Mexico Pavilion is always an amazing experience. If you’ve never been in the Mexico Pavilion it’s hard to describe. It might sound cliché but it’s really like you’re walking into another world. It could be noon outside but as soon as you step through the entrance it’s nighttime in an open air Mexican market with a restaurant at the back of the pavilion, right on the river.

First of all our reservation was for 11:30 which is the earliest you can have lunch in the pavilion. It was dead. Because of that, we were able to pick our table and of course we had to sit on the water.

We both got margaritas. Other than the fact that they cost ten dollars, they were great. Then again, it was booze and we were on vacation so it’s hard to complain.

The service was good. It wasn’t excellent. Our waiter didn’t really do anything to stand out but we didn’t have to wait for anything.

The food was very good. We have a good Mexican restaurant chain in NH and my wife spent a month in backwoods Mexico so we can normally tell good Mexican from bad Mexican. This was good. Even if you removed the fact that we were sitting across from a Mayan pyramid, on the water, in simulated night with flickering candles and festive lighting, it was still good. The atmosphere didn’t improve the taste, it held its own.

Overall eating at Mexico is a must for us. The pavilion is Disney at it’s finest. We know we are on vacation when we eat there.