We all know that ‘Ohana means family…and according to Lilo & Stitch family never gets left behind or forgotten. However, during our most recent visit to ‘Ohana at Disney’s Polynesian Village and Resort, something definitely got left behind and forgotten!
Hubby and I were so excited to score a coveted ‘Ohana reservation and, even though we had read some not-so-positive reviews, we were really looking forward to a special meal. You see, ‘Ohana really is like family to us. It’s where we celebrated birthdays, anniversaries, milestones, and it’s the place we would bring our family when we wanted to spend time together while sharing a special meal that would be stored in those core memories. Thankfully, we will always have those memories…because our most recent visit to the newly opened ‘Ohana was memorable–for all the wrong reasons.
Let’s start out with the positive, the coconut papaya scones and honey butter. Little did hubby and I know when we sat down that these little soft, sweet, carb-loading delicious bites would be the star of the meal! I am a sucker for anything with sea salt and these appeared to have flakes of black (volcanic?) sea salt sprinkled on top with the shredded coconut. The flavor was just enough sweet, just enough salt, and the papaya pieces were prevalent, making the scone very moist and not nearly as dry as many other types of scones. The honey butter was the perfect accompaniment for these little bites. The Disney website says the menu also includes cheddar bacon biscuits, but we didn’t receive those, and no one around us seemed to get them either. I didn’t realize they were missing until later, so we didn’t get a chance to ask.
The salad we received was huge for two people! Our server brought the citrus vinaigrette on the side, though we didn’t ask for it that way. Hubby enjoyed the salad, and I tried a cucumber just so I could try the citrus vinaigrette. (We’ve tried to switch to healthy eating when we eat at home, so I was just too tired of salad to eat it during a special meal…. plus this is ‘Ohana…why waste the stomach space on salad?) The citrus vinaigrette was ok, but I loved the previous salad that had the mandarin oranges. This salad just didn’t seem very flavorful…. which, unfortunately, you will see is a recurring theme of this meal.
Within minutes of receiving the scones and salad, we received the shrimp casserole, honey-coriander chicken wings, pork dumplings, the famous ‘Ohana noodles, kielbasa sausage, roasted broccolini, and roasted chicken. I was very disappointed with the pace of this meal. With everything coming out at the same time it was hard to try things while they were hot. Though truthfully nothing seemed fresh or hot. It all seemed like it had been pre-plated for a while and sat under heat lamps, which could account for the speed at which it arrived at our table.
We asked our server if any of the previous ‘Ohana dipping sauces were available, especially the peanut sauce. He said they no longer have any of the sauces due to having to accommodate so many allergies. We understand the seriousness of a peanut allergy; however, I felt like the flavors were seriously lacking without these.
The online menu states the pork dumplings are tossed in garlic-chili sauce. However, ours didn’t seem to be tossed in anything, and instead of being nice and crispy they were limp and soggy. The filling was very tasty, but I really missed the crisp shell. (I also really missed dipping these in the sweet dipping sauces!) Hubby said the star of the show for him was the honey-coriander chicken wings. He thought they were flavorful, and while he is not a fan of chicken on a bone, he really enjoyed these little wings.
On to the famous (or infamous) shrimp casserole. I had read/watched a lot of reviews that bashed this casserole. While I much prefer the skewered and grilled shrimp of the old days, I didn’t think this deserved the negative reviews it received. The shrimp was baked in a creamy sauce that was packed with seafood flavor. If you aren’t a seafood lover, then I can see why its hated, but I felt for what it was, the flavor was good. In fact, this brings me to my noodle dilemma. By now everyone knows about “noodlegate” and how, when the initial ‘Ohana menu was released, it did not include the noodle dish. This brought about cries and literally petitions to Disney to bring back the noodles! Miraculously, when ‘Ohana opened, noodles were put back on the menu! Back in the good old days, I would pour the delicious peanut sauce over the noodles and I could literally have eaten an entire plate myself. However, without that sauce the noodles were flavorless (seeing a pattern here?) and greasy. So, back to the shrimp casserole…. I took a spoonful of the sauce from the shrimp casserole and drizzled it over the noodles – BAM flavortown! Twirling up some of those noodles and spearing a shrimp to taste with them brightened up those dull noodles.
I’m not sure where Disney got the idea to add Kielbasa sausage as one of the main items in the skillet, but it just seemed like an odd choice. We eat Kielbasa regularly so this wasn’t anything special and again, if it had an amazing flavor, maybe I would have been more excited to see it on the skillet, but it seemed like a normal Kielbasa to me. Here seems like a good place to mention the broccolini…I normally love broccolini, but this was barely cooked, which made it very crunchy, and again, it was just broccolini, no extra flavor added.
I’m not sure how you roast a chicken eight ways (that’s according to the Disney menu online) but I felt this chicken with chimichurri sauce at least had some flavor to it, though it was pale and didn’t look appetizing. However, I thought this chicken had better flavor than the honey-coriander wings from the appetizer menu. Hubby disagreed and really disliked this chicken. He said he really was missing the grilled chicken breast from days past.
Let’s face it, for $55 per adult, we were really looking forward to the woodfire-grilled teriyaki beef! We have many memories of having more and more of the fresh grilled skewered steak in ‘Ohana days past. However, this is where things really went downhill for us and caused us both to question, are we really going to pay $55 x 2 for this??
Overcooked Undercooked
The first round of steak we received was super well done. This made it very tough and extremely dry. We asked our server for another round, prepared medium and medium-rare. The next skillet he brought us had so many pieces that were completely rare– or less–and had tendon running through it. The few pieces that were medium/medium-rare were better, but still gristle-y and just overall, not good. The steak was served in a skillet with what looked like oil sitting in the bottom (though our server later told us it’s a peppercorn teriyaki sauce.) Hubby and I both looked at each other and shook our heads. For $55 per person, this is not the quality or cooking expertise we would expect. I’m not expecting Shula’s steakhouse filet mignon, but for the premium price of this dining experience, I do expect a quality piece of meat that is cooked as requested. This was the point we decided ‘Ohana is best left with our good memories of delicious meals past. Though we were holding out hope that dessert would be the redeeming element of our meal…
This brings us to the famous ‘Ohana pineapple bread pudding! In my opinion, instead of the noodlegate petition, we need a bring back the banana foster sauce petition! I didn’t realize when reading the new menu that the bread pudding is now served with a homemade caramel sauce instead of my beloved bananas foster caramel sauce. Our waiter said it is a sea salt caramel sauce, which was good, but just not as good as having those delicious, caramelized bananas drenched in more yummy caramel, topping off the pineapple bread pudding. I used to eat at least two servings of this scrumptious treat myself! However, with this version I didn’t even finish the one that was served. Hubby is not a fan of bread pudding, so the waiter kindly brought him a bowl of vanilla ice cream (and didn’t even give him any Mickey sprinkles!) when he brought our check.
Let’s wrap this up. I knew going into this meal that it was going to be different from our “normal” memorable ‘Ohana meals of days past. I realize due to the pandemic nothing is “normal” anymore, and there are supply chain issues, in addition to the health & safety challenges to overcome. However, I didn’t think this meal was going to go bad on so many different levels. From not having the dipping sauces, the lack of flavors, MIA bananas, and the terrible quality/cooking of beef it, was just an overall miss. Maybe it was an “off” day, but this was just too expensive of a meal for us to repeat on the off chance this was a fluke. I think we’ll wait and see if they make any changes before we try this meal again.
How about you? Have you tried the new ‘Ohana yet? Do you have the same/different opinion? Share your comments with us below!