Coral Reef Aug 08

[Minniespal]

Enjoyed reading your review ~ Thanx for posting.

 

[Jenvenza]

CR is great. I don't understand why people give it bad reviews. I think the only thing i would complain about is the fact there are SOSOOS many kids there late at night. Which isn't the restaurants fault at all, more bad parenting. One thing I did see was a VERY trashy woman complain that her party wasn't being seated because they were not all there. This was a case of a woman who at home has no power or control and so at Disney felt she should be treated a certain way. Either way she cause a fuss on Saturday night when CR wasn't taking walk in's, which shows how booked they were. She was inconsiderate and rude to the hostess. It took a lot for me not to say anything to her.

CR was great though!! See if you can get a booth! also portions are MORE than enough. I lot of people think that larger portions means better food IT doesn't. My portions at Disney were perfect. Fat America might not agree but America also dines at Fridays. Consider your sources. Also get the dinning plan. CR counts as 1 TS meal and that's your entree and dessert and drink (non alcoholic). It's worth it to get the plan in the long run. Our waiter was extremely friendly and this was at 830pm, clearly a long day.

Imagine that....kids at a restaurant in WDW!!! And shame on those parents for taking their children out to eat at a restaurant!

 

[Huskerfamilyof5]

Glad to hear about your experience, we have ADR in Dec. Been in touch with Debbie and have scheduled a diver and custom menu for my inlaws 50th Anniv. We have a 5 pm ADR so we can attend MVMCP that night. I too will have a hard time deciding what to eat.

 

[JTDisney]

I have been a couple of times with groups of 10 or so and not too many of us had good reviews of this place. The service was not very good as compared with some other restaurants. This one is off the list from now on. Try Jiko at AKL even though the entrees are approximately $5-10 more. It is well worth the extra money and the quality of food and service is fantastic.

 

[MlWinans]

My wife and I ate here earlier this year and it was TERRIFIC. By far my Wife and mines favorite meal we had during our week there. I to had read a lot of the negative remarks about it prior to our visit, but no matter how good everywhere will have a bad day here and there. The blackened Catfish, Crab legs and Pasta I know for sure are incredible, as are all the deserts.

I would recommend Coral Reef to ANYONE!!!

 

[cadeesmom]

Coral Reef is our favorite restaurant on site!! My kids love it and this was my husband's only request. We love the atmosphere and last time we were seating right next to the glass and the divers came right down and waved to my daughter and wrote her a note on a dry erase (don't know how that works). When we started talking about our next trip (well, me begging my husband, but that is a form of talking....) my duaghter said Coral Reef before Cinderella's Castle!

 

[Lynn5700]

Thank you for sharing!!! We love Coral Reef!

 

[Explodo]

My Wife and I just ate at CR this past thursday (9/4) and it was the most horrid resturant experience I've had in the last 5 years.

To start, we were sat at wonderful table, right next to the aquarium. We didn;t see our server for a solid 30 minutes. When he did show up, after introducing himself, he left for another 15 minutes. then he arrived to bring us water and take our drink order.

so 45 minutes...we have water on the table.

We ask to see the wine list...he dissapears for 15 minutes and returns to say the Coral reef has no wine list, that they are updating the wine list and they don't have any copy's of it. BUt we could order one of the wine suggestions under the Entree's on the menu....we ordered one.

So about 15 minutes later our server shows up, not with the bottle we ordered, but with another bottle, saying "WE were out of the one on the menu...will this one do?" We look at it...and think to ourselves..."If we say no, we may die of starvation"

we say yes...

He leaves then to find a wine opener and a couple of wine glasses....15 minutes later he shows back up. Pours the wine and starts to leave. We stop him and say...You could take our order if you want to. He takes our order, and leaves

so 45 minutes + 45 minutes = 1.5 hours and we have 2 glasses of wine on the table.

After about 20 minutes, nothing arrives at the table, our waiter goes by we ask him to send the manager over to our table. He nods.

5 minutes later the manager waltzes up and looks at us accusingly and says "Is there a Problem at this Table?" I explained as nicely as possible the situation, to which she replies "We're very sorry...it's not our fault" (I was agog at this statement) I asked her to at least get her poor server some help. She actualy looked at me and said "FINE, we do whatever it takes to make YOU happy"

so at about hour 2.25, we get our appitizer...followed at 2 minutes later with the entree. My steak was cold...the wife's salmon was raw...RAW....they didn't cook it!

At this point we called the manager back over...she wasn't happy to talk to us again. We pointed out the problems with the food...she didn;t beleive the salmon was raw until she prodded at it herself.

At this point she apologizes again...we asked for the food to be removed from the bill...they declined to do so. We asked for the bill with everything included so we could simply leave. They did so in about 15 minutes. we tipped the server 15% (I didn;t think it was his fault, as he was working 7 tables)

Honestly folks, this was the worst run resturant we ahve encountered in 5 years. The managing staff was inept...and the food was putrid.

To ruin such a wonderful atmosphere as they have in the coral reef with this level of crap is beyond belief. We wasted 3 hours of a very expensive trip...just to walk out still hungry and very pissed off.

We made sure to pass our experience on to Disney management...Our Consierge staff, and to the Disney Complaint department.

Good luck with this stink hole of a resturant.

 

[staceylynnga]

Wow, I am so sorry to hear about your experience. What time of day did you arrive at the Coral Reef? I am particularly bothered by the managers apparent lack of concern. There are always 3 sides to every story, but I am now rethinking my family's dinner res for January (me, my husband, and our son will be 18 months).

Anyone else have similar experiences recently?
Thanks!

 

[Explodo]

We were there at 7:05...

 

[BONITATIME]

I am sorry you had a bad time. I ate there in May and had the most wonderful meal and the service was awesome. Almost too quick.

 

[goofy4tink]

We ate there on Sat night, 9/6, about 5:30ish. We had eaten at CR a year ago and loved it. My dh was thrilled he was getting to eat there again. Last year we were seated right beside the aquarium...mostly due to the fact that we had the diver thing going on. And it was wonderful..great service, great food, great atmosphere. The only little issue I had were a couple of kids who kept squishing behind our seats to see into the aquarium....and that was the parent's fault, not the restaurant's.
So....we arrive at CR at about 5:20, for our 5:30ish ADR. We were finally seated at about 5:50. We were seated on the top tier, at a table along the short wall area. Our server did get to the table in a reasonable amount of time, but then he disappeared for about 15 mins. He seemed to have too many tables to take care of properly also.
My biggest issue this time around was the noise level. I realize I'm in WDW and there are going to be children. But, this wasn't normal happy kids making happy noise. It was screaming, unhappy kids. And the parents trying to be heard over their screaming children. A lot of larger groups it seemed.
We didn't stay for dessert.....we just wanted to get out of there. It left a very bad taste in my mouth. Now, my dinner, the NY Strip, left a very good taste in my mouth. My dh loved, as usual, his blackened catfish, and dd made short work of her NY Strip steak!!
I just wish it had been a wee bit quieter in there, but with the headache I got from trying to listen to my dh over the screaming children, well, I just wanted to escape.

I wonder if my table area made the noise worse. When we were down on the floor, it wasn't nearly as noisy. Yes, there was the noise you would expect but nothing like the noise we had Sat night. I wonder if being on the top tier seating, that much closer to the ceiling, made the noise worse.

 

[t1lersm0m]

How much does the scuba diver cost? Someone commented that they paid to have one for their parent's anniversary. I didn't realize you could do that.

 

[britincgn]

Diver is free

 

[t1lersm0m]

Diver is free

Wow, that's amazing. I thought for sure someone would reply saying $50-$100! Free! That's great. It's probably too late to set something up for our lunch September 26th?

 

[goingtodisney908]

Wow, that's amazing. I thought for sure someone would reply saying $50-$100! Free! That's great. It's probably too late to set something up for our lunch September 26th?

You should be within time to do the menu, diver would be questionable. I was 1.5 weeks away when I found out about the menu. We'll see next Friday if it happens, I sent all the information and pictures. Go to http://www.disboards.com/showthread.php?p=27495853#post27495853 to get more details.

 

[orlosipher]

I'm trying to decide between this dish and the mahi mahi for our dinner on 11/9. I've never had grits before and so don't know if I like them or not. If I get this dish and don't like the grits, will I still have enough to eat? Did the broccoli I saw in the OP's picture come with the meal, or was it ordered separately?

TIA!