Kona Cafe — Restaurant in Bay Lake

We have had breakfast at the Kona Cafe twice now and were extremely satisfied both times. Honestly, I've had the same thing both times and can say that when I go back, I will have it the third, fourth and subsequent times. There's no way to go wrong with it.

The Kona Cafe has come highly recommended to us for the Tonga Toast, which brought us in the first time. It brought us back in, with guests, to share the experience with them. If you can swing a table in this restaurant for breakfast, book it and order this treat.

Fair warning, if you are trying to observe a keto diet, or almost any other kind of weight loss program, the Tonga Toast is not going to help. This amazing breakfast consists of a half-loaf of bread, it seems. It is stuffed with a banana mixture, fried and rolled in cinnamon sugar and then served with a strawberry compote that you will want to drink by itself. If that's not enough calories for you, you can also add regular syrup to it. Of course, it comes with some obligatory protein of your choice. I prefer the sausage, but my wife got the ham, which was pretty good as well.

To wash it down, you can choose coffee, fruit juices, or something stronger. I chose something stronger. The Polynesian Red Eye, which consists of rum, Liliko'i juice and grenadine. I'm not sure what this juice is, but is a nice tropical, sweet mix, similar to a Mai Tai or something of the sort. Combined with the Tonga Toast, it's a pretty sweet, sugary morning mix. I had to finish by having some coffee, which I can also say was a pretty good capstone for the experience.

Update: Once again, we found ourselves here, with the intention of entertaining guests. Over and over we've had people tell us that we should expand our horizons and try something just a bit new here. I'm of the opinion that if it ain't broke, don't fix it. With that in mind, we ordered our standard Tonga Toast. I don't see any reason to branch out from that, personally. I can't imagine what could possibly be better than a half a loaf of bread stuffed with banana, fried and rolled in sugar and then served with a strawberry puree along with syrup. Oh yeah, and there's some really good sausage you can get with it to boot. Combo made in heaven. Maybe next time something different? Probs not.

Incidentally, the staff was very helpful. Even though temp. checks were required along with social distancing, they allowed us to cram into one table rather than restrict it to the standard six people the table was designed to hold. This allowed us to eat together, rather than waving across the restaurant, or shouting back and forth. It helped the experience to be good, beyond the food.

Update: 03/16/21 We had every intention of being here at breakfast time for our good-old standby the Tonga Toast. Unfortunately, we missed the cut off by about 15 minutes and ended up with the lunch menu.

That may sound bad, but honestly, I prefer their breakfasts here. They're a great way to sugared up and ready to walk the marathon - that is, seeing Disney World.

Of course, with a Hawaiian theme, much of the food here is Asian influenced, so it highlights things like Sushi rolls, pot stickers, stir fry and the like. This is exactly what our lunch involved, except for the two people who do not care for Asian food. In their case, they got Mac & Cheese and a Crispy Cheddarburger.

The rest of us loaded up on noodles, fish, rice, chicken and veggies, in various forms. The food was good, and reasonable. The crowd was lower than many times in the past that I've been, so we were seated fairly quickly. Just a little quicker though and I'd have been reviewing that Tonga...

As a former cast member (Kona line cook) from long ago when they still had the Samoan for breakfast and the Kona Salad, I know the old school Disney rules and regs. Our server regularly vanished, leaving us wondering if we were going to get to place orders for much of anything. When we informed her that we can’t have anything spicy, no offer was made to bring the chef (old school practice to ensure our food restrictions were met) was made. Our table ticket clearly listed a celebration, but the old ways of Disney are clearly long gone. The managers used to make a point of stopping by to say hello and offer a kind word and, in our particular case, would have asked details and made a big deal about the nature of our celebration. Two former cast members celebrating their tenth anniversary in the very same restaurant they met in used to be a HUGE deal. The bartender Bianca at the bar made a seriously huge deal of it while we waited for our table to be ready. She asked the usual questions, and was genuinely happy to hear our story. We both liked her a lot, and she DEFINITELY made some Disney magic for us that night. Our server, not much more than the obligatory, “Congratulations.”

In my day, the chefs, front of house manager, and general manager would have made a big deal. Now? A halfhearted muttered word made in passing from the server as they head for the next table. I remember making appetizer platters, little extra touches to each plate (with attention to each individual event), and A LOT of well wishes and questions to make the celebrating guest feel extra special. We listened to our server offer bread to the other tables that sat after us, and get their drink and food orders in before we got our chance. Had we not come straight from Bianca’s very capable hands, I would not have been so patient. The rolls used to be made in house, and served with whipped macadamia nut butter that I remember fondly from my time on the line as well as the day I met my wife. That’s gone. Servers used to rush about to make sure every table was fed and happy. Not ours. The greeter used to smile and GREET guests. I know because I helped out in the holiday season a few weeks during a crisis. The greeter was a sullen little woman who had ZERO joy in her life and couldn’t care any less that we showed up for our reservation. Not so much as a greeting like, “Hello.” Truly a surreal experience compared to the days when I distinctly recall the front of house manager coming out to inspect our station and see that we were performing our duties as the rules stated. I am here to tell you all, those days are LONG gone. The Kona Cafe from our memories is dead. We couldn’t leave fast enough in the hopes that our tenth year monorail crawl would cheer us up. It did. Every other cast member we encountered outside of Kona was cheerful and pleasant and wished us well when they saw our celebration buttons, another gift from Bianca. The staff at the Grand Floridian mirrored Bianca’s demeanor. The bartender at Club 77 had the most amazing smile. They...

I have a passive goal to eat at all the Disney restaurants there are. I don't go out of my way to purposefully seek them out, but if I'm flipping through reservations, and I see a new one, I knab it. That's what happened here. I needed a place to eat at before fireworks, and this place crossed my path. So I made the reservations, showed up, and let the show begin.

First of all, the restaurant is beautiful. It's right there in the main lobby of the Polynesian resort, and it's exterior is like a Hawaiian, wavy kind of thing with giant, blue arches. I don't know, but it was neat to look at. Our extremely friendly server came over and gave us a little preamble, and then we started checking out the menu.

Before our app came out, we got surprise bread! Four, quaint little rolls with some butter on the side. Nothing fancy, but a very nice, warm start for our starving bellies. For our app, we did order the

Seafood Pu Pu Platter (Crispy Calamari, Rock Shrimp, Fish). This was a quaint little dish. Calamari was crispy, and there were plenty of tentacles, which I love. The rock shimp, if they were rock shrimp, were wasted in this format. You fry them, you destroy what's special about them. Shame. And it's also pretty funny that they say 'fish.' Like, what kind of fish? I'll never know. Overall, though, tasty, crunchy, a good app.

For my entree, I got the Polly Lolly Roll (Fried Soft-Shell Crab, Shrimp Tempura, Crawfish Tails, Grilled Asparagus, Chives, Spicy Mayonnaise). First of all, soft-shell crab is one of the best eats on the planet. So getting it in a sushi roll was incredible. You just don't see that very often. Bravo.

Second of all, the crawfish tails and the spicy mayo stepping in for a remoulade really made this a nice, Cajun-flared sushi roll. Not sure what the random shrimp was doing on top, presentation I reckon, but this was overall very nice.

I also got my hands on the Kona-braised Short Rib (Braised Short Rib, Kona Coffee-Mocha Sauce, Creamy Mashed Potatoes, Broccolini). Oooh this was good. The short rib is something that all Disney restaurants have down to a science. Fall-apart, richly sauced, very good short rib. That sauce was surprisingly delicious. Coffee-Mocha? Yes, please.

I will now take a pause to please plead with all the restaurants in all the world. Stop serving broccolini. It is not good. I'm sure it is good to some people, but those people will have to agree that there Are better vegetables out there that can easily be substituted. Come on.

I finished up the meal with something I can't find on the menu anymore. I think it was a 50th anniversary special. It was a Massive hunk of sheet pan bread pudding with a scoop of vanilla on top and a salted caramel served on the side. Ooey, gooey, decadent, the best part of the meal.

Overall, this place was nice. If you're on a quest to eat at all the Disney places, like I am, this place won't be one to...