7 Best Lake Buena Vista Restaurants | Lake Buena Vista, FL

Written By: Gail Clifford | Published By: Foodie Flashpacker| January 21, 2023

Lake Buena Vista, Florida, perhaps best known as the gateway to Walt Disney World, contains many restaurants, stores, hotels, and vacation club lodgings to support the throngs of tourists that visit each year. Its official population, if correct at 24 (2021 census) makes it eligible for Newsweek’s Top 10 Smallest Cities in the United States.

7 Must-Try Lake Buena Vista Restaurants

Amare Mediterranean Restaurant

1255 Epcot Resorts Blvd, Lake Buena Vista, FL 32830 //+14079341609

Everything is so comfortable at Walt Disney World’s Swan Reserve, including its restaurant, the Amare. That doesn’t mean it’s not upscale, just that it’s even easier than being at home. You need only dress for a casual chic dinner, and you’ll fit right in one of the best lake buena vista restaurants.

Head to the third floor, the opposite direction from the lobby, where, greeted by a large wall of wine bottles, You know you’re in the right place. Turn to the left and the hostess at Amare will greet and seat you.

Amare, Italian for “to love,” takes its inspiration from the Mediterranean, but more south than the traditional areas covered. As discussed with Chef Maurizio, a hardworking New Yorker, who grew up on Long Island, but started working as a line cook at age 16, before graduating from high school and then enrolling in the French Culinary Academy and subsequently ALMA, the Italy Culinary Academy.

Chef Maurizio spoke to us about the differences between his classical training and what they’re doing here at the Swan Reserve.

“Chef Dan, the Executive Chef of the entire place, a brilliant chef, really steered me towards this area I’d never really explored, which is like Morocco, Turkey, Greece, these areas. You get the feel for it here.” 

Trained to use fresh ingredients, Chef allows diners to enjoy premium ingredients popular to the area, from seafood and beef to olive oils and pasta. Our group enjoyed items from each.

While most of my readers know that I am a “dessert-first” diner, the appetizer, The Niçoise Salad which was shared at the table. The only adjustment recommended, that Chef said he’d take under consideration, was to add even more potatoes. They were just so delicious.

Other appetizers include hearth fired prawns, Polpetti, chargrilled pepper crostino, charred octopus, and fried calamari. Additional salads on offer include the Tarpon Springs “Greek Salad,” Taverna Salad, and the Amare Salad.

Entrees covered the seafood and steak so popular in the area. Historic Florida had a thriving horse and cattle industry. 

Paula, our Visit Orlando host, ordered the Seabass. Highly recommended by our server, Niki, she tells us she may open 35 of the parchment stuffed pockets nightly. Two filets of sustainable striped seafood steamed to perfection with a concoction of wilted greens, thyme, garlic, tomatoes, and heirloom potatoes, it’s easy to see why it’s such a popular dish.

Stacey, the other travel journalist with me on this journey, ordered the Tonnarelli Alle Vongole. She laughingly tells us how her husband can’t appreciate the glory of six steamed baby clams and a roasted tomato sauce. Lucky for her, she certainly does. To accompany it, she ordered the Mediterranean White Wine Excursion. One thing she would have changed, had she realized it was a red sauce, was that she’d have ordered the red wine flight instead. 

The first wine, a Pighin Pinot Grigio from Fruili, Italy (2020) retained floral and fruity notes that was a refreshing accompaniment to the Niçoise Salad. The second wine, one of her lifelong favorites, Fleurs de Prairie Rose from Cotes de Provence, France (2020), is always delicious, she tells me, but a little light for this pasta dish. The final white wine, Pieropan Soave Classico (2019), was a nice accompaniment with the depth of fruit balancing the food’s acidity.

My choice came down to the two steak choices: the Rosemary Grilled Beef Tenderloin or the Bistecca All Fiorentina. I’d been leaning towards the Bistecca, but Niki shared that it was 20 oz, compared to the filet’s 10 oz, and she was easily able to add more potatoes to the beef tenderloin. Sold. Rosemary Grilled Beef Tenderloin it was. Served with root vegetables and a white bean puree that tasted suspiciously like a fine mashed potato, the asparagus added both texture and depth of flavor for a marvelous meal. With just a touch of added salt, it was too much food to allow for dessert later.

Reviewing the dessert menu, though, the one gluten-free option, the Amaro Flavored Sokolatina is a dark chocolate flourless sponge with chocolate mousse and chocolate sauce. With Paula’s encouragement, I accepted one to go. With Chef’s permission, I was able to see the serving line and witnessed the presentation of this dish plated. (insert kissing fingertips emoji).

Additional dessert options for subsequent visits include cannoli, Pistachio Caragli, a Calabrian Walnut Cake, and a Greek Yogurt Cheesecake.

Orlando region residents are fortunate to have such an excellent restaurant within our midst. It’s easy to see how it will become a local favorite.

Morimoto Asia

Disney Springs, 1600 E Buena Vista Dr, Lake Buena Vista, FL 32830 //+14079396686

You may be familiar with the name “Morimoto” from Iron Chef but recognizing the name and experiencing the food are two entirely different sensory experiences. Once you’ve been to Master Chef Masaharu Morimoto’s restaurant, though, you may find all your senses are instantly standing at attention. That’s now our experience when hearing the name and reliving our visit to his Disney Springs restaurant. His ability to interpret Japanese, Chinese, and Korean dishes is matched by the restaurant’s award-winning architecture and now MICHELIN Recommended restaurant. If you start your feast with your eyes, you’ll be enchanted the moment you walk in the door.

Welcomed quickly by fast-working, smooth-talking maître ds, we were promptly whisked back to our booth table by a lovely young woman wearing a kimono-style uniform. Drink orders taken, we had time to sit back and gaze around us.

Seated near the kitchen, the glass-lined area revealed a rack of Peking Ducks, ready to be delivered upon request. One duck serves two. Their roasted skins shone in the gentle spotlight, somehow away from the bright lights a busy kitchen requires to move smoothly.

Without a voice raised in the kitchen, the primary sounds you’ll hear are murmurs of contented diners enjoying their meals. See the other people that, like you, are gazing up to the ceiling, with its tiered strand chandeliers reaching a full story of the building. Upstairs, beneath a gently curving wave, spot the shogi-like doors, open in welcome.

Pictures of Asian faces alight the walls and add to the ambiance as do the Asian characters, painted in the most fortunate red against the dark wood beams.

Our smiling server, Emma, delivers water and asks what else we’d like to drink. She’s happy to assist with wine pairings and paring down meal decisions. With her guidance, the wine connoisseur of our group was able to choose between a light, crisp, refreshing white wine or a lively, vibrant, “fruit-forward” white wine. She also requested allergy information so she could assist with our choices and confirm we’d have no issue, which was incredibly helpful.

White wine and mocktail accompanied edamame served with thick sea salt. And another wonderful meal begins.

My colleagues chose sushi rolls, ordering the salmon and eel. The eel paired with avocado, they told me, is “fresh and delightful,” and, when accompanied by the thinly sliced ginger, “Just delicious.” We accidentally received this spider at first instead of the eel, so that was promptly replaced and appreciated by my sushi-loving friends.

They told me it’s very important to make sure you put the entire bite in your mouth to receive the full effect. Please note, even the delivery server made a point of identifying the food allergy of my colleague when the spider sushi was placed, so we were never in danger. 

As much for the photo opportunity as an anticipation of the enjoyment of the meal, we chose a buri-bop which was prepared tableside. His Korean-style yellowtail rice bowl is served in a hot clay pot, 450 degrees, our tableside chef told us, finished with an egg yolk and white rice.

The yellowtail is presented in the hot pot, promptly sliced into thinner sections, and pushed to the edges of the bowl to cook. He told us that only one side is cooked to leave the texture of sashimi. My colleagues tell me that it tasted as though it had cooked through. The bowl was so hot, the egg yolk cooked quickly. My colleagues felt it was as delicious as it looked entertaining.

With my celiac disease and challenges with Japanese sauces, my order was a simple orange chicken, but they had to hold the sauce and grill the chicken independently. This simple white rice and chicken dish was one of the best I had during this visit to Orlando.

What they say on those chef shows is correct: When it’s something simple, it must be perfect. Mine was. While they did have some dessert offerings, none of us had room to have anything else while at the restaurant, and we knew that walking around Disney Springs would give us plenty of opportunity to not only work off some of the calories but allow ourselves to digest and have another treat elsewhere. It’s easy to see that it would be quite possible to have your dessert here and complete your night at Disney Springs without visiting any other establishment.

On the second level, you’ll not only have an excellent view of the restaurant below but access to the sushi bar and chefs actively preparing sushi rolls for the guests on bar stools in front of them as well as other patrons. Over to the right, you’ll find the bar, another space to sit and enjoy a cocktail each night. 

Centrally located in Disney Springs, it’s important to have a reservation if you’d like lunch or dinner during traditional meal hours. There’s a companion bathroom upstairs with the restrooms on the main level at the back of the restaurant behind the staircase. Oh, and don’t be put off by the line up the side of the building… that’s for Gideon’s Bakery. With a reservation, the wait at Morimoto Asia is minimal. The staff is that good. 

And, on a personal note, it was my first ever TikTok. Our Orlando representative taught us how to upload them and we completed it before we ever left the building. You can see it gailclifford330. Follow me and I’ll follow you back!