Tusker House Review - Animal Kingdom - Walt Disney World - May 15, 2019

Today we are reviewing Tusker House, located at Disney's Animal Kingdom. This is a Character Dining Experience for Breakfast, Lunch and Dinner. Originally Tusker House was a walk up restaurant serving rotisserie chicken mainly. But in November of 2007 it was changed to a Buffet restaurant with Character Dining for Breakfast. Later it was changed to Character Dining for all three meals of the day. 

Tusker House serves

• Breakfast from 8:00 a.m. until 10:55 a.m. 
• Lunch from 11:00 a.m. until 3:30 p.m.
• Dinner from 3:35 p.m. until 8:30 p.m.

And if you are doing the Rivers of Light Dining Package this restaurant is on the list for that package at this time.

It's located in the Harambe Village of Africa in Animal Kingdom near the Safari Ride.

This menu board is located near the Dawa Bar. 

If you walk through the Dawa Bar you will find the Check-in Podium for Tusker House. This is the sign on the ceiling of Dawa Bar.

Part of the outdoor decor can be seen from the podium.

A list of menu items is located at the podium so that you can see if these foods are something you are interested in. I'm not usually fond of foods with a lot of strange (for me) tastes. But I have to say that I tried 33 menu items here and there were only 2 that I wouldn't repeat. Both of those contained cilantro (and you know I don't like cilantro). I'll note which ones I tried by an asterisk next to the name of the item as I list them near their pictures.

To be sure you are aware of the pricing they have this reminder card on the check-in podium as well.

Then there is the allergy card that explains all about how a buffet works. If you have food allergies you can speak with the chef to find out what is safe for you.

After you check-in you'll be asked to wait in the outdoor area.

They will send you a text when your table is ready and you will be pointed to this sign.

Stop and take in some of the ambiance that is best done by Disney imagineers. Here's a shot of the outside of the restaurant by the entrance doors. Just look at all of the interesting objects.

Once inside the ambiance continues. There are several dining rooms. And yes, that is Mickey in the back corner. Tusker House has Safari Mickey, Safari Minnie, Safari Donald, Safari Daisy and Safari Goofy as the Characters. They will come by the table one at a time in a continuous loop. We saw each of them twice while we were there. They do stop and pose for photos if you like and will interact with the kids at your table.

On the table was a beer and wine list.

And a cocktails list is on the back of the beer and wine list.

Once you've ordered your drinks. You can go to the buffet. The room is very large with a lot of different food stations.

I'll try to show you all of the stations. I don't have close up photos of the food as it's a buffet so I didn't want to be that close trying to take photos while people were trying to get food. But will show you each station and let you know what was on that station.

Starting at the right side of the room you will find the Carving Station with Pork Shoulder* and Peri Peri Salmon* with a sweet and spicy mustard*. Both of these were very good, the pork was tender and juicy and the salmon was perfectly cooked, but did contain bones.

Then we found The Kids Meals in the next 3 stations. First was Mashed Potatoes*, Sautéed Green Beans* and Rotisserie Chicken Drumsticks*. These were good dishes cooked perfectly and hot.

Then came the hot foods for the kids. This included Chicken Mini Corn Dogs, Mac and Cheese*, and Corn Medley*. If the little boy in front of us was any indication the corn dogs must have been pretty fabulous as he had a plate of about 25 of them. The Mac and cheese was great, a mix of cheeses and spiral macaroni, the corn medley was a great side dish as well.

The next station for the kids was sandwich items. Pickle Spears, Cheese Cubes, Applesauce and Sliced Ham and Turkey. We didn't take any food from this station as we were trying to have items that were indicative of the restaurant.

Now on to the hot foods. This station has Plantains, Rotisserie Chicken*, Mealie Pap* and Pigeon Peas and Rice*. What is Mealie Pap you say? Mealie Pap is a dish similar to grits but smoother and usually includes parmesan cheese cheddar cheese, onion and butter along with the yellow corn meal. The rotisserie chicken is perfect cooked on their open flame rotisserie pits. The Mealie Pap was great, a good corn flavor. The pigeon peas and rice was a nice side dish.

The next station was Gravy*, Mashed Potatoes*, Collard Greens* and Kushri*. Kushri is a pasta dish with a tomato sauce. The collard greens had great flavor, the Kushri was a hearty tomato pasta dish.

The next station has Tzatziki Sauce*, Vegetarian Somasa* (think empanada-ish), Roasted Potatoes*, Roasted Root Vegetables*, and Vegetable Tandoori*. The roasted Potatoes, root vegetables and tandoori were all great flavored dishes.

The next station had Spicy Coconut Shrimp Curry*, Basmati Rice* and Cape Malay Curry Chicken (this had cilantro). The Shrimp Curry and rice were great.

Then we move on to the cold portion of foods. This station had Golden Beet Salad, Trek Salad and black eyed pea salad*. The black eyed pea salad was a good side dish.

This was the fruit station with Cantaloupe, Pineapple and Grapes.

The next station was condiments. Butter, Chutney*, and Hummus*. I enjoyed the two hummus with the pita bread and they were very tasty.

The next was the salad bar. With Italian Dressing, Coconut Curry Dressing, Tomatoes, Cucumbers, Calamata Olives, Broccoli, Bread and Butter Pickles and a spring mix of greens.

The last station in this line was he bread station with Pita Bread*, Cluster Oat Bread, Moroccan Bread and Herb Focaccia Bread*.

In the middle of the room you will find the dessert stations. there are four sides to this station.

This is the Cookie station with Chocolate Chunk Cookies and Oatmeal Raisin Cookies.

This side of the Dessert Station had Banana Creme Raspberry Cake*, Pecan Chocolate Tarts* and Chocolate Pecan Turtle Brownies*. We did share one of each of the little desserts. They were all really good and would do any of them again.

This side has the sweet breads, Raspberry Chocolate Chip Bread, Blueberry Bread Strawberry Cake with White Chocolate* and and Chocolate Cheesecake*.

This side has the Banana Bread Pudding*, and Zebra Coffee Cake.

All in all we did like the food here very much, the characters were very attentive and it was a great experience. 

Some of the recipes that can be found in the Disney Cookbooks for Tusker House are as follows.

• Taste of Epcot - Page 36 - Bobotie
• Cook Book - Page 12 - Mealie Pap
• Cooking with Mickey - Page 29 - Grilled Vegetable Sandwich
• Chef Mickey - Page 119 - Cape Malay Lamb Curry
• Kitchen Magic - Page 54 - Marrakesh Style Vegetable Stew
• Kitchen Magic - Page 55 - Spiced Tandoori Tofu

Make sure you look around when you are there, there's some awesome things to see. 

If you are planning to go from here to Avatar Land there's a nice walk down the waterway that takes you directly to Avatar Land from Harambe Village. Who wouldn't want to take this walk?

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Don't forget to check out the...

• List of all of the Places we've eaten.
• Blog Posts Chronologically

Blog Posts coming soon

• The Ganachery
• Cappy's Pizza
• Kobe Steak House
• D-Luxe Burger
• Raglan Road