Epic snacks at DisneySea

Everything I’d heard about Tokyo Disney’s snack situation before coming to Japan (“mythic,” “delicious,” “kawaii,” “extraordinary,” “unbelievable,” “best ever”)? Yup. They were all true.

The famed Tokyo Disney snacks were one of the things I was most excited about before visiting. Sure, I wanted to see the parades and experience all the new-to-me attractions. But honestly, throw Disney-themed food into the mix and there’s no contest.

We got a taste of what was in store for us during our first day at Tokyo Disneyland, where we had alien men mochi balls, Mickey and Minnie shaped popsicles, and soy sauce popcorn. Well, the snack options just kept topping themselves as the trip went on. I didn’t think you could get much better than the mochi (so good!), but I was wrong. DisneySea had SO MANY amazing eats, and we did our darnedest to try them all.

Mama Biscotti’s Bakery

First up — the pastries!

This cafe was located just off the main entrance of DisneySea. They served all sorts of goodies: coffee & lattes, danishes, flatbreads, muffins, mousse, and even my favorite little mochi balls.

We ate here twice during our visit. Easy, convenient, and delish.

The Potato Churro

Next we have the iconic churro, this time with a twist. It was POTATO flavored! It was like eating a gigantic french fry, aka the Happiest Snack on Earth.

Like with the popcorn, there are actually a ton of different churro flavors throughout the resort. This particular churro stand was located in Mysterious Island, but they had others — fairly certain I saw a chocolate flavored churro at one point, and they also had Mickey shaped churros by Splash Mountain in Tokyo Disneyland.

* Everlasting shout out to Mark for tolerating my incessant need to photograph everything before we can eat it *

Sea Salt Monaka

It wouldn’t be a trip to DisneySea’s famous Mermaid Lagoon without a Sea Salt Ice Cream Monaka. (Although, ironically, we actually got this in the Lost River Delta, across from Indiana Jones.)

Still kicking myself for not trying the Mickey tiramisu bar! But hey, next time.

The Monaka was heavenly. Vanilla ice cream sandwiched between two sweet shell shaped wafers. Could we please bring this to Anaheim?

Curry Popcorn

Just down the way from the Mermaid Lagoon is the Arabian Coast, home to curry flavored popcorn! We’d tried the soy sauce popcorn a couple days prior (& loved it) and knew we had to give this one a go, too.

It was nice and spicy, but in a subtle way. I loved the salty taste of the soy sauce popcorn, but I think this one was my favorite. Caramel wasn’t bad either, but since caramel isn’t as rare of a flavor, it didn’t stand out nearly as much as curry & soy sauce. We never ended up trying the chocolate or honey flavors — yet another reason to visit again!

Oh, and remember that Toy Story Mania madness I mentioned? How practically the entire park waits in line for Fastpasses first thing in the morning, so the rest of DisneySea is gloriously empty? Here we have proof! Compare these pictures of the Arabian Coast with our first afternoon at DisneySea, and it’s like night and day.

Chandu Tail

Of course a trip to the Arabian Coast isn’t complete without a Chandu Tail! This fabulous snack is based off of Sinbad’s Storybook Voyage, a dark ride in DisneySea (think: It’s a Small World, only with a better storyline, animatronics that are 343728947382943 times more advanced, and characters who speak only in Japanese). The snack, in essence just a steamed bun filled with chicken, is meant to emulate Chandu, Sinbad’s kawaii tiger sidekick.

I’m a huge fan of savory snacks, so this little guy might’ve been my favorite snack in all of DisneySea. It’s hard to say for sure since everything was so ridiculously delicious.

The mini Stitch head was a souvenir snack holder that I couldn’t pass up. They had these all over the resort, in all sorts of different characters, and by the end of the trip we’d collected Stitch, Chip ‘n Dale, R2D2, and BB-8.

The Chandu Tail was just as good as its attraction counterpart — the Sinbad Storybook Voyage ride. I didn’t know anything about this ride prior to getting on, and was SO wowed by it.

First off: it’s LONG, in the best way. We’re talking maybe 15 minutes start to finish. We were running in a state of perpetual exhaustion, walking 8+ miles everyday, and this was a welcome respite. Second: the design of the ride is so impressive. The robot animatronics are really high tech, and each scene is so well done.

Third: THE MUSIC. It’s all in Japanese, so I have no idea what they were saying, but that didn’t matter. The tune is so damn catchy that we ended up buying the DisneySea soundtrack just to have it. Turns out it’s an original song written specifically for the ride by Alan Menken, the guru behind the Little Mermaid, Beauty and the Beast, and Aladdin.

Gyoza Dog

Another favorite from the food category at Tokyo’s DisneySea was the gyoza sausage bun from the Nautilus Galley in Mysterious Island. The steamed gyoza bun is shaped like a hot dog, and filled with diced pork.

Best part? Nautilus Galley also serves hot, spiced wine. It was the perfect complement to the gyoza, and a cozy way to warm up in the chilly November weather. It took me back to my Copenhagen days, when I drank gløgg as much as was socially acceptable. So, yeah. I was in heaven.

I can’t remember the exact name of this one, but it was a muffin-type treat filled with a thin layer of caramel custard.

Mark loved it.

Donald Duck Ukiwa Bun

The last of the eats on our marathon DisneySea snack fest was the Donald Duck ukiwa bun. It’s yet another steamed bun, this time filled with shrimp, shaped like a life preserver, and served in some adorably epic packaging.

They sell it just between Cape Cod and Port Discovery, and we grabbed one all of 5 minutes after finishing the caramel filled Mickey head. What can I say – it really was a day of snacking.

Can you believe we ate all these goodies over the course two days? And that doesn’t even include our dinner at Magellan’s or the three course lunch we had at Restaurant di Canaletto, an Italian themed eatery in DisneySea’s Mediterranean Harbor. Miraculously, we never left the park with that post-sugar-coma, lethargic “I’ve made a terrible mistake” sort of feeling. Don’t get me wrong, the snacks at Tokyo Disney aren’t health food by any means. But they don’t quite feel like pure theme park food either.

There might just be a few teaspoons of pixie dust sprinkled in.

xx,

K