Epcot International Food & Wine Festival embracing Epcot’s 35th anniversary with new offerings
This year’s International Food & Wine Festival at Epcot is sure to delight every guest’s palette, and with this year being Epcot’s 35th anniversary, Disney foodies are going to celebrate in style with new marketplaces, kid-friendly offerings and more.
This year, Food & Wine is expanding into Future World, bringing along three all-new marketplaces: Active Eats, Coastal Eats and Flavors from Fire. This year will also bring the very first Light Lab, an all-new, family-friendly offering that is out of this world.
The offerings at Active Eats are designed to satisfy the park-goer’s appetite with food to keep them fueled all day, like Loaded Mac ’n’ Cheese, or the Sweet Avocado Crema with Strawberries, Yellow Cake and Tortilla Streusel.
Coastal Eats features flavors from oceans all over the world – like the Seared Scallops with Roasted Corn and Butterbean Succotash and Chili-Chipotle Butter Sauce below.
Flavors from Fire will add heat to Future World’s fire, with spicy food and beverage offerings like Piggy Wings, Chocolate Picante and Smoked Corned Beef with Crispy Potatoes, Pickled Onions and Blonde Ale Beer Fondue.
One exciting new offering is the Light Lab, a blacklight lounge offering a kid-friendly atmosphere and specialty concoctions that glow, like the T=C ², made of vanilla tonic water and cotton candy.
Three classic Food & Wine marketplaces will make a return to Food & Wine this year: India and Thailand, both returning for the first time since 2009; and Spain, returning for the first time since 2010.
This year will also bring The Almond Orchard, hosted by Blue Diamond Almond Breeze, which will offer desserts like Banana Almond Sundaes, as well as beverages to compliment the perfectly snackable almonds.
Merchandise is also set to be more inclusive this year, with a new Dooney & Bourke design featuring Figment and countries from the World Showcase, as well as a special Passholder-only design. A new take on Mickey Ears, as well as the classic Food & Wine souvenirs that guests love will also be a part of the merchandise lineup this year.
To further celebrate 35 years of Epcot, this year’s Food & Wine Festival seeks to make things more kid-friendly. On each festival guide map, a smiling strawberry will appear at all locations that are geared more toward children and their entire families for foodie fun.
Epcot will also celebrate 35 years with the Epcot Legacy Showplace, housed inside the Odyssey Pavilion. This culinary showcase will reintroduce guests to Food & Wine classics like the Chilled Scotch Egg wrapped in Sausage with Mustard Sauce, Zesty Cheeseburger and Cheddar Cheese Macaroni Handwich, and more.
The “Eat to the Beat” concert series will no doubt pack the stage during the festival, with 32 acts comprised of returning performers and 11 newcomers. You can check out more on the lineup for the concert series here.
The 22nd Epcot International Food & Wine Festival begins on Aug. 31, and runs for 75 days through Nov. 13. For more information on the festival and its offerings, visit tasteepcot.com.
