Disney California Adventure Food and Wine Festival
I just got back from a trip to Disneyland to check out the opening day of Disney California Adventure’s Food and Wine Festival! I went with my three siblings and we ate alllllll the food and checked out all the fun so that I could give you a well rounded review of everything! I’ve put together tips and tricks from our visit as well as full reviews of all of the Disneyland food festival menus here! And don’t forget to check out this Disney packing list for everything you need to bring with you!
Disneyland Food and Wine Festival Dates and Hours
The Disneyland Food & Wine Festival is being held at Disney California Adventure Park from March 4 to April 26, 2022. The hours of the festival are typically from 10:30AM to 8:00PM but like with anything are subject to change per week so make sure to check the Disneyland website and the Food & Wine Festival guide you can pick up when you get into the park! One thing to note is that the festival typically doesn’t open until a couple of hours after the park. The park may open at 8AM (or even earlier with magic hours) and the food booths don’t open until 10:30AM. The booths also close before the park closes, typically a few hours before. In order to enjoy the Disneyland Food and Wine Festival, you must have a valid ticket to enter Disney California Adventure. You can’t just go into the park to enjoy the festival, you must purchase a ticket.
What to Do at Disneyland Food and Wine
There is so much to do at the Disneyland Food and Wine Festival!
Festival Marketplaces
The festival is full of festival marketplaces that offer festival specific food and drink items. There are 12 different festival marketplaces offered in 2022 as well as festival specific food options offered at various regular food locations throughout the park! I’ve put together a full Disneyland Food and Wine Festival foodie guide here with all of the menus. We ate EVERYTHING and I’ve included full honest reviews of all of the food and drinks we’ve tried, so make sure to check that out as well!
Festival Experiences
In addition to the food, the Food and Wine Festival is jam packed with festival specifics shows and performances! These are all of the things that have been announced so far for this year! Check your festival guide for specific times when you get to the park. These are just a few of the free, no-reservations entertainment options to look out for:
Culinary demonstrations where celebrity chefs prepare mouth-watering dishes (Backlot Stage, Hollywood Land)Live festival music Jammin’ Chefs
There are also a handful of additional fee, need reservation options such as mixology seminars you can take advantage of as well. You can find more information on these on the Food and Wine Festival website as well. These sell out quick so if you’re interested in doing them, I recommend booking in advance.
Kids at the Disneyland Food and Wine
The Food and Wine Festival isn’t just for adults! Disney has made sure to include a couple of kid specific activities to keep the fun family-friendly!
Alice’s Unbirthday Party cupcake decorating at Hollywood Backlot Stage – sign up 45 minutes before showtime! Meeting Chef Goofy (Hollywood Backlot)Dancing along with Chip & Dale at the Jammin’ Chefs performances Listening to the Jammin’ Chefs perform music on pots and pans!Getting their tasting passport stamped as they try different things at the food booths. If you try all of the booths and get your passport stamped, you can take it back for a stamp of completion. Not quite as fun as the stickers provided in the Epcot food and wine festival but still fun!Enjoying all of the kid-friendly food – especially the desserts!
Festival Merchandise
There is always some really fun festival specific merchandise available to buy – both for regular ticket holders and magic key holders! I somehow forgot to take pictures of the merchandise, but it’s fun! You can see everything available (including prices) in this post here.
Disneyland Food and Wine Menu
The food and wine menu varies slightly every year, and I like to do reviews on all of the food so I’ve created a post just for the Disneyland food and wine menu and reviews over here. You can get my full foodie guide over there.
Food and Wine Festival Magic Key Holder Perks
At most of their events, Disneyland offers exclusive perks that are available only to Magic Key Holders. This year the perks that I saw during our visit included:
Special Magic Key holder only seating area Discounted price on the Sip and Savor pass ($52 versus $57)Exclusive festival merchandise available to purchase Special lanyard for the Sip & Savor Pass just for Magic Key holders (it’s blue and has a fun 2022 design)
Sip and Savor Pass
Sip and Savor passes are back this year and if you use them wisely, they’re a great way to save a bit of money while you’re enjoying all the food in the park! There was a Sip & Savor Cart setup right at the beginning of the park (before Avengers Campus) where you can purchase the Sip & Savor Passes. Or you can also purchase them at Elias & Co, Festival Gifts, Festival Marketplaces, Julius Kratz & Sons, Rushin’ River Outfitters, Seaside Souvenirs if the line at the Sip & Savor Cart is long. The pass includes a lanyard, a list of what items the pass is eligible for, and eight little tabs secured onto the pass. DO NOT PULL THESE TABS UNTIL YOU’RE PAYING. If the tabs are pulled prior, they will be considered voided and not able to be used for purchasing food items. Passes cost $52 for Magic Key holders and $57 for non Magic Key Holders. Sip and savor passes give you eight coupons redeemable for select food and non-alcoholic drinks at the marketplace booths and on certain festival items at restaurants throughout the park. Items at the booths range from $5-$8.50 so plan carefully which items you’ll use your sip and savor pass coupons on so that you can make the most of it! The break even point for the Magic Key version is $6.50 per item and for the regular priced one is $7. I’ve also included notes in my post on the Disneyland Food & Wine menus which ones are the best use of your Sip & Savor Pass.
Disneyland Food & Wine Festival Tips
These are just a couple of tricks we picked up during our visit to help make your festival visit even better!
Avoid Peak Hours
Try to avoid eating at the booths during peak eating hours (11:30-1PM) and (6PM-8PM). The lines seemed much longer during these times. The lines were shortest first thing in the morning when the booths opened around 10:30. Also, if you see a short line at a booth you want to try, take advantage of it. You never know when that line will be long again! And if you have flexibility, check out the festival on a weekday rather than the weekend. Not only are weekends at Disney California Adventure just busier in general but there are also special events happening only on the weekends, so they’re going to be busier festival wise as well. One other thing to note – Disney California Adventure (and Disneyland) seemed to be busier after around 2PM when people got off school and locals (aka Magic Key Holders) came into the parks. If you want to avoid lines for food, I recommend doing as much as possible of the festival entertainment before those crowds hit the park, especially on Fridays.
Plan Ahead
You can buy everything you want for the festival at one kiosk then pick it up throughout the festival. So go through the passport (or this post) and plan out what you want. Find the shorter Order Here line you can and order everything at that booth so you only have to stand in the Order Here line once.
You’ll get one big receipt that you then can take to the Pick Up Here lines at each booth to pick up the food you’ve already paid for. It’s the best way to save time standing in lines!
I ordered 28 different items at once (I told you we ate it all) and they just crossed things off as I picked them up!
Just make sure you don’t order more than you actually want because the receipt with your orders is only good for the day you order.
Work together
If you’re visiting with multiple people and want to try food at multiple booths, split lines. As mentioned above, you’ll only need to stand in line to pay once but some of the pickup lines were pretty long too. Have one person (or multiple people) stand in each pickup line then meet back up to try the food. This works best if you have 3-4 people so you can pass the receipt along without having to get out of line.
Share
Share items so you can try more without having to buy everything yourself. You can buy another one later if it’s that good you want your own! If there’s a Magic Key holder in your group, take advantage of their ability to buy a less expensive Sip & Savor pass. Split the cost of the pass and share the food.
Drop it off
If you buy merchandise you don’t want to carry around, you can leave it at the package check at Elias & Co on Buena Vista for free. They can’t take food but were able to hold our other purchased merchandise. Or if you want to be able to take it in and out, the lockers at the front right by the bathrooms and fruit stand were $7 for all day and hold a lot of stuff!
Ask about allergies
If someone in your group has allergies, check the back of the Food and Wine Festival tasting passport for a list of foods that work for common dietary lifestyles like gluten-free, vegetarian, vegan, etc. I also highly recommend asking at the cashier about any allergens before you purchase any food. While some of the food items can be customized for allergies like not putting whipped cream on top of a juice, it seems like most things are at least somewhat pre-assembled, which would make it harder to customize. I can’t eat onions and found that a lot of the items had onions but in some cases, they were able to leave them off for me. It’s definitely worth asking! But don’t worry, if you can’t eat all the food and wine festival food, here’s a list of the best Disneyland food to check out instead! There is something for everyone!
Don’t Skip the Restaurant Festival Options
Some of our personal festival favorites were speciality items offered at the restaurants for the Food and Wine Festival. Make sure to check out your tasting passport or my festival foodie guide so you don’t miss out on some of these sleeper items that you won’t find at the marketplaces!
More Disney Planning Tips & Tricks
If you’re planning a trip to Disneyland for the Food & Wine Festival, these might help too!
Disneyland Halloween Food – the best Disneyland Halloween eats and treats available during the Halloween season! Oogie Boogie Bash 2021 – my review and tips for the 2021 Oogie Boogie Bash that’ll be updated with details for this year’s upcoming party!Best Disneyland Food – while you may be enjoying Food & Wine food, don’t skip out on these tried and true favorites!Pixar Fest Food – the best of the best food to eat on Pixar Pier! Comfy shoes for Disney – these are the BEST travel shoes. I wear them every Disney trip and have no problems walking for miles and miles in them!
