I have been interested about one menu item in particular at SeaWorld Orlando's Spice Mill, and that's mostly because it seems to be hidden when looking at the various menu boards around the restaurant. Maybe, because it's under the heading "A Healthy Alternative", my eyes skip right past it.

Which is too bad, because the "Homemade Low Fat Vegetable Chili" (served in a gigantic bread bowl) is a great entry! If you don't like beans, this chili isn't going to change your mind about that. However, if you like a good, mild chili that is actually a bit more like a bean heavy vegetable stew, you might be surprised at how good this one is.

No, it's not spiced "hot", (or spiced that much at all really, just a bit of pepper, salt, and probably a pinch of garlic or onion powder). Most of the flavor comes from the tomato based broth and vegetables, of which, corn seems to be the most prominent (second to the various beans of course). The mixture stays warm in the fresh baked bread bowl... and that bread bowl is quite yummy as well.

The bread bowl may be why the dish isn't featured more prominently on the menu boards… we have heard that they do occasionally run out of the yummy bowls, before they run out of Vegetable Chili. Once you see the size of the bowl, you'll understand why they can't stockpile a bunch of these beauties… they take up a lot of room on a bread rack. If you really want to try this dish, I wouldn't wait until late in the day, when they're more likely to run out of bread bowls.

I'm not really sure how "healthful" the whole entree is. It's probably better for you than say, most of the other entrees served at the Spice Mill (which tend to be more of the fast-food variety). Eating an entire bread bowl the size of your head is probably going to add to your daily calorie and sodium count a lot more than just eating the chili alone. I however, am not watching what I eat, and the spectacle of the giant bread bowl adds to the fun of the dish!

Prices fluctuate at theme park restaurants occasionally, but the the "Vegetable Chili in a Bread Bowl" has historically been one of the more reasonable dishes at the Spice Mill, which make it a great find, and definitely something a little different than what you can pick up at other fast-food based locations.

Another quick tip… the Spice Mill does tend to get busy at peak times (i.e. "lunch" 11:30am-1:30pm)... and/or if a particular show has just let out and a ton of foot traffic passes by. If both food pick-up lines are open, and chocked full of guests, you may want to wait a half hour, and try again. Locations with a "one food line feeding into one register" type of set up take more time to get through than "distributed register" set ups.