Connections Eatery's Liege Waffles - Dessert, Breakfast, or a Soft Pass?
One of our family traditions when leaving the Magic Kingdom, was to stop by the Main Street Bakery and get a warm, gooey Cinnamon Roll with sticky vanilla drizzle. Sometimes I switched things up and got a hand made ice cream sandwich where two large, warm chocolate chip cookies or oatmeal cookies were glued together with two scoops of hand-dipped vanilla ice cream.That all ended on January 12th, 2013 when they closed the Main Street Bakery and then reopened it five months later as a Starbucks. Don't get me wrong — I like Starbucks, but I really miss that end-of-day dessert treat before we left the park. I mean, a Starbucks Cake Pop or day-old Iced Lemon Poppyseed Loaf just isn't the same as a giant gooey, yeasty, Cinnamon Roll.
The only other Disney park I've been able to find that has a counter service location near the exit — where you can sit down with a dessert for a couple of minutes before leaving the Disney bubble — is Epcot's Connections Eatery. So we decided to stop by the other day and just grab a couple of dessert items, to try and revive an old tradition.
This review is really just about a couple of dessert items. If you would like to read a more complete review for Connections Eatery — click here.
The two items we ordered from the "dessert" menu were both Liège Waffles — one was a festival offering called Figment’s Liege Waffle that was said to have an Ube (purple yam) filling and the Connections Eatery's normal Liege Waffle — which is described as being brioche dough with pearl sugar, strawberries, whipped cream and chocolate sauce.
Now I wasn't around in the 18th century when the first Liège Waffles were created — but the two waffles that Connections Eatery plated sure could have been. If you've ever wondered what it would feel like to bite into one of those foam blocks they use as a base to make plastic flower arrangements with — I highly recommend either of these waffles. But I'm getting ahead of myself.
Back in the day (and we're probably talking mid 1700's here), Liège Waffles were served both hot and at room temperature — they were often times not served with any toppings or coatings at all — and were kept on the shelves of any respectable Belgium bread shop... very much like you'd find bagels or bread at a modern day Panera or WaWa. Because they didn't have microwaves back in the 1700's, folks just grabbed a couple and ate them on the run. In that respect — the serving temperature of Epcot's Liège Waffles was on-point. Considering you don't really have to "do" anything to make an item room temperature though, makes that fact a little less impressive.
This Liège Waffle is described as being a brioche dough waffle with pearl sugar, strawberries, whipped cream and chocolate sauce.
Some people might be familiar with Belgian Waffles — a light, airy waffle that lends itself well to many desserts. But even if you've never had one of those — surely the very popular Eggo Waffle is something that almost everyone has tried at one point or another. Both of those waffles are (generally) served warm, and surprisingly — I would consider both of those waffles to be sweeter than Connections Eatery's Liège Waffle. (I'd go so far as to say that eating the Eggo box would be sweeter than Epcot's Liège Waffle, but I digress.)
I wrote "surprisingly" because a well executed Liège Waffle should have a fair amount of Pearl Sugar in the dough. Where most waffles are made with a liquidy batter, Liège Waffles are made with a raised dough that contains pearl sugar. If your waffle iron isn't hot enough, you should get little crunchy bits of pearl sugar with every bite. If your waffle iron is super hot, the sugar near the outside of the waffle will start to caramelize and give the waffle an even crunchier, almost Creme Brulee-like crunch here and there.
The Epcot Liège Waffles didn't seem to have any pearl sugar crunch in them anywhere. The only possible explanation that I can think of is — they didn't add any pearl sugar to begin with. If they did, however, and these were perfectly acceptable Liège Waffles at one time — after a day (or even after a freezing and re-thawing process) the sugar was reabsorbed back in to the cooked, room temperature waffle — giving the end-product a dense, chewy, yet somehow also dried out bite. Fresh, is best. These were not.
Flavorwise
The description of the special, limited-time, festival waffle is a little vague… "Figment’s Liege Waffle – A Liege Waffle with Ube Filling". An Ube — is a purple variety of sweet potato… well it's more like a yam actually, that has a naturally sweet and nutty flavor.
This is a special festival-only Liège Waffle from Epcot's Connections Eatery. It's called "Figment’s Liege Waffle".
There were 3 small pill-sized pockets of wet, runny, liquid purple inside the waffle. I'm guessing that might have been the Ube Filling. The purple liquid had no decreeable flavor. I wish the purple, crunchy looking frill stuck to the outer edge of the waffle had been some type of Ube product, but I suspect it was some kind of pasty crumble — that was neither flavorful or crunchy, as it turns out.
The predominant flavor of the Figment waffle was simply "white chocolate" and that was coming mostly from the piped icing and whatever icing was being used to hold the purple crumble to the side of the waffle. The figment in the center of the waffle was printed on that white chocolate "coin" with edible ink.
The Figment Liege Waffle is said to have an Ube (purple yam) filling — however, I think the crumble on the outside edge of the waffle might have been some type of pastry or cookie crumble. If it was made out of dried Ube, it didn't add much flavor or texture to the waffle.
I tried to eat this one with a knife and fork, but now that I think about it — maybe one is supposed to just pick it up like a donut? The entire item was room temperature and there wasn't anything that would fall off or run if tilted too much in one direction or another.
The Strawberry and Chocolate Liège Waffle was also room temperature and also very hard to cut with a knife and fork. If you were to pick this one up — it would have to be "open faced toast" style.
The waffle was easier to taste-test on it's own here, because it wasn't totally covered with berries or chocolate. The "flavor" was practically non-existent — other than to say it tasted a little like a dry brioche bread. Dry, but not crumbly… it was evenly dense throughout and held together quite well. Like the Figment waffle though, there was never a time where I felt a "crunch" or tasted a small pop of additional sweetness from anything like pearl sugar or caramelized pearl sugar.
The strawberries were very colorful and very lightly macerated — too lightly (if you ask me) considering the waffle itself was so unsweet and dry. It's hard to say if the strawberries were fresh cut or not — their texture was great, but they had very little flavor and became white near the core of the sliced berry. The whipped cream was of the light, airy (straight from a can) variety, and the chocolate drizzle was very much like a chocolate sauce you might put on some ice cream.
This liège waffle "dessert" item at Connections Eatery is served "room temperature".
A dense chocolate ganache might have been enough to sway me into at least calling this one a "dessert" but ice cream topping style chocolate is too runny and didn't hold it's flavor against the bread-like waffle or the berries.
Cost and Conclusion
At least Disney has managed to keep these "desserts" at a reasonable price level. Both were priced just under $6.00. However — I wouldn't call either of these waffles "desserts". They're more like breakfast items — and not great ones at that. Given the choice between a bowl of oatmeal with berries and a drizzle of chocolate or one of these liege waffles — I'd go for the oatmeal — and I'm not a fan of oatmeal.Needless to say, I'm still looking for my end-of-visit, leaving the Disney bubble, dessert item — of days gone by. Other than the actual food items though, I have to say, my feelings about the usefulness, design, and cleanliness of Connections Eatery has remained unchanged.
I think it's a decent improvement over the Electric Umbrella (the location that was retired to create the Connections Eatery and Connections Cafe complex). It's big, probably as clean as a large volume counter service location in a theme park is going to be. The condiment, utensil, and self-serve beverage islands are large and easy to access.
One of several self serve Coke machines at Connections Eatery.
I didn't really interact with much of the cast on this visit, but the lady that took my order seemed pleasant enough and was engaging with guests — and the overall cost of the items is in-line with other similar locations. In fact, I think Disney is doing a pretty good job of managing the costs -vs- quality ratio in these Counter Service Level Two locations.
Although completely unrelated to this review — the french fries seem to be an item of choice at Connections Eatery. For around $5.00 one can buy a side of fries and you can pump all the little cups ketchup you want at the condiment bar. I have had the fries here before — they are very good — and now I'm beginning to understand why each time I've visited Connections Eatery, I've witnessed several guest that have just purchased a side of fries and a soda. They are, that good. Maybe I should just see if they'd dust an order of french fries with powdered sugar for me. That — would be closer to the craveable dessert item that I'm looking for — than the liège waffles will ever be.
