Vegetarian's POV Roundup Rodeo

 By: Robbie

My husband and I were the vegetarians with Nick's party on opening day of Rodeo Roundup, and I'm happy to say that the food did not disappoint! I had a few concerns about mixing it up with the meat eaters at the same table, but Disney understands that sometimes vegetarians hang out with their meat eating friends and that there needn't be any conflicts with that. ☺

Actually I felt that the menu choices catered more to the vegetarians (as in, there weren't any unwanted and surprising bits of bacon added to any of the dishes on the menu), although vegans would have more limited choices. Here's a breakdown:

Cheddar biscuits with pepper jelly. A big old plate of these delicious biscuits came soon after our drinks were served and they did not disappoint. Warm, flakey, buttery and cheesy. What's not to like? Pepper jelly accompanied the biscuits, but really, it wasn't needed. I thought it was a little too sweet, geared more to children, than the stuff my grandmother used to make, so after tasting a bit of the jelly, I basically ignored it. I didn't need butter with these biscuits, but others might like that. 

Salads. A trio of salads were shared among the table that included a tomato salad, kale/Caesar salad, and watermelon salad. I'm not really sure what makes the kale salad non-vegan. They called the dressing "green goddess" , but it wasn't like the bottled green goddess dressing I was used to. Otherwise, the rest of the salads were vegan and quite delicious. Tomatoes tasted like tomatoes are supposed to taste and the watermelon was cool, sweet and delicious. I could have had that for dessert!

Sides. I could have made a full meal from all the sides! The table got to choose four dishes from eight available side dishes, of which three are vegan. We chose a carb heavy set that included married potatoes (potato barrels with a cheesy gravy), mac and cheese, street corn (delish!), and baked beans (vegan). 

Round up chow (main dishes). Our choice for vegetarians included a platter of roasted cauliflower, plant based sausage, and riblets. Honestly, it wasn't the best. If you like plant based meats, you'll enjoy it, but I find plant based sausage to have way too much sodium, and this was the ordinary bratwurst you find in supermarkets. The "riblet" was seasoned impossible burger shaped on a stick. It was similar to the kofta meatballs you can find over at Docking Bay 7 in the Felucian Garden dish, but was really kinda dry and hard. Thank goodness for the trio of BBQ sauces available to help that one out. The cauliflower had an interesting flavor, however, the way it was cut was just weird, as it was like they quartered a huge cauliflower so there were two huge chunks of it in the platter. I did like the flavor of it, though. 

Dessert. Each person gets to choose one from five. There was only one vegan choice, which is peach strawberry pie, and the one I chose. Others include lemon blueberry cheesecake, chocolate silk pie, apple pie and a cupcake. These are all served in small mason jars, with the exception of the cupcake. Mine was just okay so I would choose something different next time.

All in all, we really enjoyed our meal and would definitely go back for more.