REVIEW: The ONE Reason You Must Eat at Toadstool Cafe in Super Nintendo World at Universal Studios

While we were out having our perfect day at Universal Hollywood, no perfect day would have been complete without stopping into Super Nintendo World.

In between squeezing in all of the character meet and greets, taking a spin (and avoiding the banana peels) on the new Mario Kart: Bowser’s Challenge ride, and playing with the PowerUp bands we worked up quite an appetite and naturally had to try out Toadstool Cafe!

From the moment you step foot into Super Nintendo World you really can feel like you’ve been transported to another land… and maybe truly sucked into the screen to become part of the game.

The larger-than-life obstacles and theming are ripped right from the levels you’ll find across all of the Super Mario and Nintendo games but one space we found very unique was their restaurant — Toadstool Cafe.

Background

Toadstool Cafe is the only dining option within Super Nintendo World currently. It echos the same fully-immersive theming you’ll find throughout the land and we felt like they really kept the momentum going into even the smallest details here.

Here you’ll be introduced to a heavily themed array of menu items made by Toad and all of his companions to keep you strong and capable through the rest of your gameplay (day). You might even get a peek at the back side of the kitchen staff through the help of a few cleverly placed screens.

We felt like we just needed a bit more amped up a notch or two to match such an elaborately themed and well-thought-out restaurant in other ways. However, because of its exclusivity and leaving a lasting impression on us, we totally support making it a “must-do” when visiting Super Nintendo World.

Atmosphere

So now that you have a little bit of a background to this restaurant, let’s take you through the whole experience. Your dining experience here will actually start well before your dining time as you’ll need to make a reservation to enter. In order to do this, you’ll need to scan a QR code in the land to get onto the walk-up or reservation list. Once that is done, you will get a return time to enter.

The only thing that really bothered us about this process was that you and everyone else who has the same reservation time are let into the restaurant all at once so if you’re looking to minimize your wait, our best advice is to be near the entrance so you can be one of the first let in at your designated time. Once you’ve stepped inside you’ll be able to order at the counter from the full menu.

After you’ve placed your order at the counter you’ll be directed over to the main dining area to find a table. The theming of this restaurant blew us away! The inside was really elaborately themed and it really feels special to step inside. It was really fun to see the scenes change outside the window between a happy toad town followed by an apparent attack from bullet bills which makes the restaurant turn dark inside. You may also catch a glimpse of Luigi running by!

The center of the restaurant features the iconic “super mushroom” encased in acrylic on display just underneath a green pipe tunnel. It’s surrounded by a decorative almost stained glass-looking set of panels (yes, just like the windows in the game) of other types of “powerups” like the turnip and star you’ll be familiar with if you’ve played a Mario game a time or two.

As you make your way through the dining room you’ll see the interactive story windows that look like a view of the outside land (but they’re really just screens) that will change with whatever is going on in the story at the time.

Although those things were lighthearted and fun when the lighting and the music changed, overall there were times when some parts of the theming left us feeling lackluster.

As you’re seated you may notice the mushroom tops that have been folded down as the overhead lighting against the more dimly lit restaurant. The tables are offered in square, rectangular sections but there’s also an option for booth seating if you prefer that.

The table tops are made to look like you’re dining off of freshly cut wood and the seats are topped with wooden mushroom tops making them a bit easier to pull out from the table.

We were very impressed with the attention to detail here and looking around the restaurant just to take it all in might have been our favorite thing of this whole experience. It certainly helped cushion the frustration we experienced with waiting here, as it seemed like every time we moved on to the next step there was another wait. You get into the restaurant and then wait to order. You’ll place your order and then wait to be seated. You’ll finally be seated then you have to wait for the food you’ve already waited to order… you get the idea. So while this is technically a quick-service restaurant, just expect that you will be waiting (sometimes longer than you may anticipate) between what you’ve just done and your next step toward eating your food.

Food & Drinks

We know the land is super immersive so we KNEW to anticipate some highly themed food to match. Their menus are pretty extensive with several starters and salads…

…beverages…

…entrees and dishes…

… and dessert options.

There are even a few kid’s menu options to choose from!

So out of all of that, we chose the Super Mushroom Soup, Piranha Plant Caprese, Chef Toad Short Rib Special, and finished off our meal with the Princess Peach Cupcake. We also ordered the Super Star Lemon Squash to keep in theme.

For starters, we need to talk about the Super Star Lemon Squash. This drink is made of honey lemon soda with mango stars and assorted tropical bobas. This fruity beverage costs us $8.

We really enjoyed the distinct added sweetness to the drink against the carbonation but overall it tasted to us like mango sweetener added to a lemon-lime (Sprite) soda. The boba was more consistent with popping pearls as opposed to Tapioka boba found in some drinks which weren’t bad, they just added to the fruitier taste when burst.

While we really enjoyed this powered-up Sprite-like soda, we realized that the extra sweet flavor might be a bit much for someone who’s looking for a more mild carbonated but sweet-flavored drink.

Then our food started to arrive at the table! The first we want to talk about was one of our starters the Super Mushroom Soup. It’s made of creamy mushroom soup with Super Mushroom crackers that are themed on top. It’s also served in an adorable Super Mushroom souvenir bowl that’s included in the price. This one cost us $19.99.

The top of the mushroom head lifts off to reveal the mushroom soup sitting in a foil container inside the bottom. We really appreciated this because it kept cleaning up to take it with us a lot easier and so much simpler. When you first see the mushroom soup it looks pretty standard for a creamy soup but the mushroom-stamped crackers do come on top of the soup.

We thought the soup was FANTASTIC — we found it to be incredibly creamy and savory and we enjoyed every spoonful even when we were scraping the bowl clean. It melted in our mouths but we also know this dish could be a bit divisive because there are chunks of mushroom in the soup. If you’re not someone who likes an earthier mushroom soup or doesn’t do well with textures, this might not be the soup for you. We also want to note that if you’re not a mushroom fan, you can get the same souvenir bowl with the tomato soup option instead.

Then we moved on to the Piranha Plant Caprese.

This dish is made of tomatoes, fresh mozzarella, asparagus, and basil pesto served with mixed greens, shaved radish, and apple vinaigrette for $12.99.

To be fully transparent, the theming was the most exciting part of this dish. The caprese was solid — just normal yet fresh, crisp tomatoes, and the mozzarella cheese was cut into large pieces but we knew to expect that to be the case with this type of cheese. It was also heavy against the rest of the lighter items but very enjoyable. The basil pesto was just the right amount to add to the salad without overpowering the other flavors that were packed into the dish.

The presentation was what really sold this one for us. If you’re someone looking for a decent caprese that’s familiar to you, you’ll do just fine with this dish without being too adventurous. On the flip side of that, we missed the familiar taste of balsamic dressing as opposed to the apple vinaigrette (that was only just a tad sweet) chosen here and we felt it was a weird choice to change up to something so familiar to a caprese salad.

Then we made our way around to the Chef Toad Short Rib Special. This dish is made of braised short rib, creamy goat cheese polenta, and red wine reduction. This entree cost us $24.99.

This dish really disappointed us. The short ribs were ice cold when we got them so we’re not totally convinced we got the best version to attest to all of the flavor, but we could see the potential for this dish to have been great. The base was creamy and the short ribs were really flavorful (with a buttery and faty flavor) and fell apart with ease. It also paired with the mushrooms that were added to it surprisingly well.

The goat cheese polenta really didn’t sell a ton of the creamy yet textured goat cheese flavor to us but that very well could have been due to the temperature we experienced in our meal.  Ultimately it was just too cold for us to get much more out of it but there were people who stopped us and commented about how they really enjoyed this dish and hoped we did too — that just wasn’t our experience this time around.

Then it was time to round out our meal with dessert and the Princess Peach Cupcake. This was a raspberry-filled Funfetti cupcake, buttercream frosting, and Princess Peach chocolate crown for $9.99.

Our first impression of this cupcake was intense. We couldn’t get over how big it was compared to our hands so we really anticipated getting the bang for our buck here. When we cut into that first bite, we instantly knew how divisive this dessert would be too! It tastes like the cookies you can buy at the grocery store that are made like a dry, crumbly sugar cookie but topped with creamy icing (usually with dot sprinkles) when you bite into it.

The Funfetti cake was moist at first but felt like it got a bit dry as we continued to dig into it while the icing that built up most of the top of the cupcake felt pretty standardly buttercream to us. The crown was fine but nothing totally noteworthy. The inside raspberry filling really threw us for a loop. It reminded us of the raspberry-flavored stale doughnut but it’s a safe bet if you’re looking for something sweet here. At best, we felt this dessert was just lackluster — very pretty but not overly special and a little on the dry side.

Should You Go?

Overall, if you’re planning on visiting Super Nintendo World we think you should give it a try. We’re not of the camp that thinks the food was super stellar here but it was very elaborately themed and keeps you feeling immersed in the land so that’s why we think it still needs to be included in your plans.

We felt like the restaurant wasn’t built to scale the demand it has already seen from the land’s visitors. We were a bit disappointed to see such a low-capacity restaurant trying its best to keep up with the masses looking to dine here and we felt like that could potentially be hurting the quality of food that you’ll go on to eat. We’ve already mentioned how you’ll be waiting from step to step and that seemed like it could really become a bother if that’s not something you’re anticipating in your experience before you make a reservation to enter.

If you’re looking to eat here there are a few tasty options to choose from so you’re not going to be hungry, but just know if you’re dining here it will mainly be due to the theming and not necessarily because the food is just that good.

If you want to see the rest of our best day ever at Universal Hollywood, check out our video below…

… and be sure to stay tuned with us at AllEars.net as we bring you the latest coverage from Universal Studios and more!

5 Reasons To Go To Super Nintendo World If You Aren’t a Gamer

Do you hope to see Toadstool Cafe come to Super Nintendo World at Epic Universe? Tell us your thoughts in the comments!

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