How to Abstain at Disney World During Lent

To all my fellow Catholic Disney fans out there, this post is for you!

Late Winter and early Spring are great times to visit Walt Disney World. The weather isn’t too hot. There is usually a school break or two thrown in the mix. The crowd levels are actually surprisingly not as terrible (except for President’s Day weekend and week). However, there is always one little wrinkle that can really throw off your trip…Lent.

For those of you non-Catholics out there, Lent is the time between Ash Wednesday and Easter. During this time, Catholics are asked to make sacrifices through fasting in a number of different ways. One of those ways is abstaining from meat on Fridays. Not always an easy task when on vacation, especially at Disney World, but we are here today to give you a rundown of exactly what you can eat if you find yourself at Disney World during Lent.

Don’t expect this to be a comprehensive list. With how much menus change, there is no way we could keep up. And of course, Disney offers many meat alternatives at each location. We will be looking at locations that can satisfy everyone though, and how we can avoid eating meat and feat (fake meat).

**Very important information: Avoid character meals during Lent. You are paying an arm and a leg for them usually. Don’t limit yourself to the meatless options. Talk about a waste of money. If you are going to pay $55.00 per adult and $39.00 per kid, make sure you can get your money’s worth. Avoiding meat is not how you do that.

Resorts

We aren’t going to dive into all the resorts right now. We are just assuming that you will be there for breakfast. Every single resort is going to serve you the classic Mickey waffles. However, if you are like me, and you find these waffles to be a little subpar at the resorts (please don’t cancel me), there are still more options.

Now we can’t run through each and every resort, but from our experience, we can safely say that each resort does offer the following items in addition to Mickey waffles.

Eggs (usually scrambled)
Pancakes
Breakfast Sandwich (you can ask for no meat, remove it yourself, or ask for fakon…that would be fake bacon)
Oatmeal
Muffins
Bagels

And a variety of grab and go options such as fruit, yogurt, granola bars, etc.

If you are like me, breakfast is the easiest meal of the day to avoid meat. So let’s head over to the parks, and see what they have for lunch and dinner options.

EPCOT

Let’s start at EPCOT because if you are going to visit Disney World during Lent, this place is going to be the easiest place to find food. We won’t dive into any of the festivals just because those food booths change year to year, and usually sometime during Lent as well. However, let’s check out some of the staple restaurants and what they have to offer.

Yorkshite County Fish Shop (England Pavilion)

A Catholic Lenten staple. Fried fish. Need I say more?

Sunshine Seasons

EPCOT’s main food court has a plethora of options. It is inside, air conditioned, and right by Living with the Land, Soarin’, and Nemo and Friends. A great stop for a quick service meal, and plenty of options for everyone.

Cheese pizza, stir-friend shrimp, Mediterranean veggie sandwich, spicy fish tacos, and mac ‘n’ cheese. Sunshine Seasons should satisfy everyone in the party, all in one stop.

Tokyo Dining, Teppan Edo, Katsura Grill, & Takumi-Tei (Japan Pavilion)

Japan is going to give you options of having sushi and sashimi. These are great choices during Lent. While this isn’t the same fish you would be getting at dollar sushi night at your local sushi joint, I can’t say that I would choose to eat raw fish while walking around a theme park.

Coral Reef

This seafood restaurant should be able to satisfy everyone in your party. Shrimp cocktail and clam chowder for appetizers. Shrimp and grits, grilled salmon, and mahi mahi for the main course. The kids menu features grilled shrimp, grilled fish of the day, and pasta with cream sauce.

This would be a great place to dine anytime, but especially on a Friday during Lent.

Tutto Italia Ristorante & Via Napoli (Italy Pavilion)

It is Italian food. Pizza and pasta Need I say more?

Space 220

This does doesn’t matter if you are headed to the lounge or the full service restaurant. The lounge is going to offer you shrimp cocktail, deviled eggs, calamari, and friends cauliflower. The full service restaurant will have those options, plus seared tuna, miso salmon, stuffed shells, and spaghetti and shrimp. The kids menus features many of those same items, plus mac ‘n’ cheese.

A versatile menu, and it comes with a great view!

Magic Kingdom

Now over to my favorite park, Magic Kingdom. While there is generally at least one item at each restaurant you could have, we are again focusing on restaurants with multiple selections to try and satisfy everyone with just one stop. There will always be an uncrustable here and there, and most places you will also find a salad or mac ‘n’ cheese, but we are hoping to satisfy everyone’s taste buds in just one stop.

Sleepy Hollow

This will be the only place I mention for a breakfast stop. I wouldn’t even say hit them up for breakfast, I would say hit this place up for a morning snack after you have been going hard for a couple of hours after rope drop. While Sleepy Hollo offers funnel cakes and mickey waffles, the real treat here is the “fresh fruit waffle sandwich.” It is basically a waffle, covered in Nutella, with bananas, blueberries, and strawberries on top. It is delicious, and should not be skipped. Unless you gave up chocolate for Lent. But that is another topic entirely.

Tony’s Town Square Restaurant

Let’s go back to Main Street U.S.A., and hit up the first restaurant you see when you enter Magic Kingdom. This restaurant gets a bad rap from a lot of park goers, but I will tell you, it isn’t bad. It is pricey for what you are getting, but you are at Disney World, so what did you expect? A classic Italian menu is featured at Tony’s, and you can get entrees such as spaghetti, fettuccini alfredo, oven-roasted shrimp scampi, or the fish of the day.

Don’t overlook Tony’s when thinking of place to hit up, no matter if it is Lent or not.

Pinocchio Village Haus

Here is where you will find Magic Kingdom’s pizza and salad restaurant. With a cheese flatbread and a margherita flatbread, you choices might be slim. Add on a salad and breadsticks though, and now you are ready to feast!

Jungle Navigation Co. LTD Skipper Canteen

Here is one you were probably not expecting to see, but here we are. Now we aren’t talking a significant selection, but over half the menu items are going to help you continue to abstain from meat for the day.

Appetizers include a Jungle Green Salad, the Lost and Found Soup (soup of the day), and a Falls Family Falafel. Entrees served are the Curried Veggie Crew Stew, a “not piranha” fish of the day, and Skipper Dan’s Dan Dan Noodles (just ask for the crispy pork topping to be left off).

Columbia Harbor House

You knew we wouldn’t be able to leave Columbia Harbor House off this list. This is THE seafood restaurant in Magic Kingdom, and they do not disappoint.

Lobster rolls, the New England Shrimp Boil, grilled shrimp, grilled salmon, a seafood trio, and classic friend fish are all featured on the main menu. Of course, you can’t forget the clam chowder, though I can’t say I would ever eat that while walking around Magic Kingdom. The little ones (and little at heart), can enjoy fried shrimp, shrimp skewers, and a smaller portion grilled salmon.

If you go to Magic Kingdom on a Friday during Lent, you can’t miss this place.

Animal Kingdom

Over at Animal Kingdom, you would think you might have a smaller selection of restaurants that have multiple items that will work for you. But you would be wrong. Animal Kingdom features a number of locations that can satisfy everyone!

Harambe Fruit Market

This one is pretty straight forward. No so much a restaurant, but definitely a place where you can grab a quick snack on the go.

Fruit. Muffins. Fruit. Mickey pretzels. Fruit. Churros. Fruit. Grilled corn on the cob. And they have fruit too!

Pizzafari

Cheese pizza, Caesar salad, breadsticks, and garlic knots. Classic. Easy. Can’t go wrong here.

Satu’li Canteen

Featuring some higher level entrees with their Ocean Moon bowl (a number of ingredients here, including raw tuna), a chili-garlic shrimp bowl, or a chili-spiced fried tofu bowl are your entrée choices. Not a lot to choose from on the kids menu, but they do offer a cheese quesadilla that could work.

Not a ton of options, but enough that you could make it work.

Now we are getting to the restaurants with a variety of options for anyone.

Rainforest Cafe

Rainforest Cafe is going to give you a plethora of soup and salad options, plus seven different seafood entrees. Shrimp, grilled salmon, fried fish, and even blackened fish tacos for those of you that are a little more adventurous. None of that doing it for you? You can always go with a pasta dish, and add just a taste of seafood on the side or to your pasta dish.

The kids menu also features seven different dishes that are meat free. Pasta, shrimp, quesadillas, grilled cheese, and of course pizza.

Rainforest Cafe would be my vote for a family meal.

Yak & Yeti Restaurant

Now if we are looking out more for the adults in the party, Yak & Yeti will be hard to beat. Appetizers include calamari, fried green beans, and firecracker shrimp. You can even start with ahi tuna nachos. Soup and salad options are next up on the menu, and all but the chopped chicken salad will meet the Lenten requirements. All six of seven noodle bowls are either vegetarian or seafood options.

Into a specialty option? Look no further than the miso salmon, the coconut shrimp, or the bhaktapur duck (Oh no, not Donald!) to satisfy your cravings.

Only stir-fry noodles or mac ‘n’ cheese on the kids menu here. So if you are going with a more adult crowd, this is definitely the place for high quality, meatless dishes.

Hollywood Studios

Hollywood Studios is one of the harder parks to navigate. While there ae many restaurants that do offer at least a salad, or possibly a single non-meat option, we have been trying to focus on places that have more of a variety of options. With that said, there won’t be much to choose form when it comes to Hollywood Studios, and we would therefore suggest visiting any other park on Friday’s during Lent.

Catalina Eddie’s and PizzeRizzo

Both of these establishments offer cheese pizza options. It isn’t much, but it will do the trick.

Mama Melrose’s Ristorante Italiano

Another Italian restaurant makes the list. This one offers much more than cheese pizza though.

Minestroni soup, fried calamari, and Margherita flatbread lead the way when it comes to appetizers. Entrees feature shrimp campanelle, Mama’s Italian pasta (with or without shrimp), polenta, and a fish of the day option.

If none of that does it for you, you can always order a cheese pizza from the kids menu.

The Hollywood Brown Derby

The top restaurant in all of Hollywood Studios, and one of the top ones in all the parks, is The Hollywood Brown Derby. You won’t be disappointed by the offers they have here, and the quality will not be matched anywhere else in Hollywood Studios.

For your appetizers, there are a number of soups and salads, as well as shrimp cocktail. For the main course, you will be able to select from the salmon coulibiac, a tomato and eggplant risotto, seafood cioppino, or Duck à l'Orange.

I can’t say this is a restaurant that I would recommend bringing small children to, but in case you do, they do offer grilled fish and mac ‘n’ cheese as their meatless options.

Conclusion

In closing I would say it is very possible to hit up Walt Disney World on a Friday during Lent, and not feel too out of sorts. I think your best option would be to hit up EPCOT, just because of the sheer volume of choices that would be available to you. However, as you can see from the list above, no matter where you end up, you will be able to make it work.

And of course, if you are looking to book your next Disney vacation, no matter if it is during Lent or not, please feel free to reach out to DDWK Travel (ddwktravel@gmail.com), and we would be more than happy to get your packaged booked, and help you navigate how to abstain at Disney World during Lent.