2014 EPCOT Flower and Garden Festival: Festival Center

And it begins! 

First stop: Festival Center. This is where you can attend lectures, demonstrations, and ask IFAS Master Gardeners all of your gardening questions. This is also where you can pick up an event passport. By the way, there is a stamp for Festival Center, even though there is not a designated box for it. Ask for a stamp at the front booth (this is also where you will come for the "Completed" stamp in your passport).

Entering Festival Center

Inside Festival Center

Passports

And, we're hungry! Here are the offerings at Intermissions Cafe- including two vegan options. 

The prices are higher here, but the portions are much larger. Although we have not yet been out there to explore on THIS trip, from past experience, the offerings at the Outdoor Kitchens are tasting size. The offerings here in Festival Center seem to be full size portions.

Fruit & cheese plate (vegetarian; this should also be gluten free)

Caprese push-pop (vegetarian; this should also be gluten free)

The Caprese push pop is adorable! And only $1- you can't go wrong there. I need to come up with ideas to serve in a push pop. Fruit salad?

Vegan trio (Hummus, tabbouleh, couscous, roasted red pepper coulis, pita bread) NOT gluten free (also not a trio, I count 4 items here, no? ;) 

Southwest chicken wrap with black bean spread. Obviously neither gluten-free nor vegan. Luckily I'm here with Tim, aka the Test Kitchen, so we will get to try all interesting options, even if they are not ingredients that I could eat (which would make for a very limited blog post, lol).

And on the allergy note, while you might make an educated guess as to what may be (or is clearly not) gluten-free, there is really no way to guarantee that there will not be cross-contamination with gluten or other ingredients in a festival/food booth type of setting. So, proceed at your own discretion and use your judgement regarding what works for your particular needs.

There is plenty to enjoy at EPCOT and the Flower & Garden festival without eating at the food booths. The entire Walt Disney World Resort complex is fantastic about accommodating food allergies, so you might choose to enjoy all of the festival gardening events, but choose to eat in a Disney dining location that can safely accommodate your dietary needs.

Ok, off to the Festival, and Outdoor Kitchens (The smaller, Spring version of EPCOT's International Food and Wine Festival booths). 

P.S. I'm not used to this mobile Blogger platform, OR taking photos with an iPad- so bear with me. Hopefully the photos improve as the day goes on :)