Walt Disney World Restaurant Review – House of Blues

BY MIKE WARING – MAY 2011

I can’t quite put my finger on why I like this venue so much. It might be my ADHD or something. The amount of folk art and stuff they have fastened to all the walls at House of Blues keeps me busy, and usually (though not always) can distract me from the squalling baby over at the four-top in the corner.

It’s been quite a while since our last visit to House of Blues, and although we’re not talking haute cuisine or anything, it manages to deliver a perfectly decent meal, with some good music and decent service. Personally, I could use some more spice in my Cajun-influenced dishes, but I realize that not everyone has burnt out fifty or sixty percent of their taste buds. I’m sure they need to tone down the offerings some, so as not to cause fainting spells and palpitations.

We each had soup to start. Mine was a Turkey Shrimp Gumbo, because I have an abiding need to sample gumbo almost wherever I can find it, and then pronounce – “Mine is better!” Almost anywhere: I do tend to avoid it if I discover it on a menu in IHOP for instance, but House of Blues seemed like a safe bet, and it was not bad. Mary enjoyed her corn chowder, especially when accompanied by a skillet of rosemary cornbread.

For my entree I tried the ribs with a Jim Beam BBQ sauce. What can I say, that night I just had a hankering for some ribs. The ribs could have spent a little longer on the coals, or whatever grilling method they actually used back in the kitchen, though they were certainly fall-off-the-bone as advertised. They just needed more smoke. The BBQ sauce was fair to good, though with ribs I desire a bit more spice and a bit less sweet, but others’ opinions might vary, however wrong they might be.

Mary had the fish of the day and the snapper was fine. Indeed, it was better than my dish and I made some efforts at distracting her, so I could snag some fishy goodness. Unfortunately she is on to most of my tricks, so I had to content myself with tidbits and crumbs.

As filling as the starters and entrees were, we found ourselves incapable of forging on to a sweet, sweet finish to the meal, even though Mary confessed that the White Chocolate Banana Bread Pudding sounded mighty tempting. I’m not sure I agree with herm as we are talking about sullying perfectly good bread pudding with bananas. Some things man was not meant to add to bread pudding. But I again, that’s just one man’s opinion and all the others are just flat out wrong.

Starters can be had for a very narrow range of prices, basically$10 to $11. For everything. For something a bit cheaper, soup will run $4 for a cup, up to $6 and change for the gumbo.

Salads are $13 to $16 and burgers and sandwiches range from as low as $11 to a high of $13. So not a lot of difference there. Entrees are $17 to $27. Desserts are pretty limited and all cost $7. Overall, one can get out of there with wallet only deflated about $65 or so, if one limits oneself to only taking one other person and does not include six or seven beers. I know I don’t.