Our HONEST Thoughts on the Mac and Cheese Booth at the EPCOT Food & Wine Festival

If you think you’ve experienced all that the 2022 EPCOT International Food & Wine Festival has to offer…you’d be wrong. (Proceed with caution: cheesy goodness lies ahead.)

Mac & Eats

Yes, the festival has been underway for quite some time now, but some booths were fashionably late to the party. So, it’s time for us to continue our food adventure by digging into the Mac & Eats Booth! Are there any must-eats here? Let’s chew on that.

The Mac & Eats booth, which was new in 2021, is back again this year! At the Mac & Eats Booth, you’ll find a few different items — of the Mac & Cheese variety, of course. You may notice a few returners, like the Traditional Mac & Cheese and Cowboy Mac & Cheese. But, if you’re in the mood for something new, they have that too! There are 2 new drinks, as well as the new Chili-Cheese Macaroni & Cheese.

Mac and Eats Menu

Now that we’ve gotten the menu out of the way, let’s dig in!

Eats

First up, we grabbed the newest item to hit this booth — the Chili-Cheese Macaroni & Cheese with Sour Cream and Cheddar Cheese. This item is actually plant-based, so it’s vegan and vegetarian-friendly!

Chili Cheese Macaroni and Cheese

It’s topped with Fritos, vegan cheese, vegan sour cream, chives, and plant-based chili. Basically, the flavor profile is like a mix between Frito pie, the plant-based totchos from Woody’s Lunch box, and mac and cheese. It’s glorious! Our plant-based eater who tried it was really impressed with the quality of the “cheese.”

The chives add a nice green flavor to the heavier parts of the combo, and it all blends together nicely. You can grab it for $5.50.

This one was surprisingly amazing!

Next up, we have the Traditional Mac & Cheese with Herbed Panko. We’ve had this one in the past, but we decided to check it out again (ya know, for quality control 😉). All in all, it was basically fine. We wish it would’ve had some more seasoning, like garlic salt or black pepper.

Traditional Macaroni and Cheese

The mac and cheese itself wasn’t nearly as cheesy or creamy as others that we’ve had around Disney World, so that was a smidge disappointing. It would definitely be better with some toppings! You can get this dish for $5.

That’s not a huge portion either.

The other returning dish is the Cowboy Macaroni & Cheese with Smoked Pork Belly, Brisket Burnt Ends, Pickled Peppers, and Onion Straws. Yes…this thing is jam-packed with ingredients. The portion size on this dish was a lot better than the traditional version, and it’s topped with HUGE chunks of the pork belly that melt in your mouth.

Cowboy Macaroni and Cheese

It had a fair amount of sauce on top, and the onion straws provided a good crunchy texture that we enjoyed. It comes with peppers, so those averse to heat should probably order it sans peppers. It’s a pretty heavy option, but you certainly get bang for your buck with that $5.50 price tag.

This was hearty and delicious!

So what are our thoughts?

Overall

This year, the Mac & Eats booth lands squarely in the middle for us. Nothing in particular stood out as a “best of the fest” menu item, but we did really enjoy the Cowboy mac and the plant-based Chili Cheese mac. We were a bit disappointed with the traditional version, but we’d definitely still recommend stopping by this booth to try out something…especially if you’re a pasta lover!

MAC AND CHEEEEESE (I mean Mac and Eats 😂) 🧀

Cowboy Macaroni & Cheese with smoked pork belly, brisket burnt ends, pickled peppers, onion straws, and barbecue aïoli
Traditional Macaroni & Cheese with herbed panko
Chili-Cheese Macaroni & Cheese with sour cream and cheddar cheese pic.twitter.com/q7IOFTs7bW

— Disney Food Blog (@DisneyFoodBlog) August 15, 2022

Are you planning on visiting the 2022 Food and Wine Festival? Click here to see the FULL menus for all of the food booths this year, click here to see a list of all of the NEW items coming to the Festival, and click here to see how EPCOT has UPGRADED its cheese crawl.

2022 EPCOT Food & Wine Festival

Click here to see our insider tips for the 2022 EPCOT Food and Wine Festival, and click here to learn about the 7 truths you need to know about the Festival. You can also check out our DFB Guide to the Food and Wine Festival for 200+ pages of tips, tricks, and advice! And stay tuned to DFB for the latest Disney and festival news!

Click here to see our reviews for EVERY single EPCOT Food and Wine Festival booth!

IT'S WINE & DINE TIME!

Food & Wine Festival can be a bummer. You stand in line waiting for what looks like the perfect treat, and it's a bust. But fear not, dear friends, we compiled EVERYTHING you need (and the things to avoid!) to plan the ULTIMATE EPCOT Food & Wine Festival experience.

If you're planning a day or a week at the festival, we've got every performance, activity, and tasty nosh detailed out so you can make the most of your time and money. Listen, it's a tough job eating and documenting the nearly 200 bites and sips, but we do it all for YOU!