We can’t believe it, but we’re almost ready to move on to the next EPCOT festival! Sure, Flower and Garden is still underway, but we can already feel the weather changing, like something is about to begin.

We’re just a few months away from the kick-off of EPCOT’s Food and Wine Festival! We don’t have official dates for the festival just yet, but if tradition means anything, August is going to be a big month for the theme park. While Disney is working away on the details, we just wanted to drop a few ideas for some changes we are desperate to see at the 2026 Food and Wine Festival.

We’re a few months away from the beginning of what we deem the absolute behemoth of Disney festivals. It’s Disney’s biggest, and often longest, festival, and it takes place during some of the hottest times of the year. Each festival definitely has its fans, but the Food and Wine is widely regarded as the fan favorite festival. That doesn’t mean we can’t improve upon it, though. Disney, get out a pen and paper so we can have a chat. 

Let’s start simple: you need to bring back demonstrations and seminars! In the past, Culinary Demonstrations and Wine and Beverage Seminars were some of the festival’s most popular events. They were an affordable and fun way to learn in a hands-on environment, but they have disappeared since 2020. Fans have been begging for the return of these events, and yet Disney feels keen on ignoring us. We won’t stop asking for it, guys.  Seriously, we won’t, so humor us!

Just try out one or two demonstrations and seminars so we can see how they perform.  They even teased us during the EPCOT transformation, saying that CommuniCore Hall was going to be EPCOT’s new dedicated festival area. Disney called the new “home base” for EPCOT’s seasonal festivals and live events. CommuniCore Hall and CommuniCore Plaza are located in World Celebration and were supposed to bring EPCOT International Festivals “to the center of Walt Disney World,” according to Disney. While they have definitely used those areas during the festivals, we really anticipated that seminars and demonstrations would pop up in these locations. Spoiler alert, they haven’t yet.

Next, we would love to see you add tasting passes to this festival! This is something that you can actually find over at Disney California Adventure at Disneyland Resort during their Food and Wine festival, and we love it. Over in California Adventure, you can find the Sip and Savor pass. This pass is a souvenir credential that includes credits that are eligible for one food item or non-alcoholic beverage per credit at the Festival Marketplaces.

This is such a fun way to prepay for food and drinks, and it can even be used as a budgeting tool. We also appreciate that it’s a built-in souvenir. Back in 2015 through 2017, EPCOT did offer something called the Festival Tasting Sampler (and yes, we covered it at the time, which you can see here). The package included:

• Eight entitlements for food or beverage of your choice at 30 Food and Wine Festival Booths
• Priority seating at the 6:45 Eat to the Beat Concert on the day the package is purchased
• Limited release 20th Anniversary pin that comes in 3 different colors

All for $59. Ah, the good ole days! We don’t expect that price (although we would love it), but if you could just bring back something along the lines of a tasting pass, we would be happy.

Next, we are legitimately begging for a new menu at the Tangierine Cafe: Flavors of the Medina. This is Morocco’s Food and Wine Festival booth, and it has been nearly the same for YEARS. Last year, they did give us a new dessert, and sometimes they’ll mix up the ingredients, but it’s nearly the same every year.

That being said…we honestly don’t dislike this booth, and it does offer pretty good bites every year. We just thought, while we were writing down our dreams and desires, we would include a new menu request here. Speaking of new menu requests, we quite literally need you to change the Italy Booth in nearly every way. 

Year after year. Festival after festival. This booth is somehow always bad! We don’t get it! We love Italian food, and we especially love Via Napoli, just steps away from this booth. Each year, if we think the food is “fine” at this booth, we consider it a win! We honestly don’t get how each year it disappoints, but it does. However, 2026 could be your year, Disney. Really, think about this.

Are you going to get mad at us if we say the tables and shade situation needs to change? Well, don’t get too mad because that’s our next point. It’s like Disney will add some much need tables only to take away others that we loved. Is there a shortage of tall black metal tables we don’t know about? Is there an epidemic going on?

We also have another table gripe: if there are empty tables, it’s because they’re in the sun and they’re so hot you feel like you’re touching lava. We need more shade, Disney! EPCOT is a big park, and there’s a lot of walking. Please don’t make us eat the hot soup you served us on a scorching black table with no shade. Have some humanity!

That leads to our final request: please start serving temperature-appropriate food! Listen, we get it. The Food and Wine Festival serves as the “Fall” festival in EPCOT, but we’re still in Orlando, and it’s 95 degrees. No matter how badly we want it to be Fall, it just isn’t. That means it’s too hot for heavy food and very warm soups.

We love this soup. We love those dishes, but trust us, they are much harder to enjoy during the Food and Wine Festival. If we are already hot, we don’t want to become HOTTER because we’re drinking melted cheese. Now that being said, you don’t have to totally get rid of these. Maybe you could just add some more temperature-friendly items here and there. Perhaps a gazpacho?

Disney, there are lots of ways you can address this issue, and you’re the experts, so we’ll leave it to you. These are just a few of the big changes we really need to make for you before the Food and Wine Festival kicks off in 2026. Be sure to keep following DisneyFoodBlog for more Disney news, tips, secrets, and more.

2026 EPCOT Food and Wine Festival Booths, Menus, and FOOD PHOTOS

Tell us which EPCOT festival is your favorite in the comments!