food IS a theme park
When it comes to finding budget-friendly Disney essentials, you don’t need to look any further than your local ALDI store.
©ALDI
Sure, ALDI carries a lot of awesome — and unique — food items, but you can also find super inexpensive Disney souvenirs and essentials in the store’s aisles every week. Well, if you happen to be headed to ALDI between January 14th and January 20th, you’ll be able to grab some pretty epic finds, including a Disney essential that’s only $4!
So, we don’t want to brag or anything, but we’d like to think that Disney World listens to us when we have a valid complaint. For example, y’all know we were pretty loud about it when the hushpuppies disappeared from the menu at Columbia Harbour House in Magic Kingdom. But, lo and behold, those hushpuppies came back.
Liquid Nitrogen Minnie cake pop
We also raised a bit of a fuss over the waffles at Sleepy Hollow when they switched from regular waffles to Mickey waffles. Now, we normally love Mickey-shaped food, but the new waffles did NOT stand up. But, hey, Disney changed those back to round waffles. Well, there’s another treat in Disney World that we think Disney listened to us about, and we’re HAPPY they did!
We have a lot of favorite snacks in Disney World, and yes, we talk about them ALL the time. We’ll always order up a DOLE Whip when we need a refreshing cold treat. We’ll never turn down Totchos in Disney’s Hollywood Studios. We’ll also never pass by the Spring Roll Cart in Magic Kingdom without getting our beloved Pepperoni Spring Rolls.
Pizza Planet Spring Rolls
Well, some NEW spring rolls have arrived in Hollywood Studios, and we had to see how they stack up to the spring rolls in Magic Kingdom. So we headed on over to Toy Story Land to the new Popcorn and Snacks stand to try out these new spring rolls and see how they compare!
Disney just dropped some pretty big announcements, and let’s just say that Disney fans are EXCITED.
Magic Kingdom
We’re talking about huge discounts at Disney World hotels, two FREE hotel nights and two free theme park days, bigger discounts for select Annual Passholders and Florida residents, hotel perks, and MORE! Well, we’ve been following our readers on social media, and we love reading your reactions to all this news.
We are SO close to the EPCOT Festival of the Arts that we can almost taste it (LITERALY!). The festival runs from January 16th through February 23rd. Now, this is one of my favorite festivals because there is SO much to see and do, and the entire idea of the festival is focused on the arts, including the culinary arts.
That means you get some really cool food booths that offer a lot of unique eats and drinks. Then there’s also the Wonderful Walk of Colorful Cuisine, the festival’s food crawl, where you eat five of several colorful foods to earn a prize. Well, we now have a confirmed list of all the foods that will be included in this year’s Wonderful Walk of Cuisine.
We know we’re not the only folks who stand in that long line at Starbucks at Main Street Bakery in Magic Kingdom every morning waiting for our caffeine fix. It seems like a lot of Disney World visitors gotta’ have that Starbucks first thing in the morning.
New Starbucks drinks!
Now, we also know we’re not the only folks who get excited when a new drink menu drops at Starbucks, and now that it’s a New Year, we’re standing in line to try two new Starbucks drinks, and let’s just say one was a hit, and the other was a miss. But which was which? Let’s chat!
There’s just a special sense of accomplishment that comes with finishing a LEGO build, right? First, it’s so much fun figuring out where each brick goes and seeing it go from nothing but a pile of bricks to a full-fledged scene.
Sleeping Beauty LEGO display in Disney Springs
Of course, if you’re working with Disney LEGO sets, it’s even more fun. That’s why we’re always keeping an eye out for new Disney sets when they drop online. Well, guess what? We’ve got eight new sets to share with you that just popped up over at The Disney Store.
The theme for Magic Kingdom in 2026 is CHANGE. EVERYTHING is changing in Magic Kingdom. Rivers of America and Tom Sawyer Island are gone FOREVER while Disney builds a new Cars-themed expansion, Piston Peak, in Frontierland. A new Villains land is being built behind Big Thunder Mountain Railroad, which is also currently under construction for some new updates. Buzz Lightyear’s Space Ranger Spin is even getting updated.
Happily Ever After
Well, that’s not all, because the ICON of Magic Kingdom is also changing, starting this month. Disney has plans to repaint Cinderella Castle, starting this month, and that’s going to impact some entertainment in the park as of January 28th.
Happy New Year, DFB friends! We have officially kicked off 2026 in Disney World and said goodbye to the holiday season.
Countdown to Midnight Cake Bar
But there’s SO much to look forward to in the coming weeks, including the EPCOT Festival of the Arts, where we’ll be eating our way through every food booth (and we are SO ready). However, before that happens, we’ve got some changes to tell you about that are happening at Disney World restaurants. Yes, it’s that time again…let’s look at the Disney World restaurant menu changes from this week. Here’s a word of warning: some of your favorite holiday snacks and drinks are officially gone for the season!
One of the best parts of a new month is seeing what kind of new snacks drop in Disney World. Now, we all know that Gideon’s Bakehouse drops new cookies and cold brews every month, so we couldn’t wait to see what the bakery had in store for January 2026.
Gideon’s January drops!
Well, we just found out what those new snacks are, and let’s just say we made a beeline to Gideon’s Bakehouse to try them out. So keep reading to see what we think of these new treats!
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