Animal Kingdom Lodge’s Signature Dining experience is located at Jiko- The Cooking Place. Themed in the colors of an African sunset, you will find a multi-culturally influenced menu with some of the best wine options on all of Disney property! The menu selections are an eclectic mix of Indian, African, and Mediterranean dishes. You’ll watch chefs prepare appetizers and tantalizing dishes right before your eyes, and the menu is full of flavors and dishes that will please any appetite. You can view the full menu HERE.
This is a favorite of couples and a signature dining experience so remember if you are on the Disney Dining Plan it will take 2 of your table service credits! Also, if you choose to dine at Jiko, they have expectations for how you are dressed. It’s a good idea to make sure you look nice. Jiko is kid friendly, as well, with pizzas, steak, macaroni and cheese, and other fun items on their children’s menu.
Overall, we give Jiko an “A+”.
Curry was TOO spicy (and I eat curry quite often and like spicy foods). It was not edible. However, our server was amazing, noticed I had not eaten any, and put in a rush order for another entree. We were not charged for either! The filet (my new entree and what my dining partner got as well) was amazing! I suggest to anyone to get the sides that actually come with the fillet instead of asking for the Mac and Cheese. The chef knows what they are doing when they make the plate!
Jiko is by far the best adult resturant on Disney property..highly recommend parents take night out and enjoy on evenin.
Our very first meal at Disney World was at Jiko. We had 5:30p reservations on 12/3/11. We were led into a little room off the main dining room. For most of our meal, we were the only ones in the room, and it was kinda nice. Like our own private party. Very good way to start off our adventure. We were a party of 8, (4adults and 4 kids) and immediately the 4 adults decided we were each going to try something different, so we could all sample each others meal. We were on the dining plan, so we each got an appetizer, entree, and dessert. I have to say my husband’s appetizer was my favorite of all 4 I tried. He had the wild boar tenderloin w/ truffle oil, (AMAZING) tho very small portion. it was barely enough to share. We also had the mushroom flatbread, cheese sampler platter, and the spring rolls.(all of which were okay. If you get the cheese sampler make sure u eat the cheese with the accents available… some of them are pretty potent without. LoL) Our dinners were absolutely excellent. We had the filet mignon (an amazing steak), duck, prime rib, and we think chicken (it obviously wasn’t very memorable). The prime rib came with truffled potato puree, which is a fancy mashed potato, but it was the most amazing mashed potato I’ve ever had. The kids meals were okay, our kids picked at them same as normal. Desserts were awesome. I don’t remember the names, but all that we had were very very good, and very rich. Jiko is fancier than we are accustomed to at home, so we were in a bit of sticker shock when we got the bill and the gratuity that was automatically added. If you are in a party of 6 or more, 18% IS automatically added. A fact that we had not really come across in our planning, while we had planned for tips, we didn’t plan near enough because of this fact. While Jiko isn’t a must do for us on future trips, that’s mostly because there are so many new ones to try. LoL