so, let’s just say I was born in Seattle and lived there until I was almost in high school (Go Seahawks!) and moved to Denver after college and Z was born there and lived there for about 25 years (Go Broncos!) and maybe, just maybe, we don’t care about watching football.  We decided we didn’t even care if we watched the commercials.  So, finding out that the parks (as in Disney parks) would be less than busy and it was the first warm day in weeks (hello 85, welcome back!) we headed out to Hollywood Studios.  Before joining some recent South Africa to Orlando transplants to ride the rides we stopped in for lunch at the new Hollywood Brown Derby Lounge.  It is a tiny little patio lounge serving a small menu of tapas style food and cocktails alongside two fun non-alcoholic drinks.   We both ordered one of these drinks, the Mimi Kaboom.  I guess Mimi is a ‘citizen’ of Hollywood Studios who fancies herself an actress.  Her namesake mocktail is made of lime, agave, pineapple and fresh mint along with a few soda bubbles.  It was really bright and refreshing and I really enjoyed it.  At $4.49 for a glass it carried the Disney tax but for a mixed drink sans alcohol I thought it was pretty good.    We ordered two items to share-a plate with two fairly good sized sliders, one Wagyu beef with avocado, bacon & gouda and one chorizo and Manchego.  I liked the beef quite a bit better because I don’t care for warm Manchego but both were tasty.  The real piece de resistance was the Charcuterie board.  It was about $20 but was probably really enough for 3-4 people who were just there for a snack and a cool drink.  It had almost too many items on it.  Two small pots of ‘meats’, one a faux gras that was a whipped creamy chicken and one of duck rillettes.  Z liked the chicken but it weirded me out with it’s smoothness.  The rillettes I found tasty and savory on the small buttered toasts they provided.  There were also three cheese selections, a goat, a blue & a brie.  The blue was really nice-salty and earthy.  The brie had truffles embedded which I don’t love-but it was triple cream and very dense.  The goat was unusual, a hard cheese that was tasty.  There were four cured meats as well, a serrano ham-good.  A salami picante-nice and chewy, salty.  A Chorizo (Spanish style)-Loved it.  And then a creepy (to me) Salami Toscano-way too earthy and cellar like for my tastebuds but Z liked it a lot.  He is way easier going about weirdly textured things than I am.  I’ll try them-once.  Again, it’s a fairly huge board and would, I think be better for a couple more people.

There are only about 12-15 tables and due to the park being fairly empty we were able to snag a table when we walked in.  I think normally you would have to have a bit of luck on your side not to wait if you wanted to eat here.  They don’t take reservations and it is genuinely tiny. As you can see, lots and lots of tastes.  It actually wore me out by the end.  I would enjoy slightly less options.  There were other menu items I’d like to try, a famous Brown Derby Cobb Salad and mini-dessert flights along with duck confit tacos.  Yes, please..   Oh, I almost forgot, there were also some really delicious bread and butter pickles.  They were so good with the goat cheese.  I’m going to have to make some of those.   This is not quick service-so if you are jonesing to go on rides, it probably isn’t for you.  I’d say our lunch took around an hour or so.  But, as a nice way to spend Superbowl Sunday afternoon?  I’ll take it.  So, sorry football fans.  I hope we can still be friends.