Bringing you a post from one of our contributors, Arlene! You can see more of her work @wanderwithred.

The drive from downtown Orlando to Kissimmee will set you back about half an hour (not including traffic), but once you’re at Duck Donuts you’ll forget all about I-4 and the annoying, never ending construction. The first Duck Donuts location opened in Kitty Hawk, North Carolina in 2007 followed by Duck, North Carolina. Their newest location opened July 1, and is located inside the Crosslands Shopping Center in Kissimmee.

Vanilla cake donuts are fried and customized to each guest, offering a personalized desert experience. Guests fill out an order form where they can select from ten coating choices, seven toppings, and five drizzle choices. If you’re feeling adventurous go for the Quacky Assortment and try a dozen different choices selected by Duck Donuts. In addition to donuts, caffeine addicts can indulge in brewed coffee as well as cold brew. Duck Donuts serves its own signature coffee blends—Riptide Roast, Light House Blend, and Sunset Pier Decaf with special seasonal flavors changing throughout the year.

Breakfast lovers will enjoy their morning fare, but these are not your ordinary bacon egg and cheese sandwiches. Duck Donuts takes breakfast to the next level by offering a Sausage Egg & Cheese, housed in a Maple Donut sprinkled with bacon. Hello sweet and savory to start the day!

The Donut Sundae is made of  a warm donut, Breyers Ice Cream, whipped cream, caramel and chocolate sauce and sprinkles. The warmth of the freshly made donut was a wonderful compliment for the cool vanilla ice cream and an excellent treat for the hot summer days ahead. Hooray for a fun new donut shop in town!

More than just churros and chicken fingers, Disney’s culinary scene continues to evolve and serve up some incredible experiences. This year, the Walt Disney World Resort chefs launched a new dinner series to showcase the talents of the culinary team featuring unique creations and wine pairings. Continuing throughout 2017, “Delicious Disney, A Chef Series” features storytelling with food. These dinners allow guests to experience exceptional cuisine in an atmosphere of pure Disney magic.

Last week we were invited to experience an incredible five-course wine dinner in celebration of Ratatouille’s 10th anniversary. French-themed of course, the evening started with a French 75 and ended with a hand-painted, white chocolate Remy! One of Disney’s best qualities – attention to detail – is on full display during these events. Don’t miss your chance to dine inside Golden Oak and enjoy a memorable evening full of incredible cuisine and wine pairings. Here’s a little taste of what we experienced during our dinner!

• We started off the evening with a beautiful French 75 and hors d’oeuvres before being seated in the main dining room.

• Accompanied by Canard-Duchêne Champagne, our first course was a delicate roasted mushroom with cheese and a rosemary espuma. These food-friendly bubbles were the perfect accessory to our Amuse-Bouche.

• Next up, potato-leek soup paired with Domaine Louis Moreau “Vaillons”, Chablis 1er Cru. A lovely pairing and one of my favorite wines from the evening – I’ll take a whole case please!

• We then moved to Hokkaido scallops with artichoke, baby leek and caviar. Clos Saint Jean Châteauneuf-du-Pape Blanc was poured for yet another fabulous pairing.

• For the last course pre-dessert we had Colorado Lamb with (of course) Ratatouille. The true star of the dinner in multiple ways, this authentic accompaniment was stellar. As expected, the 2009 Château Lagrange, Saint-Julien was a treat to experience!

• In true Disney style we ended the meal with an impressive dessert adorned with a chocolate laced Eiffel Towel. And to really outdo themselves, a surprise dessert was brought out, which included a hand-painted white chocolate Remy which was presented in a dramatic fashion across the dining room. The Sauternes was then poured and the fun continued throughout the final course.

If you haven’t experienced the finer side of Disney dining yet, you’re missing out on one of The City Beautiful’s culinary gems. See the schedule below for the rest of 2017. All reservations may be booked by calling 407.939.5773 daily between 9 a.m. and 5 p.m.

July 19th at 6:30pm 
Enjoy the exotic and exquisite tastes of a journey Under the Sea
Featuring Flying Fish’s Timothy Majoras and Team
Location Markham’s at Golden Oak

August 16th at 6:30pm 
A Walk around the World with Disney
Featuring Culinary Director Edwin Wronski and the Flavor Lab Team
Location Markham’s at Golden Oak

It’s that time of year again! Where Orlando residents complain endlessly about the blistering heat and pine for bearable outdoor weather. Coming to our rescue is Blue Bunny ice cream with its first-ever ice cream sandwich food truck concept! This new dessert truck is serving up gourmet, customizable ice cream cookie sandwiches throughout Orlando and Tampa.

This fun experience is more than just a food truck and features fresh-baked cookies with endless options to customize your sweet treat. The truck features four flavors of cookies fresh baked to order and a variety of ice cream flavor and topping combinations. Start with vanilla or chocolate ice cream and add sprinkles, candy or mixed nuts to name a few. Here’s some crazy combinations we’d recommend for your own cool sandwich!

• Sweet Mix Up: Half chocolate chocolate chip and half peanut butter cookie filled with vanilla ice cream, rolled in Oreos and drizzled with caramel sauce
• The Blondie: Sugar cookies with vanilla ice cream and Heath crumbs mixed with chocolate chips
• Chocolate All Day: Chocolate chocolate chip cookies with chocolate ice cream rolled in Oreos, chocolate chips and drizzled with chocolate sauce

Sprinkled throughout town, these trucks are located near sporting events, gathering for a community event or simply running errands. It’s a fun mid-day break that brings new meaning to the term “pop-up.” Orlando, along with Phoenix, Ariz., is one of only two cities to enjoy this new ice cream sandwich truck concept! Clearly, the bunny understands how much The City Beautiful needs an ice cream fix! Find the next ice cream spot @BlueBunnyTruck on Twitter and Instagram, and see all event listings at http://bluebunnytruck.com/events.

And if you miss the trucks around town, you can find plenty of cold sweet options in stores around town. Bring on the heat summertime, you don’t stand a chance with ice cream in hand.

This post was sponsored by Blue Bunny, but the content and opinions expressed are my own.

Cooper’s Hawk recently hosted a collaborative four-course dinner and wine event with Jeremy Ford for their wine club members and we were lucky enough to attend. Jeremy Ford was the 2016 winner of “Top Chef” so this was an event where we cleared our calendars to attend.

If you haven’t been to a Cooper’s Hawk, it’s worth a visit the next time you’re looking to try something new. We were impressed with the concept which pairs (no pun intended) a combination of restaurant, winery, and artisanal retail market concepts. The wine program at Cooper’s Hawk features an easy to navigate wine list and, actually, has one of the largest wine clubs in America. Cooper’s Hawk Wine Club offers its members exclusive wines, events and other privileges, such as this Dinner with a “Top Chef”.

Chef Jeremy created a menu inspired by the season bringing new and fresh ingredients to the table. The first course was fresh mozzarella cheese with Togarashi, Ponzu and covered in warm buttery goodness. The oak and citrus notes of Cooper’s Hawk Lux Chardonnay was a great accomplice to the first course. The second course was a light and flaky roasted Halibut with asparagus, morel mushrooms and chopped pistachio. The third course really covered some ground with a bone-in crispy short Rib and polenta fries paired with Cooper’s Hawk Lux Meritage. For dessert Jeremy highlighted strawberries as the star of this course with a Strawberry Sundae accompanied with Kaffir Lime Meringue.

We also had the opportunity to meet Master Sommelier Emily Wines, she recently joined the Copper’s Hawk Team as Vice President of Wine and Beverage Experience. We enjoyed speaking with Emily at the event and are very excited to see what she has in store for the future of Copper’s Hawk wine program. The brand recently launched a collaborative Pinot Noir Rosé with Food Network Chef, Tyler Florence. The wine is a limited production blend made exclusively for the company’s 250,000-plus Wine Club members as the “Wine of the Month”. This collaboration wine can be sampled by the glass in Cooper’s Hawk tasting rooms and restaurants. Happy rosé season!