Jared and I took date night to a new level by going to the Spirit of Aloha dinner show at Disney’s Polynesian Village Resort.

For my birthday, Grandma gave me money for Jared and me to enjoy either the Hoop-Dee-Doo Musical Revue or Spirit of Aloha Dinner Show, both of which are at Disney resorts. After looking at both menus, I decided I would like the food at Spirit of Aloha better.

I missed the detail on the dinner confirmation that said you’re supposed to arrive at least 40 minutes early if you don’t pick your tickets up before the day of the show, so we arrived about 15 minutes before the show was supposed to start. Luckily, the cast members had no problems getting us our tickets and seating us.

When we were being guided to our seats, we were given leis and had our photo taken, which helped set the Polynesian feel for the night.

When I made our reservation, I chose section C for our seats. It was the cheapest section and at Disney, there never seems to be a bad seat. I was so glad I chose the section I did. Our seats were right in the front of section C and we were at a table just the two of us. Our view was fantastic and the section was raised up so nothing was blocking our view even though we were toward the back of the room.

The view from our section C seats.

The tables were set with amazing coconut rolls and the appetizer display to share when we sat down. We had to ask for butter, but the rolls were so sweet they almost didn’t need anything on them. Jared was happy to see that beer and wine were included in the overall cost of dinner so he ordered sangria, but wasn’t thrilled with it since it didn’t have fruit in it. During dinner, he got a beer instead. I ordered a virgin strawberry daiquiri, which was $5 and our only additional charge for the night.

The appetizer included pineapple, salad with mandarin oranges, and noodles. You could definitely tell the pineapple was fresh. Jared said the salad was good so I took his word for it (I hate vegetables). He tried the noodles but said, “Ew, they taste like feet,” and didn’t eat any more.

Dinner was presented like the appetizers and looked so good, I couldn’t wait to dig in. We had pulled pork, ribs, roasted chicken, plain white rice, and vegetables. I ate a little of everything (except the veggies) and the pulled pork was by far my favorite. I was pleased to see there was no sauce on it (I’m also not a fan of sauce), but it still had really great flavor. According to Jared, the veggies were amazing.

During dinner, the show started. It loosely followed a plot and featured performances from different Polynesian islands. There were hula dancers, poi spinners, Tahitian dancers, and even a fire spinner. It was fast-paced and entertaining to watch. At one point, they had all the kids come up to do a hula dance and another time, they played a slow love song and couples, including Jared and myself, went up and slow danced. Our waiter even picked up my phone from our table and took pictures while we were slow dancing. It’s that kind of thought that really sets Disney’s cast members apart.

For dessert, we had pineapple-coconut guava cake with chocolate crunch. Although the “chocolate crunch” was a little lackluster, the cake was really good. It was very light and refreshing with whipped “icing” and wasn’t too heavy on the fruit flavors. We only got one square of cake for the two of us so it was probably a good thing we were mostly full at that point.

I’m glad it was just Jared and me at dinner because the table next to us had a family of 4 and they got the same amount of food we did. I don’t know how they were supposed to share that food with double the people we had because we cleared our plates. You could ask for more food if you finished what you had, but it just seemed strange they didn’t get more food, especially for dessert.

We definitely made the right choice by going to the Spirit of Aloha show. The atmosphere was very tropical and the performances were fun to watch. The food didn’t seem like much at first, but it really filled us up by the end of the night. Jared and I agreed that we definitely got our money’s worth and that we will be back again soon.