This post probably contains affiliate links. You can read the details about what that means here.
A few months ago I wrote a round-up post where I had various Disney bloggers vote on their favorite quick service meals in Disney World. While several different restaurants got a lot of love in that post, Animal Kingdom’s Satu’li Canteen was one of the most popular choices.Since I’ve never eaten at Satu’li Canteen myself (and since I was “busy” hanging out at the beach in St. Augustine with my family last week), I asked my buddy Nicole to write a guest post reviewing Satu’li Canteen and sharing why she, too, considers it to be one of the best quick service restaurants.
Hi there, guys! My name is Nicole Graber from The Disney Journey. Jen asked me if I could tell you all about one of my favorite Quick Service restaurants in all of Disney World. Satu’li Canteen reached favorite restaurant status because of the excellent food quality and the variety of options for people with gluten sensitivities like myself.Satu’li Canteen is a Quick Service restaurant located in the Pandora area of Animal Kingdom. The restaurant is open for lunch and dinner only, opening at 10:30am and staying open until park closing.Guests are able to use Disney mobile ordering through the My Disney Experience app, which can be a real time saver. Satu’li Canteen is an ideal place to grab an early lunch after a busy morning spent enjoying rope drop at Animal Kingdom.
Is Satu’li Canteen on the Dining Plan?
Yes. A meal at Satu’li Canteen uses one quick service credit if you are on the Disney Dining Plan. It also offers some snack credit options, including two desserts (which we’ll talk about shortly) and several drink options. Unfortunately, there are no discounts for Annual Passholders or Disney Vacation Club members.
Restaurant Atmosphere and Theme
As with all other aspects of Pandora, the theming of therestaurant is top notch. The basic idea is that the facility is a former RDAmess hall that is now owned by Alpha Centauri Expeditions and allowed toembrace the Na’vi culture.
The building itself is quite large and fits a good number of tables. In addition to this, there is substantial covered outdoor seating aswell. There are fans outside to cool you down in the hot weather, and heatersbuilt into the ceiling that throw a surprising amount of heat in the coolerweather.Following Pandora’s overall theme of environmental conservation, Satu’li Canteen:
- Does not have lids for their cups
- Uses paper straws
- Uses real plates and flatware
While this is great in terms of conservation andkeeping a smaller footprint, it has the secondary bonus of creating a diningexperience that is a step up from “fast food”.
You might also like:
Review of Avatar Flight of Passage Ride in Pandora
Satu’li Canteen Menu
The food offerings at Satu’li Canteen are truly unique. You will not find another restaurant around that has similar food. The bonus of Satu’li Canteen being a newer restaurant is they seem to have planned the menu with food allergies in mind.
Create Your Own Bowl
The basic idea behind the majority of the menu options atSatu’li Canteen is to create your own bowl. As such, you choose a protein, abase (i.e. potatoes, rice, etc.), and a sauce. This allows you to personalizeyour bowl exactly how you want it, and also gives you a lot of differentcombinations to try out on all those return trips to Disney World you’ll end upplanning.
The type of protein that you pick will be the determiningfactor in the overall price of your meal. You have a choice of beef, chicken,shrimp, tofu, and a beef and chicken combo bowl. The combo bowl is the mostexpensive, with the chicken and tofu bringing up the rear as the cheapestoptions.The bases give you the opportunity to make vastlydifferent meals. If you are a meat and potatoes type of person, you can try thered and sweet potato hash. For those who like salads, there is a hearty saladbase. Rice lovers can gravitate towards the rice and beans. And finally, noodlesround out the four base options.There are 3 different sauces to choose from to top off the meal:
- Charred green onion vinaigrette
- Black bean vinaigrette
- Creamy herb sauce
If sauce just isn’t your thing, you can always opt to go without sauce as well.As you can see from these combinations, Satu’li Canteen offers up some of the healthier food options in any of the parks. Considering this a Quick Service restaurant, that is very impressive.
Satu’li Canteen Menu Changes
Once upon a time, there were other menu options, but those have since been removed. There used to be an entrée size version of the cheeseburger steam pods. Also, there was a shrimp and noodle bowl. While this second option is no longer directly stated on the menu, you can make your own version if it via the create your own bowl using shrimp as your protein and noodles as your base.
Satu’li Canteen Breakfast
At one point, Satu’li Canteen offered a scrumptious looking breakfast menu. However, this was pretty short lived, officially ending in September 2017, lasting only a few months. Let’s face it, during breakfast hours, anyone who is in Pandora is trying to get on Flight of Passage, not eat breakfast.There were murmurings that breakfast would be offered seasonally, specifically during very busy times like Christmas and Easter. However, I have not seen any reports of this so am unable to verify whether or not this is true. Considering the lack of information, I’m guessing this never happened.
Satu’li Canteen Kids’ Menu
The kids’ menu is more varied than the adult menu, likely to accommodate the picky palates of most children. The kids are able to order kid size versions of the protein bowls if they so choose, but they also have the opportunity to have cheeseburger steam pods, cheese quesadillas, and hot dogs wrapped in dough.The more traditional meals come with vegetable chips and grapes on the side. The create your own bowls do not come with any other sides.
You might also like:
Best Disney Restaurants for Kids
Satu’li Canteen Desserts
The menu at Satu’li Canteen is rounded out by a couple ofdessert offerings, one of which is VERY Instagram friendly. The most popular dessert is the Blueberry Cream Cheese Mousse. This is perhaps the most colorful and prettiest dessert I have ever seen.However, if chocolate is more your thing, then look nofurther than the Chocolate Cake. This cake has a crunchy cookie layer withbanana cream topping. But don’t be fooled, this looks like no other chocolatecake you’ve ever seen.
Satu’li Canteen Allergy Menu
One of the things I like best about Satu’li Canteen ishow easy they make it for people with food allergies to enjoy their deliciousfood. As soon as you enter the restaurant there is a cast member there to handyou the menu. Simply ask for an allergy friendly menu and they have them rightthere for you to peruse.The allergy menu for Satu’li Canteen is quite detailed for the top 8 food allergies. You will find a wide variety of options to choose from because of the different combinations you can make. I promise, you won’t be disappointed.
✅Satu’li Canteen Gluten Free Menu
In terms of gluten free options for the entrees, all ofthe protein choices are available as an option, and all the bases exceptnoodles are gluten free. From there you can choose from 2 of the sauces: creamyherb dressing or charred green onion vinaigrette. I’m not going to do all the math of exactly how manychoices this gives us, but you choose from 4 proteins, 3 bases, and 2 sauces.For those of us who are gluten free, having this many options is a gamechanger.The removal of the boba balls is the only thing necessary to make this combination bowl gluten free. I have no idea what is in the boba balls that makes them a gluten risk, but I’m OK with the absence.
Satu’li Canteen Review
In the past year I have eaten at Satu’li Canteen 4 timesover the course of 3 trips, so clearly, I’m a fan. On the 3rd tripto Satu’li I forced myself to get a slightly different bowl just for the sakeof trying something else for blogging purposes, but then went right back to myusual by the 4th trip, because it’s just that good.
Chopped Wood Grilled Chicken Bowl
The favorite combination for my family so far is theChopped Wood Grilled Chicken bowl with red and sweet potato hash base with thecreamy herb sauce. All of this is then topped with a slaw, and for those whocan eat gluten, boba balls. 
Between the Chicken and the Beef bowls, I prefer the chicken.I think the flavors of the base and sauce blend better with the chicken thanwith the beef.
Slow Roasted Sliced Grilled Beef Bowl
The quality of the beef is very good, nice and tender,not overcooked, which is always a risk when ordering beef from what isessentially a fast food restaurant. You can see from the picture that there isstill a nice amount of redness to the meat, which is how I prefer my beef. 
My only potential criticism for both the beef and chickenbowls, and I’m assuming all of the others, is regarding the quantity of thesauce that is put on the bowl. As someone who loves sauces and rarely seems tohave enough, I found that they are very liberal with their sauce application.For me this is fine, though even I would say that itwould probably taste better with just a little less sauce. The flavor of thecreamy herb sauce is great, but it is strong. As a result, it can overpowersome of the other awesome flavors in the dish. If you are someone who tends tolike less sauce on things, I would highly recommend that you ask for the sauceon the side or specify that you only want a little.
“Teylu” All Beef Hot Dog Wrapped in Dough
Both of my kids chose to get the hot dogs wrapped indough. They really enjoyed the hot dogs, even requesting to go back to Satu’liCanteen for lunch on our second Animal Kingdom day.
For kids, the presentation of the hot dog is prettyinteresting and novel. The dough the hot dog is wrapped in is a nice goldenbrown, while remaining soft and fluffy. But whatever it was they liked aboutit, both of the kids ate the whole thing, so that’s a win in my book.The chips that come with the hot dogs were also a nicetouch instead of the standard French fries. They are made with a mix of potatovarieties and are pretty darn tasty. Because I absolutely had to sample them,for the sake of blogging, of course!
Blueberry Cream Cheese Mousse
And finally, we reach perhaps one of the most unique andInstagram worthy foods around: The Blueberry Cream Cheese Mousse. Even though Icouldn’t eat this, I ordered it for my hubby and the kids simply because Iwanted to take pictures of it and hear their opinions. They were totally onboard with being the guinea pigs on this one. It appears that the only thing which makes this notgluten free is a thin layer of cake at the very bottom. This is a real bummer.If they had just left that part out, more people could enjoy it.So here it is! Feast your eyes upon the Blueberry CreamCheese Mousse!
Pretty cool looking, right? So … did it taste as good as itlooks? When I asked my husband how it was, he said he liked the passion fruitcurd the best. Granted, both of us tend to like lemon curd, so this isn’tsurprising, but perhaps not a ringing endorsem*nt for the dessert as a whole.In the end, it seems like the Blueberry Cream Cheese Mousse was a decent dessert, but taste wise not one to go out of your way to get. However, I would still suggest you get it, simply for the novelty of the dessert itself. Let’s face it, it just looks cool.
Satu’li Canteen Copy Cat Recipes
Do you want to get a feel for what the food at Satu’liCanteen tastes like from the comfort of your own home? Here’s a video I found that shows you how to make the grilled beef bowl. The recipe is Whole 30 compliant, paleo, low-carb, and gluten free!Grilled Beef & Sweet Potato Bowl with Chimichurri Sauce
Final Thoughts on Satu’li Canteen
It’s no surprise to you by now that I am clearly a fan ofSatu’li Canteen and encourage everyone to give it a try. The pickiest eaterswill no doubt be turned off by the rather unique choices here, but you mightend up surprised by how much you like it.On top of the food just flat out tasting good, theportion size that you get with each bowl is huge. With the prices coming in at around $13-$17 a bowl, that makes Satu’li Canteen a good value for your money.The quality of the food and the sheer amount of it makes this a very fillingmeal, which is key in my world. And when you combine the value with the easethat Mobile Ordering offers, it’s a win-win.
Nicole is a mom, a Disney lover, and a social worker all rolled into one. Her passions for planning Disney trips and helping people collided to create the blog, The Disney Journey. The goal of The Disney Journey is to help people plan the ultimate Disney vacation, without the stress and anxiety. Come follow the Disney Journey on Facebook to stay up to date on the latest happenings.
