WDW Restaurant Executive Will Take Buyout

After 21 years, Dieter Hannig, the WDW Vice President for food and beverage new concepts, will retire from Disney, taking the recently offered buyout for Disney executives. It will be a major departure of someone who has overseen the creation of some of my most favorite places to eat.

Hannig has overseen the development of dozens of new restaurants at Disney World over the years. Critics credited him for elevating the resort into a top dining destination in the early 1990s, when he began encouraging executive chefs at Disney restaurants to run their eateries as if they owned them.

The German-born chef said his fondest projects included developing the California Grill atop Disney's Contemporary Resort and creating the African-inspired Jiko and Boma in Disney's Animal Kingdom Lodge.

He has most recently been developing a third African restaurant, which will feature dishes infused with Indian flavors in the time-share addition Disney is building next to the Animal Kingdom Lodge. The restaurant -- "Sanaa," which is Swahili for "work of art" -- is scheduled to open in mid-April.

We plan on dining at Sanaa this coming June. If this is as good as Boma and Jiko, then Hannig will have left a lasting legacy of classy and amazing restaurants at WDW.

Zz.