Hungry Bear Restaurant Review
Hungry Bear Restaurant is a counter service dining location serving Japanese curry in Tokyo Disneyland’s Westernland. This TDR dining review features food photos, a look inside the restaurant, and our thoughts as to whether it’s a good place to stop for a meal during your trip to Tokyo Disney Resort.
Despite sharing a name, this restaurant bears no resemblance to Disneyland’s Hungry Bear Restaurant in Critter Country. Besides maybe the fact that both contain some stray Country Bear Jamboree references. (Hungry Bear Restaurant in Tokyo Disneyland is right next to Country Bear Theater; Hungry Bear Restaurant in Disneyland used to be right next to Counter Bear Playhouse.)
As mentioned this version of Hungry Bear Restaurant specializes in Japanese curry. And by specializes, I mean that’s the only thing on the menu. There are a couple of curry restaurants in Tokyo Disney Resort, including our beloved Casbah Food Court, as curry is incredibly popular in Japan. In fact, Hungry Bear Restaurant is so popular that it hungered for an expansion a couple of years ago and consumed Mile Long Bar in the process.
Terrible puns aside, Hungry Bear Restaurant is absolutely huge, but it doesn’t feel like it at all. Each room in the restaurant looks and feels different, and is very well detailed. It can be very busy in Hungry Bear Restaurant during the prime dining hours, but it never feels like a loud mess hall due to how the restaurant is divided up. Some booths are even located in jail cells!
Let’s take a look around Hungry Bear Restaurant at Tokyo Disneyland…
This is the main dining room, which is actually quite large. As you can see, it’s packed. We dined here about an hour before park closing right after catching the last showing of Country Bear Christmas, and it was still this busy.
I can only imagine how busy it would be during the 6 pm dinner rush.
Here’s another one of the larger dining rooms, decked out for Christmas. Lots of cool decor on the walls, as you can see, but these two main rooms aren’t nearly as cool as the smaller rooms. The restaurant forms a (sort of) horseshoe shape.
The main ordering area at the bottom of the horseshoe is flanked by larger dining rooms, plus smaller dining rooms on the sides of the horseshoe, and outside dining within the open area of the horseshoe. That probably makes no sense, but short of me drawing a “diagram” in MS Paint, that’s the best I can do to explain the layout of Hungry Bear Restaurant. Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to get any good photos of the jail cell rooms or other areas.
When I mentioned that the menu was limited, I meant it. Curry is the only option, with pork, meat patty, or chicken curry being the main curry options served, in regular or large sizes, with mild or regular curry. There’s also a special “30-Spice Large Curry” available.
On our visit to Hungry Bear Restaurant, I ordered the 30-Spice Large Curry. It includes rice, sausages, fried potatoes, and cheese. Despite the “30-spice” name, I’d call this a mild curry. That was fine by me, as I’m not one for particularly intense curry.
It’s worth reiterating that this is Japanese curry. While it bears similarities to Indian curry, it’s generally much more mild. Think of it as a cross between a western stew and ‘traditional’ curry. That’s not a perfect description, but the point is that you shouldn’t be scared away if you normally find curry to be too adventurous. If you’re game for stew, you’ll be okay here.
I absolutely loved this curry–my mouth is watering as I write this review. The combination of potatoes, sausage, and cheese in a curry worked surprisingly well, and this was an excellent dish. This is something I’d definitely get again when we return to Hungry Bear Restaurant.
Sarah ordered the chicken curry (the pork is fried), and also really liked it. Hers was similarly mild (our understanding is that Japanese curry generally isn’t as spicy as you’ll find it elsewhere). She ordered the large portion, which was a good size, but definitely not large enough for sharing. If you have a normal American appetite, we highly recommend going for the larger sizes whenever possible.
Overall, Hungry Bear Restaurant is yet another gem of a counter service restaurant in Tokyo Disneyland. While the Japanese curry is mild compared to what you might expect, it’s incredibly delicious and is a good way to try some authentic Japanese cuisine at Tokyo Disneyland. Even if curry is typically too intense or adventurous for you, we’d recommend giving this a try.
Hungry Bear Restaurant has become one of our absolute favorite restaurants at Tokyo Disneyland, and it always draws a huge crowd–for good reason. Tokyo Disneyland has a surplus of excellent counter service options, and it’s really tough to go wrong no matter where you eat (unless that place is Tomorrowland Terrace!). Even if you don’t dine here, it’s worth breezing through after doing Country Bear Jamboree, as there are a lot of cool posters and artwork that you can quickly check out.
If you’re thinking of visiting Japan for the first time and are overwhelmed with planning, definitely check out our Tokyo Disney Resort Planning Guide. It covers much more than the parks, from getting there to WiFi to currency and much, much more. For more photos and an idea of what we did day-by-day during our first visit, read our Tokyo Disney Resort Trip Report.
Your Thoughts
Have you dined at Hungry Bear Restaurant? What did you think of it? Do you prefer this curry or the Indian curry served at Casbah Food Court in Tokyo DisneySea? Have you been to the Disneyland versions of the restaurant? Do you agree or disagree with our review? Any questions? Hearing your feedback–even when you disagree with us–is both interesting to us and helpful to other readers, so please share your thoughts below in the comments!
Would you recommend trying Japanese curry for the first time at this place? I’ve never, ever had any type of curry… but I do love beef stew… Maybe my husband and I will buy one type and share it (I know you said it isn’t really sharable but if we don’t like it, I don’t want to waste it!).
This looks so different than anything we have in the States!
I think the food looks good however compared to the other restaurants in Tokyo I think I may skip it like you said…
If you like curry, it is DEFINITELY worth trying, especially if you have 2-3 days in Tokyo Disneyland. If not, yeah, not so much.
I love curry and this restaurant looks amazing. It’s probably the only “wilderness” themed curry place in the world.
I particularly enjoyed the fact that this line survived any edits made to this post:
“In fact, Hungry Bear Restaurant is so popular that it hungered for an expansion”
Haha, do you really think these posts are edited? Now, I know you’re a long-time reader of the blog…you have to have noticed the typos and flat-out mistakes…right???
As for that gem of a pun, you missed the best part about it CONSUMING the bar! 😉
I would find it hilarious if these puns and typos accidentally find their way into any legal writing you do