Basic Dining plan- pay for extra meals here and there?

[MagicPrincess]

Deluxe dining plan just seems like WAY too much food for our family. Plus I really don't want to feel tied down to reservations every day!

How many people get the basic dining plan, and maybe pay for an extra character meal here and there. I'm wondering if that's the way to go?

Thoughts???
Any other suggestions?

I wish they had dining plan ala carte!
Thanks!

[RivieraMaya05]

We do the basic plan and usually just eat breakfast in our room. Only once have we paid for a meal OOP and it was when we went to Chef Mickeys for breakfast and then paid OOP for dinner at T-rex.

My suggestion is to make the most of your credits. I would use credits to pay for Character meals and pay for other meals OOP that may be less expensive.

[Nadjalu]

I agree, use your credits first, especially for character meals and more expensive meals.

Then if you need to do a lunch or breakfast OOP then it is cheaper.

We get the DDP and use all our credits for dinners and lunchs, spacing the heavier lunches quite a few hours from dinner. This helps to ensure we only need a very light breakfast or snack first.
Then we pay for those OOP.

[ToyStoryBo]

We've never done the DP, but we're planning on it for our next trip. I can't speak from experience, but I am thinking like you. I really want to maximize our credits, and eat mostly dinners that we otherwise would not do because of the cost. We do plan on eating breakfast in our rooms, but I am sure they will get sick of that because we will be there for 9 days...plus the kids enjoy breakfast foods, esp when eating out. So I was thinking about doing one breakfast buffet, but breakfast is the cheapest meal of the day. I am thinking that we will pay for one breakfast OOP, as I would much rather use the credits for dinner.

[MagicPrincess]

ugh...it's so hard to decide what to do!!!
I really need to sit down and figure out everywhere we want to eat, and then figure out what it would cost every which way.
I know we want to go to a few character breakfasts, plus a TS meal each night for dinner.

[koolaidmoms]

We have used the DP on our last 4 trips. I found that even with a family of hearty eaters if I planned ahead and maximized our credits we could make do with just our credits and purchasing a few snack items. I don't think we have paid for a full meal ever using the DP.

That said. It does take planning. Knowing what park you are going to be in and what meals can feed an adult and a child especially at CS if you have children with big appetities. Five of the eight days we ate at buffets or family style to fill everyone up. We tried to eat about 4-4:30 so that breakfast was a snack credit, lunch was a CS (usually split) and then a big dinner and if needed a snack later at night.

Hope this helps a bit. :)

[bitohoney]

I've done that in the past...get the regular dining plan and end up paying OOP for some meals. This time I'm trying the DxDP for the 1st time because I can't chose just 1 TS per day. There's so many I like! I would always end up paying for at least 4-5 OOP. Now I have places I love and places I've never been to on my ADR list.

[catne]

Agree that Deluxe is a LOT of food, and a lot of time. Some people use the deluxe to do just two meals a day - one table service for breakfast, then snacks through the day, then a 2 credit meal for dinner (either signature restaurants, Cinderella's Royal Table, or the dinner shows.) We rarely use the deluxe, though, just based on the volume of food. And we really don't think the signature places are really worth 2 credits...overall, wouldn 't consider them worth twice as much as the 1 credit places. Just our opinion, of course - you'll find plenty of people who love the signature places.

But some considerations...how old are your kids? And what kind of appetites do they have? If they are "Disney Adults", then I suggest you pay cash for the character breakfasts for all of you, and use your table service credit for dinner (adult breakfast prices are much cheaper than typical adult dinner prices.)

BUT if your kids are under 10 years old, then you may find it much better deal to use their credits to pay for their character breakfast because kids' character buffett prices are relatively higher than prices on kids' dinner meals (and if they're light eaters, you can often order less for them at dinner when paying cash, especially if you might be sharing some of your food. ) You can split the way you pay -- paying cash for the adults' breakfasts & using credits for the "Disney Kids" in your family - just be sure to tell your server which people will be using credits & which will pay cash (and check your receipt to make sure it is correct.)

[candielips]

When we travel this fall we will be on the basic DDP for 12 nights and plan on only paying OOP for Mickeys Backyard BBQ. I just felt that the cost of only $45 an adult was not worth 2TS.
Otherwise we will pay OOP just for small things like breakfast, when we are not eating in our room.

[ancestry]

We did the deluxe plan in June and ended up frequently eating three table service meals per day. A few days we did two meals with one of them being a 2 point meal but for most days we did 3 TS meals.

This coming May we decided that we do not want to spend so much time eating and running from reservation to reservation. We are going to do counter service for lunch and table service for dinner with a very light breakfast. After pricing everything out we realized that it was cheapest to do the regular dining plan and pay out of pocket for the few extras (items or meals) that we wanted versus getting the deluxe dining plan again.

[Tiger926]

Each trip we re-evaluate our dining as we've done it all: DDE/TIW, OOP, DP and Dx, multiple times each. We have a 6yr old and 2 yr old, plus DH and myself. Three of us have low blood sugar, and we have allergies/sensitivities, so eating is a necessity for us.

In the summer we go for approx. 2 weeks (12 days this July), and doing Dx is too much money, plus we have our 1bedroom villa as we are DVC members, so we do DP and supplement with OOP discounts that we get with various cards (AP, DVC and Safari Club), plus make breakfast in our villa most mornings. It is always still cheaper than Dx, yet it allows us to have created our own DP which is in between DP and Dx. That being said, we don't care for CS much at all (we only care for a select few), so sometimes we use CS meals for breakfast once in awhile, and throw in an extra TS with cash which allows for some days to be 2TS meals.

This coming trip in March, we are in a studio for 6 days, so can't cook breakfast in our villa. After running the numbers with DP and Dx, it is better for us to go Dx this trip, as for a couple of hundred dollars more, we are getting more meals and more snacks. Baby is still free as he's under 2, so those appetizers go to him (he eats more than I do). We are also doing Royal Table (aka Fairy Tale Dining as of Feb. 7), which we don't normally do as a treat for kids. We don't find that 2TS credits are generally worth it either (even on Dx), but this is a treat as we had an extra credit to handle. That dinner alone is close to $200.00 for the 3 (baby is free) of us too, so Dx works out well in this travel scenario.

So, as you can see, we go through this each trip too! It takes careful planning to crunch those numbers. Sometimes upgrading to Dx is worth it based on restaurants, ages of kids and length of trip. Other times, like in summer, it is not. Don't forget though to look at any and all discounts that you might qualify for if paying cash: AP, DVC, Safari Club.

Good luck to OP and all others making this decision. Happy eating, Tiger :)

[jenniferkeala808]

It is my boyfriend and I going. It's his first time and we would like to spend as much time as possible at the parks but we also love doing sit down meals. Basic dining plan works for us. Right now, we are going to be eating most breakfasts in our room and we are only paying OOP for one meal. That's what we're doing! good luck with your planning!

[TillyMarigold]

We are serious foodies and went during free dining last year. We brought no food with us except coffee and bottled water. We took two tours that included meals (Keys to the Kingdom and Wild by Design). We booked 9 reservations for a 9-night stay, but 2 were at Signature restaurants.

IIRC we ended up paying OOP for 2 TS meals (each, so 4 total) and 5 QS meals (total). I figured out which to pay for by looking at the menus and choosing the two most expensive things we were likely to order, and adding them up (and dividing by 2 for the Signature places). Boma at $19 each and Cape May at $22 each were the cheapest, so we paid those OOP. For QS we paid OOP if the per-person total was $10 or less. We also paid for a few snacks OOP--coffees one day, plus a couple things that weren't on the dining plan like gelato in Italy, and a box of doughnuts in the gift shop that was 2 breakfasts and a snack. We had snack credits left over and bought candy in the gift shop, which we ate on the plane (we were flying an airline that doesn't give any snacks at all).

We like to sleep in on our vacation, so many days we had only a late breakfast, snacks (we usually would get 1 snack to share, then a couple hours later, get another snack to share), and then dinner.

[RachChamb]

Are park hours posted before the 180 day ADR time?

We're going in October, our ADR date is April 13th. Will I have access to the hours at that point so I can plan my meals better?