How do you use your Disney Dining Plan?

[keneka]

Coming from the United Kingdom , our Disney vacations are usually 2 weeks long (as the plane fare is so expensive it is worth our while to visit less times but for a longer duration during our trip). With 3 adults in or party, our food bill at the end of our vacation could almost be the price of an additional member of our family.

On our last trip in 2013 we were lucky enough to receive the Disney Dining Plan (counter service) free when we purchased our vacation & I tried to plan our meals to get the most out of the deal. As two meals & one snack were included per day - members of our family shared some meals (in places we knew the portions were enormous) to make the credits stretch to as many meals as possible - as well as booking a handful of our favorite table service meals for a couple of evening meals during our stay & using snack credits on ice cream sundae's rather than bottled or soda drinks.

Breakfasts seemed to be the exception to our vacation, with some CM unclear what was included as well as some breakfasts that weren't worth using our credits for (as they are more valuable at dinner & lunch mealtimes).

I was just wondering how other people use their credits, what restaurants use your credits better & how would you recommend using them to people who haven't used the Disney Dining Plan.

 

[jamnmom]

Your past experiences of sharing meals and booking a few favorite restaurants are the same things that we do. As for breakfasts, we also found that it was only in the parks where there was question about what was included. I have never had that problem in the hotels. So...we would get a good breakfast at the hotel (one meal/credit per person); then we would share one meal during the day at a favorite counter service and get the best snack allowed. Many times this would be enough, but if we were really wanting a third meal and we didn't have a dining reservation, we would just go ahead and buy another quick serve meal and share it. One of our favorites where the portions are really big is the Seasons in The Land at Epcot. LOVE the rotisserie chicken with black beans and rice with strawberry shortcake. Hard to believe this is a Quick Serve meal!!

 

[keneka]

I love the sunshine seasons - I think that is a restaurant that keeps getting better & better, we always get the rotisserie chicken - reminds of the one they used to serve at Tusker House (when it was a counter service)

 

[LJSquishy]

In 2012 we had "free dining" with 1 table service, 1 counter service, and 1 snack daily. We used our snack credit each morning to get a yogurt parfait, had a counter service lunch, and a table service dinner. We never wanted any additional snacks because it was too much food...we declined a lot of counter service desserts and sometimes declined table service desserts.

 

[leebee]

We also share meals on the DDP (usually stay at a value resort). We buddy up and use one person's QS credit to share a breakfast platter (according to allears.net, the bounty platter at POP includes scrambled eggs, pancakes, potato casserole, buttermilk biscuit, sausage, and bacon, so plenty to share) and the other person's QS to share a lunch. We each would have our own snack and our own TS credit for dinner. It took some careful planning, and sometimes we'd buy supplemental food, but it worked for the most part.

It also helped that we brought some food (granola bars, dry cereal, bagels w/cream cheese packets, etc.) from home. If we'd been staying longer I might have considered ordering breakfast foods from one of the local delivery services (my family usually eats bagels, fruit, and yogurt for breakfast), but for a 5 night stay that wasn't cost-effective.

 

[anricat]

For breakfast, our family of three can split a large breakfast quick service meal and be fine, unless we’re doing character breakfast, then we turn that into brunch and stuff ourselves silly and eat a snack in the afternoon. We do bring snacks from home also. Last time, we brought along a loaf of banana bread and some homemade snack bars, a few apples and some pretzels and crackers and other things. We ate some of those items for breakfast some mornings and also used snack credits to "buy" some OJ that we split amongst ourselves and muffin and bagel which we also split.

We also found that some snacks we purchased with our snack credits worked well across multiple days. For example we got some cinnamon almonds (from the cart in Tomorrowland) and ate them over the course of a couple of days. Take along several different sizes of ziploc baggies so you can store extra snacks, muffins, bagels, etc. in. Also, since each meal also gives you drinks and dessert, we didn't always need all those drinks or desserts. Most of the time for drinks, we got bottled water and took that around with us. We also had a reusable filter bottle that we refilled from water fountains. For the dessert credit, we often got one dessert to share amongst the three of us and then for the other two desert credits, we were able to sub other things instead of dessert. You can just ask them. For example, at one quick service restaurant, we were able to get an extra side instead so we were able to get some apple sauce to take with us for a snack for later and some extra broccoli to share for a (slightly) healthier meal. When in doubt, ask what you can sub. You don't HAVE to have dessert.

There are lots of ways to maximize the dining plan. Last time we ended up with a bunch of leftover snack credits at the end. We took home a bunch of those yummy cinnamon almonds. I love those things.

 

[*3*Mouseketeers]

What we usually do is eat breakfast at the resort, bring the mugs for drinks to drink at breakfast and get a bottled drink to carry with us to the park. Sometime mid-morning we might get a snack (sometimes french fries) that is filling for a while. Late afternoon around 5:00 or 6:00 we eat the 2nd meal and save the dessert for later. I'm a pretty big eater and we only spent out of pocket a couple times for snacks or drinks. If we get hungry at the resort we always have something handy to eat that we brought with us (chips, crackers, yogurt, etc.)

 

[lovewdwdvc]

Oatmeal or parfait for breakfast is a snack credit. Get water by the case and do not use snack credit for anything to drink. Works great. Have lots of fun.

 

[lisalis]

We would get fruit instead of desserts for many meals, and put it in the fridge for breakfast. If we ate at the hotel, we would get fruit juice or a milk to save for breakfast and just use our mugs. We also brought granola bars and cereal for breakfast in the room most days. It's difficult for us to get up too early, since we our time is an hour earlier than FL time.

 

[canadiandisneynut]

On our last trip we realized that snack credits can go a long way in Starbucks shops at Epcot and MK for breakfast. We always go to Sunshine Seasons as well at Epcot because of portion size. We go to Flame Tree BBQ at Animal Kingdom and to Cosmic Rays at MK- large portions.

 

[GrumpyDad1974]

When we get QS dinning plan, we do a quick breakfast in the room. We drive so we bring a toaster, bagels and cream cheese. If you had a car a quick stop at Walmart would be a good idea. But then we do lunch in the park, dinner at our hotel or DD.

 

[Tarheel girl 1975]

We usually have the regular dining plan with 1 TS, 1CS, and 1 snack. We usually bring snacks and breakfast food from home. Things like granola bars, muffins, cereal, and yogurt. We usually drive, but we used garden grocer one year when we flew. We usually save our meal credits for lunch and dinner, although it's nice to have a hot breakfast at some point during the week. Sometimes we share snacks because they are so big. We usually go during F&W Festival so use our snack credits at the kiosks and sometimes we'll replace a meal that way. Anytime we eat CS at the resort we use our refillable mugs and grab a bottle of vitamin water for later. Sometimes, we'll save our CS desserts too.

 

[Nebraska_Disney]

We go for 10+ days on our trips and we set up a grocery delivery for the first day. We buy cereal, milk, juice, yogurt, and other breakfast/snack items as well as bottled water, to be delivered on our day of arrival. The kids usually eat in the room and my wife and I, who are not big breakfast eaters, will grab something small as well. Depending on how your group eats, the dining plan may not be worth it and you may get more value out of paying out of pocket. Depending on the age of those in your group, the price can change in a hurry. Something to consider if a room discount is offered vs "Free" dining.

 

[frannn]

We bring some snacks for the plane & the room- like granola bars, beef jerky, and fruit snacks. We make a Walmart stop in the beginning of the trip for soda, water, more snacks, bagels, spread, and muffins. We either eat breakfast in the room or the food court (or if we are in a rush, something small at the parks). We do the regular free dining each year, so we use lunch as the CS and TS for dinner. If DD12 is not too hungry, we will pay OOP for a kid's TS meal at some places, like BOG and CDF. We then use the leftover adult TS credits to do a lunch at SciFi. If we go to the outlets we stop at Sonic or McDs and use the CS for breakfast on a different day. On the last day, we order CS to go from wherever we are at (last year was WPE), and carry it onto the plane for dinner. This year DD25 is coming for only part of our trip, so we will use her leftover alotted credits for a TS breakfast and a 2 credit meal. Any portable snacks come back on the plane with us, while soda is left behnd. This works out well for us.