Be our Guest lunch vs. dinner?

[DSNY4ever]

Okay, I have been googling this into the ground and I am tired of trying to figure it out. So Lunch is a fast pass meal? So do you book it with your fast pass plus at the 60 day mark? Does it take up one of your 3 Fast passes for the day? When do you pre-order your food, how far in advance is that?

Is there a reason to do lunch vs. dinner? We did dinner here once the first year it opened and we'd like to eat here again. I thought lunch sounded easier...but it looks more complicated?

 

[CodeGoddess]

All meals at BOG are ADRs now.

Dinner is a sit down assigned seating with a waiter where as lunch is more cafeteria style. You order your food via phone or kiosk (day of), get your own drink, find your own seat and then someone will bring the food out when it's ready. I read that lunch is much more loud and chaotic than dinner but lunch is cheaper so depends on what you are looking for.

 

[Derb]

I have an ADR for lunch for my Feb trip. I just tried to check the Disney website to see exactly when it would let me preorder, but of course there's a glitch on the website right now. I know it's pretty near the actual trip date that you can order, I don't remember exactly when. I do know that the Master's Cupcake is the one with the grey stuff, and I think you can only get that one with lunch. I think it comes on top of a rather hard brownie at dinner instead, that people always mention isn't good. So that's another difference between lunch and dinner.

 

[PlanningMama]

As others have mentioned, lunch is an ADR now but it is a quick service credit instead of a table service credit. Yes, you can pre-order your lunch, I think I did ours about 30 days in advance but I believe you can modify it up to pretty close to your ADR date. I do not know when the window officially closes on that. You do not have to pre-order if you don't want to. Pre-ordering is supposed to make things go faster when you arrive, and it certainly did in our case, but I have seen other reports that it did not really work that way, so experiences have varied on that. If you choose to go for dinner, it is a table service credit and you cannot pre-order. For lunch, you can choose to sit anywhere. For dinner, they will seat you. The Beast is there as the dinner host and circulates throughout the restaurant and you can meet him and have pictures with him on your way out. At present, the Beast is not there during lunch. I think the experience is very nice either way, so I would recommend considering whether the use of table service credit/quick service credit is important to you, and whether or not meeting the beast is important, and whether or not you care about choosing your own seat. Of course, the dinner is more upscale in terms of food choices also, while lunch is more casual with mainly a choice of sandwiches although both meals are very good and the lunch, in my opinion, is the best use of a QS credit on property. So the type of food you are hoping for should also factor into your decision. Hope this helps!

 

[abinormal]

We chose lunch over dinner because it fit better with our schedule - we were out of the parks before dinner most days.

Also, I like getting my own drinks and not having to wait for a check. There were a lot of complaints about service at the time I was making ADRs.

 

[JennyN]

If I understand correctly I need to book for lunch at BOG, what are the chances of getting a table without a booking? My daughter just wants the "gray stuff" can we just go for that and would we need to book?

 

[Derb]

I haven't been there since last November, but at that time they were not taking any walk ups and there were swarms of upset people when we walked right in with our ADR's. And that was back when it was a special fastpass adr, not a reg. ADR. I had preordered, but was unable to figure out how to request no mayo on my DD's turkey sandwich, so we had to spend some time at the kiosks where I was able to modify the order. I would think the place is still popular enough that an ADR is necessary, and I wouldn't personally waste my time just getting one cupcake. Lunch was delicious!

 

[DSNY4ever]

Thanks guys, it sounds like the Fast pass articles I was finding about it are dated info. This helped a lot. We never do the dining plan, so we don't need to worry about credits. I guess I'll just see what we can get!

 

[PlanningMama]

If I understand correctly I need to book for lunch at BOG, what are the chances of getting a table without a booking? My daughter just wants the "gray stuff" can we just go for that and would we need to book?

I agree with the above poster - when we were there last month people without ADR's were being turned away so chances are probably slim. But we were there during free dining so maybe it was just a very busy time.

 

[michelepa]

PlanningMama explained all the differences very well so I won't repeat them here.

I did want to note that since they are such very different experiences and food choices we opted to do both a lunch and dinner on our trip this past August. It is like eating in two different restaurant, especially if you eat in different themed rooms.

We were lucky to secure a reservation for dinner our first evening and had a very fancy expensive meal in the Grand Ballroom seated close to the windows watching the snow fall and meeting the Beast.

Lunch at BOG was our last meal of vacation. It was quite chaotic but the food was good and DD chose to sit in the Castle Gallery room.

We enjoyed both experiences although the food was hit or miss at both meals depending on what you ordered.

We are returning next year and DD would like to eat both lunch and dinner at BOG again and that's fine with me.

 

[Darci Thordarson]

Okay, I have been googling this into the ground and I am tired of trying to figure it out. So Lunch is a fast pass meal? So do you book it with your fast pass plus at the 60 day mark? Does it take up one of your 3 Fast passes for the day? When do you pre-order your food, how far in advance is that?

Is there a reason to do lunch vs. dinner? We did dinner here once the first year it opened and we'd like to eat here again. I thought lunch sounded easier...but it looks more complicated?

You have to make a resrvation