Best restaurant to do character dining

[Muse]

HI

Which restaurants in WDW do character dining? We went to DLP a couple of years ago and jostled in the parks for character photos. Then on the last night went to Cafe Mickey and met loads of characters and took loads of photos!! If we had done this on the first night, we would have saved a bit of time.

We want to do character dining so the kids meet the characters early in the hol so they are not pestering to queue and have photos taken with them in the parks!! Your help is appreciated.

 

[2Tiggies]

Crystal Palace: Pooh, Tigger, Piglet and Eeyore
Ohana: Lilo, Stitch, Mickey and Pluto
Cape May: Minnie, Goofy, Pluto and I can't remember, but I think it is Donald
Chef Mickey: Mickey, Minnie, Pluto, Donald and Goofy
Tusker House: Donald and friends
1900 Park Fare: Princesses
Akershus: Princesses
CRT: Princesses

I am sure I have left some off, but right off the bat those are the ones I can think of. I usually try and get a bit of variety into the mix. It is a great time saver, although DD still wants to stand in line ....

If you go to www.allears.net, select the Dining tab at the top of the page, scroll down a bit and keep an eye on the left panel for Character dining, they have a table of restaurants with the characters at each.

 

[Mrs Doubtfire]

It depends which characters you want to see

We always go to Crystal Palace in the MK - there you can see Winnie the Pooh and friends. If you want princesses you can go to the castle or Arekuesh(??) in Epcot.

Breakfast at the Beach Club with Mickey and friends or Chef Mickeys at the Contemporary Resort........... and so it goes on.

If you decide who you want to see then I'm sure everybody will have plenty of suggestions for you

 

[team harris]

Our favourites are Crystal Palace with Pooh and Friends and also Chef Mickeys with Mickey and gang. The photo and autograph opportunities are endless and the character interaction is fantastic. Would do these again without hesitation - and you are right todo them early on in your holiday to bypass the queues in the parks for photo and autograph ops. Have also done character breakfast in Animal Kingdom, but although can't really explain why, we did not enjoy it as much as Crystal Palace and Chef Mickeys. Also worth doing is Cinderellas Royal Table when she is in residence!

 

[2Tiggies]

CP is our favourite too! The food and service has always been consistently above average for us.

 

[Pooh's-Honey-Pot]

1900 Park Faire was mentioned above - I just want to point out it has different characters depending on what time you go.

Breakfast is (usually) Pooh, Tigger, Alice, Mary Poppins and Mad Hatter. Dinner there is GREAT - you get Cinderella, the ugly sisters and the step mother, and they put on a really funny show, and keep arguing across the restaurant etc! Its great if your children like the Cinderella story!!

 

[crabbie1]

Another vote for CP and chef mickeys.Also liked the garden grove in the land at epcot.Mickey pluto chip and dale in there country bumpkin outfits.Food nice as well.
Doing stitch and co at the poly for the first time this year and 1900 park fare .As mrs D says it depends who your children like.

 

[Trespassers William]

We love Crystal Palace too, great food and plenty of Characters. Our kids also enjoyed Mickey's Backyard BBQ, you get to dance with Mickey, Minnie and Chip & Dale, something a bit different from the normal character dining

 

[dee slack]

all the character meals are excellent and much better organised than DLP IMO.
Also, the character meet and greets in the parks are much better (ie specified times/places and queues!) so you might not need to do too many character meals and still see lots of characters.

 

[PJB71]

My DD's also love the Liberty Tree, but think they only do character dining in the evening now. There is usually, Minnie, Mickey, Goofy and Pluto, and the food is usually scrummy

 

[dixonsontour]

Hi, if you are going in 2 months time you need to make reservations NOW.

WDW dining reservations open 6 months in advance.

If you go on wdw website there is a dining section. Under that is character dining - have a search around for what is available at the times you want.

most have4 no charge for making a reservation - adr. you can always cancel. Without adr's you will not be seated or may have a very long wait.

P.s just seen your dates are the same as ours - see you there!!!

 

[The Eighth Dwarf]

We all really enjoyed Tusker House, thought the food was good and the atmosphere was nice. Plus the kids get to dance round the restaurant banging drums and things which my DD really seemed to enjoy.

 

[Muse]

Hi, if you are going in 2 months time you need to make reservations NOW.

WDW dining reservations open 6 months in advance.

If you go on wdw website there is a dining section. Under that is character dining - have a search around for what is available at the times you want.

most have4 no charge for making a reservation - adr. you can always cancel. Without adr's you will not be seated or may have a very long wait.

P.s just seen your dates are the same as ours - see you there!!!

Thank you all for your replies.

Wow what a coincidence. Notice you are in Lancs. Are you flying from Manc?? We are going on the afternoon flight with Virgin on the 15th!! Can't wait. Have just reserved my first table at Chef Mickeys!!

 

[2Tiggies]

Can't wait. Have just reserved my first table at Chef Mickeys!!

Your children will love it! So will you.

 

[amystevekai&bump]

My DD's also love the Liberty Tree, but think they only do character dining in the evening now. There is usually, Minnie, Mickey, Goofy and Pluto, and the food is usually scrummy

unfortunately there are no longer characters at LTT - they did come back briefly when CP was under refurbishment, but they have gone again and don't look likely to be returning any time soon I'm afraid!

 

[Sapper383]

Like others have said, it does depend on your children....

Last Sep we did:

Crystal Palace: we went for Breakfast as you can get into MK before it officially opens....the food was great and the opertunity to take photos without anyone else in front of the castle was fab....but this wasn't our best character interaction.

1900 Park Fair: We went for dinner with cinderella, step sisters and step mother, prince charming....We loved the food and location.....the best thing was the character interaction...My DD4 wore an anistasia dress I had made, the attention she got was the best ever....The step mother saw DD first and took her by the hand to go and meet anistasia...on seeing my DD anistasia shreeked with joy and sat on the floor talking to her for at least 5 mins...she later came to our table and wrote a personal message to my DD and kissed her autograph book, she stayed at our table for at least 5 mins.....then as anistasia went to other tables, she asked them if they had seen the mini anistasia.....if they said they hadn't she would shout over to my DD and tell her to stand on her chair........My DD had the best evening ever!!!!!

Garden Grill: We went here for my DS10 who loves chip and dale....the meal wasn't great but loved the rotating resturant and as we were sat in a booth, you couldn't see anyone else in the resturant....it felt like we had the characters to ourselves....I had made DD a chip and dale dress and DS a chip and dale tshirt for this meal.....chip and dale made soooo much fuss over them both and took them both by the hand and walked off with them....the Character handler also asked if chip and dale could have a photo of DD's dress.....characters were fab, but I don't think we would go back as the food was poor.

Hollywood and Vine: Little einstines and Jojo's circus...breakfast, food wasn't great and character interaction wasn't all that good....we wouldn't go back here.

sorry for going on a bit, but hope the info might be of some help......

we are going back to Disney in 2011, we will definatly do CP for breakfast and 1900 for dinner......we are also going to try Chef Mickeys and Akershaus

 

[dixonsontour]

We're on 10.25am Virgin from Manchester which lands 2.30 ish at Orlando.

Is that the one you're on?

 

[Nero the dog]

Even though our kids are past the stage of meeting characters. We are still having meals at Cyrstal Palace (with characters) and Tusker House (no characters) .
We think the quality/variety of the food makes it worth while when you look at what you pay for a normal meal in the parks.