Breakfast or Lunch

[teachallday]

Simple Question (ha ha ha - Is there really such a thing?)
Which is better and Why? Breakfast or Lunch for Table Service Meals?

Okay, I am almost at my 90 day out point. Time for me to get seriously thinking about where and when I want to eat meals.

A few things have been decided. Based upon the issues with my little Princess who has Special Needs , we are trying to avoid Table Service meals at dinner time. We also have to avoid places that have an open flame. We want to meet a variety of characters at the meals, so we can avoid waiting in line to meet them. Must see characters are: Handy Manny, Princess, and Chip & Dale (she really loves their old shows).

Our current choices are:
* Garden Grill (only place I could find with Chip&Dale without flame - Dinner only unfortunately )
* Playhouse Disney’s Play ‘N Dine
* Cinderella’s Royal Table
* Chef Mickey’s (we are staying at the Contempoary)
* Crystal Palace
* Donald’s Safari Breakfast
* Corral Reef

 

[Girly_Qs]

How many are you looking to pick?

Overall, either works well, IMO.

You can do an early breakfast and get into the parks before rope-drop. Or a very late breakfast that carries you through til an early dinner (are you planning on using CS for dinners?).

Or you could do like we usually do (though we usually do it with CS) - breakfast is snack credits or granola bars, etc that we travel with. Hit the park for rope drop, get as much done early as you can. As the crowds begin to pick up grab an early lunch (before the rest of the crowd is thinking about it yet), and then hit a couple more things while everyone else it getting lunch at the "regular" lunch hour.

Keep in mind though (since I'm not sure what dietary restrictions you're facing), that MANY places have the same menus at lunch AND dinner, so if dinner's out . . .).

As for your current options, I can only offer up my own experiences:

- Garden Grill: we also went for dinner. We found it to be . . . eh. Not horrible, but no one in our group (that trip was 9) is in any hurry to get back. Food was just okay, not a huge variety (since it's family style at the table, not buffet or a al carte to choose your own), and character interaction was just alright.

- Play n Dine: food was okay (we did lunch). Nothing spectacular, but a large variety so everyone (again, 9 that trip) found plenty to be satisfied with. The character interaction here was GREAT if your dc is into JoJo and Goliath, Little Einsteins, Handy Manny, etc.

- Cinderella’s Royal Table: Haven't done it yet, we'll be going this trip (Dec) for lunch.

- Chef Mickey’s: we went for dinner and loved it all around. We all (6 that trip) loved our meal, and the girls had a VERY good time with the characters. It can get a bit loud, but we all had fun. We'll be doing breakfast there next trip.

- Crystal Palace: I know lots of people around her love it. Personally, we were underwhelmed and aren't hurrying to revisit it. Food was alright (better than GG, IMO, but we preferred CM and 1900PF that same trip), character interaction was alright (got pics with all, etc). I don't know, it wasn't a bad experience by any stretch, but . . . more . . . 'meh' for us.

Haven't done your other 2, but have heard decent things about them and I'm sure you'll find someone else with the experience to weigh in .

Also - have you considered Princess Storybook at Akershus? We did dinner there last trip and didn't care for the meal at all, but the princesses were fantastic. We'll be doing it again this trip, but breakfast this time! We also REALLY enjoyed our dinner at 1900 Park Fare - both the food and the characters were superb IMO (and that of the other 5 that trip, lol).

HTH a bit!

 

[teachallday]

We are staying for 7 nights, so we have 7 Table Service (TS) credits. Now CRT is a two credit meal, so we might pay for that one Out-of-Pocket and add another TS meal.

There is interest in Yak & Yeti, so we might do Donald’s Safari Breakfast and then do Yak and Yeti for lunch. Yak & Yeti is also a Counter Service (CS) restaurant, so we could do that instead of TS.

Our plan at this point is to be at our resort (Contemporary) for dinner each night, doing CS. Depending on the little Princess' tolerances, we might get on the monorail and go to the CS places at the other Monorail resorts or even possibly Magic Kingdom. I really do not like the idea of having every dinner as a CS meal, but with her issues, we know it will be VERY hard for her to handle a TS meal around dinner time. We are trying to make this trip as stress free and enjoyable as possile, after-all it is supposed to be a VACATION.