Breakfastosaurus

[cinmell]

Is Donald's Breakfastosaurus buffet or family style? If you have been to this breakfast, did you enjoy it? We're thinking of giving it a shot on our next trip. Thanks!

 

[GoodFairies]

It's a buffet. I'm glad we tried it once, but I prefer Chef Mickey's. Restaurantosaurus is a little difficult to navigate.

 

[Muffy]

It is a buffet but we much prefer 1900 Park Fare. The food was mediocre at best.

 

[F1Julie]

I found Donald's to be a bit of a disappointment as far as character meals go. The food is ok, but the buffet line gets long as the restaurant fills up. We had the 8:00 seating. The place is huge. My biggest disappointment was in the character interaction. Each character came by only once, one right after another, and hung around long enough for one picture before moving on. At other character meals, the characters seem to work the room better. For breakfast, I also much prefer 1900 Park Fare. The food and characters are much better. If your going to Donald's since you'll be at the AK I think you'll enjoy it if you don't expect too much. If you are making a special trip just for Donald's, I would go elsewhere.

 

[inaminute]

Many people like Breakfastosaurus.

I'm glad we did it once, but will never go again. It just wasn't worth the price. It was crowded with long lines for the buffet and the food was nothing special.

We liked Chef Mickey's much more and will definitely do that again!

 

[CamColt]

As other have said it is a buffet, and we too were disappointed with it. The food itself wasnt bad, but the whole procedure was very stressful and we couldnt wait to get out of there, putting a little damper on the food for us.
We much prefer Chef Mickeys where we have fun and arent stressed out.

 

[Lewski709]

Why is it so stressful?

 

[Fire14]

DH, A friend and I ate here on our May trip. We loved it ,had great character interaction, food was some of best bfst. buffet food we'd had. My friend who is a cook asked to make sure we ate here again on next trip which we have and it will be our first of trip.

other friends of ours voted it their fav character meal also.

 

[Kaycee]

Donald's is one of those restaurants where you will get a lot of different opinions. We've ate there four times, and loved it every time. The reasons: 1)my younger DS is a huge Donald fan, and this is one place we know he can see Donald and 2) I have two boys, and they both enjoy the archeological digsite theme at Donald's.

I've heard people complain about the food, but we've always had a good meal there - it's typical WDW breakfast buffet fare as far as I can tell so I'm not sure what the problem for others has been.

I've also heard complaints about the service, but we've been fortunate enough to have great servers on three visits and an average server on the other visit. We've never had bad service here.

I'd recommend trying it for yourself if it sounds appealing to you. I have found that some of our very favorite WDW restaurants are the ones you read the worst reviews about.

 

[CamColt]

Originally posted by Kaycee

I'd recommend trying it for yourself if it sounds appealing to you. I have found that some of our very favorite WDW restaurants are the ones you read the worst reviews about.

I totally agree! Everyone has different tastes, and every experience at any restuarant can go from one extreme to the other. If any restaurant looks like it interests you, Id definitely give it a try.

Lewski, I assume you wre asking about my experience. We had an 8:10 PS and arrived at the park well before 8:00. We had hoped to be done by park opening at 9:00(I had heard this was the thing to do). Checking in at the gate and then at the table inside the gate took forever. Then we had to wait longer for our waiter to gather up all his customers and take us to the restaurant...all this while he ws shouting orders at us(think General Knowledge in Cranium Command). We were seated and he told us we could either sit and wait for the characters or go to the buffet. There was no line at the buffet so we went. We were a party of 7 and some of us had 1 or 2 things, some had none when our waiter started yelling at us, by name, "Smith" party get back to your table Donald is at your table, over and over. He could see we were trying but other people were now taking pictures so we had to be courteous and walk around or wait, however he continued yelling at us by name. We were so afraid of him we tried getting back so fast we all left my 2 yo at the buffet, LOL! Upon getting back to the table with mostly empty plates we got a quick picture with Donald and were then told we had to sit and wait for all the characters. Donalds also hit my 2 yo in the face with his tail which set him off crying so he didnt make it in many pictures with the characters. By the time we were finally starting our meal it was well after 8:30, probably closer to 8:45 not what I had expected for an 8:10 buffet meal. Between trying to eat fast to get out, and deal with our waiter yelling at us, we were quite stressed.
I much prefer Chef Mickeys where you go to the buffet at your leisure and you dont need an appointment with the characters. However, from the reviews Ive seen here this is not always they norm, just our experience.

 

[marcyinPA]

We went to Donald's in May of this year, and it was an unfortunate experience! My ds5 chose it for his 5th birthday celebration, and having never been, we were really excited about it. I made a late PS...I think it was 10:30. We got there and it was purely chaotic inside. People up, people down, long lines and no characters. Our server was pretty much non-existant. He served us coffee once. Other than that, we had to hunt him down for everything else. He never acknowledged my son's b-day, which was kind of disappointing. The food lines were long, and there were not many choices. Some was overcooked, some undercooked. Many items were already gone and not replaced. Once the characters came around, they stayed for one photo and split, never to come around again.

We've been to a few other character breakfasts(Cape May and Crystal Palace) where the food has been much better, better selection and quality. The service has been better too. If it is Donald you want to see, head over to Chef Mickey's...he's usually in the lobby (at dinner anyway!)

If you are looking for just a great breakfast buffet and don't really need characters, try the Trails End at Fort Wilderness. Awesome food, awesome service, relaxing atmosphere, and the best value on property.

 

[Chadsgirl44]

My DH and I had a great breakfast in August. We had a PS at 10:00 and everything was hot and fresh. We had plenty of character interaction even with 2 adults! Our server was wonderful and always kept our plates clear and checked on us often. I was a little apprehensive about eating here prior to August due to comments from other DISers, but I'm glad we did and will again!

 

[Lewski709]

Thanks for all the info. I think we'll do it. I am not the type of person to not say anything to a manager if it stinks. I won't be in a rush and won't be pushed around by the staff. It's our breakfast and we'll get our food when we want. If the characters are on a schedule, won't they get back around? Again, if I am not happy....I won't just let it go and I don't complain often. Has anyone said anything to anyone there about the bad service?

 

[Celestine]

Let us know how you get on as we're booked for our December trip.

 

[lenshanem]

Taken from my June trip report -
Donald’s Breakfastosaurus at AK was a bust. I had read bad reviews before, but it was one of the few character meals we had yet to try out. Just as the reviews mentioned, we were rushed, rushed, rushed. A matter of fact, when Mickey came to our table a CM asked us to be standing up and ready for a pic before he even came over. He was with us for less than half a sec, I barely got my camera in focus! On a more positive note, the chef was accommodating with the food allergies and brought my daughter out a nice plate with fresh fruit, etc.


We won't be returning to this one or recommending it.

 

[JennyDrake]

We have eaten there 4 times over 10 years and overall, I'd have to give it a thumbs up. We've had good servers each time--not outstanding, but good. Well, actaully one year "Gaston" was outstanding.
The food is standard Disney buffet faire, with many combinations of scrambled egg and omlet dishes. DH, who is "Mr. Meat and Potatoes" likes it a great deal.
I thought the variety at 1900 was better than ANY other buffet and the quality was the best, but DH didn't care much for it.
The characters do not linger, but I didn't find it to be rushed more than any other character meal.
I know lots of people rave about Chef Mickey's, but it is last on our list for character measl. It (and the Crystal Palace) are very noisy, and I found almost every dish there to be very, very sweet.
My biggest gripe with Donald's is if you get there before the park opens (which I encourage) you are held outside the agets, and herded through in small groups to an area out side the restaurant, where you wait yet some more. With that said, I doubt we've ever waited more than 15 minutes total (with PS).
Someone did ask if the characters would recircuit...good question. the last time we were there in July (we usually go in the off season) and the servers were directing the characters to where they needed to be, and it was clearly a One STop Event. Keep in mind though that we did not ask for the characters to return. I suspect they would if asked.

 

[Raggedy]

We had a great time. Donald fed my son, because he didn't finish his cereal. My son was 13 at the time. If it was anyone else, he wouldn't of ate. Goofy kept kissing my 15 year old niece.
We had the best time here. We are going back this trip.

 

[fizz13]

We really enjoyed this one. Maybe its because we had the first PS of the day off-season, so it didn't feel crowded and there was no wait for the buffet line. Goofy did a little dance and we had plenty of time with each character ( I loved them in their jungle gear). My kids enjoyed watching them walk around as much as meeting them. BTW the food was ok and I probably wouldn't go back for this alone.
Claire

 

[G&J's Mom]

Maybe it is because we had a later PS, but we went on a Saturday in June and had a great time! The food was good with a minimal line, the server was awesome and the character interaction was fantastic. We did not feel rushed at all. We will definitely be going back in Dec.

We did dinner at CM's and had a very opposite opinion, and we will not do that again. It was disappointing.

Different strokes for different folks I guess.

Enjoy!

Denise

 

[jacksonsmom]

We have been in Donald's 4 times. All 4 times we had the first seating (8:00)

The 1st time we went we really enjoyed ourselves. The food was great (for a buffet). The characters were playful. We did not feel rushed at all.

The 2nd time we went was in off season (1st time was in June) anyway, again we had a wonderful time. Characters were playful & the food was tasty.

Fast Forward to this past summer. We were at WDW for 3 weeks, we decided to make plans to eat at Donald's since it was one of our favorite character meals

Well, our first time there during the 3 weeks. It felt so much different. The food was still decent, so no complaints there, but we were pretty much told to STAY seated until the characters came around OR we would miss them.
The characters came around, one after another & we were able to get a quick picture & that was it.
VERY RUSHED!

We thought maybe the place was having a bad day, so we kept our 2nd PS for 2 weeks later.
Well, same thing happened. The waiter basically yelled at us to keep our autograph books opened. Donald, Mickey, Goofy & Pluto QUICKLY came around one after another & I swear there were probably at our table for 30 seconds each! It was awful.

Only thing good I can say about Donald's is we do love their food, it always seems to be plentiful & fresh.

But after hearing so many recent bad reviews about Donald's we have officially crossed Donald's off our list!