Character Meals Super Thread!!

[DizNee Luver]

Ok, I'm still a little confused on the early entry thing. (WDW vets, first time DLR) We have 5 day park hoppers, and staying on site, so from what I understand, we will have an early entry to one or the other of the parks every day (depending on which park it is for that day). But normally, we like to arrive ahead of rope drop, and tour until late morning before stopping for table service. But last time, we did have an early bkfst at CRT (WDW) before park opening, and my kids LOVED being able to take some photos on Main St and in front of the castle when it was virtually empty!

So here is my question - would we get that opportunity if we book Minnie & Friends "before" park opening? Or is it really only open at the same time we would get in for early entry anyway (since we are 5 day/onsite guests)? Which would mean that really we wouldn't be ahead of the rest of the crowd (would we be able to get to Main St for pictures anyway, or would it be blocked off?), and by the time we finished eating, would have "wasted" our early entry time? We are going at Christmas, so I know will be really busy, and if we will lose our advantage of early touring, then I might just go for a 10 am time, and tour first and then take a break to eat when it starts getting more crowded. (Then again, if we did do breakfast first, we will have at least one more morning to do the rope drop early touring, and it would be nice to take photos with a basically empty street if that's possible! )

So which way should I go? (Minnies for first seating, or wait til 10 am?) It will be on a Saturday if that makes a difference. Thanks!

Saturday would be early entry for the Disneyland park and I don't believe they'd be open prior to that for meals.......I could be wrong, but my best guess is you'd be eating during that one hour window.

Going during the holiday season and this being a weekend day.....I'd suggest going with 10am meal time.....that way you could enjoy the early and quieter time in the parks.

Now if I'm wrong on this info.....hopefully someone will let us know.

Another way to find out would be to call Disney Dining and inquire what the earliest seating time would be for that specific date and then ask what time the park opens. 714-781-3463

 

[tylerandalexsmom]

Thanks! I've been looking on the website for park hours, but they aren't up for that far out yet! (I'm used to planning and making dining reservations 180 days out at WDW!)

 

[Zbugz]

So here is my question - would we get that opportunity if we book Minnie & Friends "before" park opening? Or is it really only open at the same time we would get in for early entry anyway (since we are 5 day/onsite guests)? Thanks!

Yes, the earliest you can eat there is 10 minutes after early entry starts. You'd be using your extra hour to eat breakfast.

 

[crysmom]

I have a question about late dinner seating at Goofy's kitchen. We arrive at our hotel at 630 pm ish (desert inn) I'm considering booking dinner at goofy's kitchen for 8 pm. We have five kids and I want to know if this late dinner time will mean its more adult oriented? Is it just as likely to have many characters there at the late seating ?

 

[coaches24]

we just returned and did all 5 of the character meals

Goofy's kitchen - Wonderful, saw many characters and they each spent time talking with the kids

Minnie's Breakfast - Good, saw many characters spent good time with kids

Surf's up breakfast - wonderful - kids had a blast dancing and characters were awesome

Storytellers breakfast - eh - characters were good, and the kids had fun dancing, but maybe it was the end of our vacation and It just didn't seem as fun

Ariel's grotto -food kind thrown at us in a hurry, princesses rushed by the tables - had the rudest snow white ever...DD had just put a big piece of bread in her mouth so snow said just stay there I'll be back, so we waited....and waited....and all the rest came and went, so DH asked about snow so she came back and had a scowl on her face the whole time, hurriedly signed their books and did the photo without even saying anything to the kids...we did this meal because it was DD's birthday and I can say we will likely never go back.

yea I was not happy with AGs either. DD still had a great time so I can't complain too much but I too felt like everything is rushed through and the princesses hardly spend anytime with anyone. for the money I paid I expected more. DD had just finished being made up into Cinderella at BBB and Cinderella spent about 1 minute with her. I left feeling ripped off.

the only other character meal we have tried was Minnie's at the plaza inn and that experience was fantastic! Several characters and all of them spent time at our table more than once. It was hard to eat because of the constant barrage of characters (but I still managed to eat plenty lol ). DD was only 2 at the time but she still talks about eating with Minnie.

 

[WeatherbySwann]

Not sure if this has been said yet or not, but we also saw Max at Surf's Up back in July. Not sure if we just got lucky or if he is regular there, but he's a possibility too! It was Mickey, Minnie, Stitch, Pluto, and Max. I don't hesitate in saying it was one of the best instances of character interaction I have ever seen. Book a late seating so that the restaurant is only semi-full and you'll have great interaction. Lots of fun.

 

[DizNee Luver]

Not sure if this has been said yet or not, but we also saw Max at Surf's Up back in July. Not sure if we just got lucky or if he is regular there, but he's a possibility too! It was Mickey, Minnie, Stitch, Pluto, and Max. I don't hesitate in saying it was one of the best instances of character interaction I have ever seen. Book a late seating so that the restaurant is only semi-full and you'll have great interaction. Lots of fun.

I've seen Max there as well.....just forgot until you mentioned it!! I find the interaction very good at this meal and it's become our families favorite!! (we'll be there in about a week and a half!!)

 

[lucysmom]

Are there characters at Storytellers when you go for dinner? Are there character photo packages at Minnies and at Storytellers?

 

[DizNee Luver]

Are there characters at Storytellers when you go for dinner? Are there character photo packages at Minnies and at Storytellers?

No characters at Storyteller's for lunch or dinner....just breakfast.

Unfortunately Storyteller's doesn't do a picture prior to the meal but Minnie & Friends does.

 

[ballarinamom]

I have a question about late dinner seating at Goofy's kitchen. We arrive at our hotel at 630 pm ish (desert inn) I'm considering booking dinner at goofy's kitchen for 8 pm. We have five kids and I want to know if this late dinner time will mean its more adult oriented? Is it just as likely to have many characters there at the late seating ?

We have always done Goofy's later on our travel day and have done 8:00 before. We found the characters were the same, the dancing was the same and the food options were the same as if you were the first dinner seating. So enjoy!!

 

[jkattk]

Sorry this may be answered somewhere but it's hard to read through 20 pages of postings... How long should we plan for Goofy's Kitchen for breakfast? 1 hr? We were planning to do this our departure morning but our flight time has just been moved back so I'm re-evaluating what time our reservation would need to be now.

 

[Mommy2PrincessAbby]

Sorry this may be answered somewhere but it's hard to read through 20 pages of postings... How long should we plan for Goofy's Kitchen for breakfast? 1 hr? We were planning to do this our departure morning but our flight time has just been moved back so I'm re-evaluating what time our reservation would need to be now.

All the character meals can be finished in an hour, they tell you you are allowed to stay 90 minutes tho.

 

[ParkHopper1]

Just did Storyteller's yesterday morning and man, was that buffet sad! The menu items that the rest of my group ordered weren't too bad but the buffet was pretty pathetic. Only saw three characters all morning. If you are after a "character" meal...hit one of the others!

 

[DharmaLou]

REALLY impressed with Minnie & Friends at Plaza Inn. We got to meet TEN characters the morning we went. I was under the impression there would be 6 (though maybe I made that up in my mind). Even got to meet some less common ones like Fairy Godmother, Rafiki and Suzy the Mouse.

 

[Mommy2PrincessAbby]

Quick review of our trip 12/5-12/10... We ended up doing all 5 meals while we were there:


Surfs up: my favorite breakfast, order the made to order eggs tho (this hold true for all the meals however)... Saw Mickey, Minnie, Daisy, Chip, Dale, Stitch and Pluto... Stitch is my fave character to interact with, but we had fun with the chipmunks at 4 of the 5 meals.

Princesses at Ariel's: excellent plated dinner, the characters (we saw ariel, belle, snow, cindy and aurora) work the room efficiently, so you will not be skipped, unless you engage the character they will move along as soon as they sign your book and you take 2 pictures.

Storytellers: no picture at the beginning, characters are woodland creatures (we saw chip & dale again, plus Turk, Meeko, koda and Kenai), best bet is to order off the menu, the buffet was good, but heavy on pastries.

Minnie's: character chaos, people go up to them often instead of waiting for the character to come around, we had a table in the middle of the room, and eeyore and tigger went to every table around us but us, I had to go get them both. We also saw perla, Minnie, chip and dale (best interaction was with them), and hook. Food was fine, hard to find some items, like the oatmeal is kept with the breakfast items behind the glass. I don't like that you serve yourself the beverages here too,

Goofys kitchen: after a long hiatus we tried this place for dinner... Best buffet we had been to, lots of choices (really good potstickers!). Also saw Pluto, goofy, donald, chip & dale, Minnie, Mulan, and aurora. Goofy was fantastic, and we got some great pics with him.

 

[DSNY4ever]

Review of Minnie and Friends 11/28-

We had the earliest reservation you could get and it was not an early entry day in Disneyland so we thought we would have a quiet walk done main street and a nice start to the breakfast before the park opened, but they were already letting people in and blocking them off at the entrance to each land so Main Street was crowded.

There were so many people checking in for their reservation at the same time and all being led to their tables at once...and all of the characters came rushing out at the same time it felt like true CHAOS!! We were rushing to throw our bags down, pull out our cameras, get our infant in his highchair and try to pay attention to the characters. We didn't get to go get food until about 25 minutes into the meal and with everyone coming in at the asme time the food area was packed. We saw Minnie, Pooh, Eeyore, Captain Hook, Chip and Dale.

The characters did a great job, they were all very fun and could get a good vibe of if my son was into/comfortable with interacting with them at that moment. My son was bonkers over Minnie Mouse the whole trip so when she came to our table he was shaking with excitement and spit out all his food (he's only 14 months), she sat with him and let him "feed her his eggs" and then she helped him with his sippy cup, it was so sweet. He was in heaven.

It was hard to get pictures because with all the tables I couldn't stand back far enough to get a good photo or to get video with the characters. The food was good, but honestly if you bring an infant and try to feed him, interact with the characters and get pictures etc....you won't have much time to eat.

We did have a great time and I would do it again, but I wouldn't do the first seating again as it was way too chaotic and I would rather come in later when things have settled down a little, even if it meant missing a little park time.

Oh and I didn't like the sales pitch to buy the photo they take at the beginning.

 

[Ride Junkie]

I've seen Max there as well.....just forgot until you mentioned it!! I find the interaction very good at this meal and it's become our families favorite!! (we'll be there in about a week and a half!!)

Just curious, who is Max? The horse from Tangled comes to mind. We're doing the Surf's Up breakfast in a few weeks, loved it last time.

 

[mgrace79]

Just curious, who is Max? The horse from Tangled comes to mind. We're doing the Surf's Up breakfast in a few weeks, loved it last time.

Max is Goofy's son

 

[lucysmom]

We just returned on the 23rd. Our first night there, we had dinner at Goofy's Kitchen. We loved it. Goofy was, well, so goofy! All of the character interaction was super. The food was fine. We really liked the pot stickers and the steak. I did ask them to cook the steak for me because I do not like pink meat, and it was no problem at all. It was a great way to spend our first night at DLR.

Our next to the last day we had a late breakfast at Minnie's. The food was fine. My husband loved the bacon, cooked just the way he likes it--crispy. My son had cup after cup of blueberries. I think he got his money's worth in blueberries alone! Again, the character interaction was super. The characters kept having dance-offs. Chip can bust a move!! We loved it.

I can highly recommend these meals. The food was fine, but the characters were magical. At WDW, the characters barely stop at your table long enough to take a picture. At DLR, they interacted with us. It was wonderful!

 

[Ride Junkie]

Max is Goofy's son

Ohh, ok! Thanks. DD would like that.