Character Meals with Dinning Plan

[dancemomnj]

I am trying to figure out how to get the most out of the plan with character meals. I am also trying to figure out the best places to eat for us. We are a family of 4. My girls will be 4 &6. I am thinking the best deal is dinner with the character meals but not sure if lunch or breakfast would be nicer. So far my thoughts are the tho following below. We are at Disney for 7 nights in November and staying at POFQ. Any suggestions would be great!
Thank you all in advance!

Chef Mickey's for dinner

Castle for lunch? My 4 year old hates breakfast and I saw only the Fairy Godmother was at dinner

Princess Story Book breakfast or should I change to dinner? Not sure of the kind of food for dinner? Is this princess overkill? Tehy are little girls?

Crystal Palace for dinner. My 4 year old is a BIG Pooh fan!

50's Prime Time Cafe sounds fun.

Any other suggestions would be great!

 

[DisneyMomx7]

Here are some of my kids favorites:

Chef Mickeys
1900 Park Fare (Cinderella's Gala Feast)
Liberty Tree Tavern
50's Prime Time Cafe
Sci-Fi
Ohana

We're doing the CRT for lunch but paying out of pocket. I didn't think it was worth 2 ts.

Have fun planning.
Also - we enjoyed the Princess Storybook Breakfast more than the PS Lunch. We only went to lunch because Ariel was there (with legs!). Now that they've seen her in her gown both girls wanted to go back to breakfast instead.

 

[Wendy31]

My children are also 4 & 6. We'll also be in WDW in June for 7 nights & 8 days. Following are the character meals we currently have planned:

Liberty Tree Tavern dinner (arrival night - Tues)
[no character meals currently planned for Wed)
Crystal Palace lunch (Thurs)
Garden Grill lunch (Fri)
CRT lunch (Sat)
Donald's Breakfastasauras (Sun)
PSB breakfast (Mon)
Chef Mickey's breakfast (departure day - Tues)

The other sit-down meals we have planned are Mama Melrose's FDP (Wed), San Angel Inn dinner (Sun), & WCC dinner (Mon).

Even though we might get more "value" for our money w/ character meals at dinner, we like lunches because, if we begin touring the parks when they open, by lunchtime, we're ready for a nice break. Lunches don't seem to cut into our park time & resort time as much as dinners do - but that's just our experience; every family is different!

We prefer dinner at LTT to dinner at Crystal Palace & save Crystal Palace for lunch. Crystal Palace has a wonderful buffet w/ lots of yummy selections! LTT just feels more dinner-ish to me.

We're paying OOP for CRT because DH & I decided we didn't want to use 2 TS credits for it. We tried the CRT breakfast last year & wanted to try lunch this year. The princesses are at lunch, and children also receive swords & wands at lunch.

We tried dinner at PSB last year & really didn't prefer the food. We booked the dinner specifically to see Ariel too - who was my daughter's favorite last year. This year, we're trying breakfast which I think we'll enjoy more. We really hope to see Snow White - so, surely, between lunch at CRT & breakfast at PSB, we'll see her at least once!

Donald's Breakfastasauras is for our son who loves dinosaurs & to compensate a little for 2 princess meals - although he adores Snow White as much as DD. Hopefully, we'll also be able to book the rumored Toy Story meal as well. Pixie dust that the rumor will become reality in time for our trip!

We like having a really special breakfast on the morning of our departure - hence, breakfast at Chef Mickey's. (I have to have Mickey waffles on my last morning!)

I also like scheduling a really fun dinner for our last night which is why we're trying Whispering Canyon Cafe - it's not a character meal, but we like the time of food that's on the menu &, hopefully, we'll have fun w/ everything that goes on WCC! (Last year, we tried 'Ohana for dinner on our last night - which was also nice.)

Since you have kids, I recommend trying to reserve a Fantasmic Dinner Package if you plan to see Fantasmic at MGM so you don't have to wait as long to get good seats for the show. We didn't really like Hollywood & Vine last year, so, this year, we're trying Mama Melrose's.

We're eating at San Angel Inn for DH who has wanted to eat there since 1991! But another restaurant that we want to try at Epcot that looks fun for kids is Coral Reef.

Have fun deciding! One of my fav parts about planning our WDW trips is scheduling our meals!

 

[imlazar]

We used a dining credit for Donald's breakfastsaurus at AK, it was fairly empty and we got to spend a lot of time with the characters, I'd recommend it.

 

[dancemomnj]

Thanks you all for your advice! Anymore keep them coming!

 

[hezreck]

If you think it's Princess overkill, I would skip the Princess storybook breakfast (wasn't impressed) and go to Cape May breakfast instead. There you will see Minnie, Chip and Dale and maybe Pluto or Goofy. My DD loves the princesses too, but this year we are doing 1900 Park Fare dinner. She's a little older this time (age 9) and now she wants to see Prince Charming!!
That's my girl!!

 

[jwfla422]

Cape May is a good breakfast I also agree, but may be kinda tough if your 4 yr old isn't big on breakfast. My 7 yr old dd was the same way but is slowly beginning to eat eggs and pancakes other than the ones dh makes at home.

Some of her favorites also include CP which we've only done for lunch. She's not a big Pooh fan but does like seeing the Pooh characters when we're in WDW. The food there is excellent and there are tons of choices. We've done the princess meals and at this point I don't recommend any of them because I think CRT's has become a big rip-off and PSB leaves a lot to be desired. DD gets her princess fix at Toontown and at the WS in Epcot.

She did like O'hana's breakfast before Stitch was there (LOL!! She's afraid of Stitch --she's almost 8, but that's her choice)--It was a fun breakfast though. 1900 Pk Fare's breakfast is also good but I we weren't impressed with the Cinderella dinner.

She also has liked the GG lunch and dinner. We haven't been there since they've done the menu changes but plan to go back again next visit. LTT was also a good one. We were there a little longer than we would have liked to be but at least the characters came around again.

 

[Kae]

Last June we loved the PSB. Girls 4,5, & 9 Epcot is so nice in the AM. We enjoy Crstal Palace for Lunch we find it a great break form the Park & my kids eat lunch the best.

And as far as Princess overkill-never heard of it!!

Kae

 

[karrit2000]

Do your girls eat big breakfasts? If they do then mixing in some breakfasts will give you more options. There aren't too many lunch choices any more, it's mostly breakfasts & dinners. Figure out which characters they want to see & then plan accordingly. I think using dining plan credits for character meals is a good deal. O'hana's breakfast has Lilo, Stitch, Mickey & Minnie. I've had both good & bad meals at Breakfastosaurus. Of course the food choices are important too if you have picky eaters.

 

[dancemomnj]

Do your girls eat big breakfasts? If they do then mixing in some breakfasts will give you more options. There aren't too many lunch choices any more, it's mostly breakfasts & dinners. Figure out which characters they want to see & then plan accordingly. I think using dining plan credits for character meals is a good deal. O'hana's breakfast has Lilo, Stitch, Mickey & Minnie. I've had both good & bad meals at Breakfastosaurus. Of course the food choices are important too if you have picky eaters.

The 4yr old is very picky with breakfast. I figured we would do one buffet breakfast.
Thanks!