Chef Mickey's for dinner

[AllNamesTaken]

I've heard such mixed reviews for this. Has anyone been there recently? What specifically did you love or hate? Also, is a lot of time spent waiting for your turn with each character or are they readily available? Can we plan to get through dinner (eating and character autographs) in an hour and a half?
We're 4 adults, 5 kids.

 

[matt&jakesmom]

We eat dinner at Chef Mickey's every year when we are at WDW. We are eating there on Monday (our 1st day). We really enjoy the variety of food. We have never had any problems.

Each character will come to your table and spend a few minutes to sign an autograph and pose for pictures. If you happen to have a character not come by, just ask the CM and she will arrange it. Last year my DS was in the bathroom when his favorite, Dale, came by. We told the CM and it was no problem.

I hope you enjoy it as much as we do.

 

[toocooltobeMom]

We have just returned from a week @ WDW. Chef Mickey Dinner was great. We have to admit that DH and I ate there w/o my DS(he was hanging out at MGM w/other teens)
It was an eventfull experience for us. First off, we wanted to change our ressie to a more adult-oriented restaurant, since DS wasn't going to dine w/us. No luck. Every restaurants were sold out. So we were struck eating at Chef Mickey. Once we got to the restaurant, we were told that there has been a mistake made regarding the ADR's. Our ressies was for Friday not Wednesday. (which meant we have 2 dinner ADR for Friday) The Front end manager was sooooo nice. He went out of his way to call and recheck the computer system to make sure our other ADR's were not mixed up too. He came back apologizing the delay and led us to the next available table.
The food was very good. Especally the mashed-potatoes. The manager came back to our table twice to say hi. We thought the service was so outstanding too. Our waiter "Graig" never failed to refill our soft drinks and cleared our table. DH ate so much, I kind of felt embarassed with stacks of plates in front of us 2.
Kids or no kids, we are definitely returning next year to eat there.

 

[Tumbleweed]

We've eaten there 3 times. The first two times were fabulous! Good food
and fun! The last time (May, 2005), we didn't enjoy the food. There didn't
seem to be any vegetables other than salad. My husband is diabetic and
he is wary of anything glazed, etc. We're giving it another try in October!

 

[Armandocme]

We were there July 2, 2006 for dinner. Our server was top notch. Better than some upscale restaurants I've been at. He came by frequently and made sure we had everything we needed. He even spent some time with us explaining how often the characters came by and in what direction they would be coming from. He said it takes about 45 minutes for 1 character to make a single round to every table. You will definitely get the autographs you need in an hour and a half. We liked our server so much we got his autograph too!

 

[toocooltobeMom]

Hello there, it looks like we both have the same waiter at Chef Mickey. His name is Graig. Wasn't he nice? We are so looking forward of going back next year. Maybe we might have him wait on us again. By the way, we tipped him an extra $10.00 just because.

 

[Kim1964]

I was there on August 14. The mashed potatoes are really good, and the dessert bar is good, too. The kids liked the Mickey shaped mac and cheese and the pizza. It's not a spectacular culinary experience, IMHO, but the characters coming by the table make the kids so happy, it's worth it to us.

 

[Amy&Dan]

I never understand why CM gets such bad reveiws for dinner. We have had dinner there about five times in the past two years (May being the most recent) and have had wonderful food, service and character interraction each time. I agree with others, the mashed potatoes are delicious! I have also enjoyed the salmon (it was pesto encrusted last time), the peel and eat shrimp and the desserts. It is a buffet but I have enjoyed the food as much as the characters. Its not Le Cellier, but its not supposed to be! We have also always been seated promptly unlike some of the other buffets at WDW where we have had to wait as long as a half hour or more.

 

[shaycamp21]

We were there on Tuesday (Aug 21) and the food was pretty good. For us it was more about the character experience than the food.We love dining with the mouse himself! Though I did enjoy the salads, mashed potatoes, pasta, tropical chicken and desserts of course.

 

[Servants of Evan]

We were there for dinner on August 10th (perfect "first night" dinner for our family). I thought the food was fine. The prime rib was actually decent, though if you're holding out hopes for a rare slice you'll probably be disappointed. We had Glen as our waiter and I must say, it was some of the best service we had over the 11 days. Characters come to your table so if you get a booth, sit the kids on the outside so the characters can interact. Do not go running around the place in search of the characters -- they'll find you.

 

[Cannot_Wait_4Disney]

Note that this site is not indicative of the average regarding Chef Mickey's. It tends to get a bum rap here.

We liked the food. It wasn't bat at all. Everything was to temperature and rotated out in a timely manner. The kids were for the most part excited, but well behaved. It was high energy fun. If you're looking for a quiet meal, don't go here obviously. But other than when they played the song and did the napkin twirl, the noise level was no louder than Narcoosees.

 

[Tam1067]

We had dinner there in July and found it to be a pretty decent buffet. We'd also eaten there a couple of years ago.

The atmosphere is loud and silly, and the characters do make the rounds regularly. I think we were in and out in about an hour and got to see all the characters during that time (Minnie, Mickey, Chip, Dale, Goofy, Donald--who stays in the lobby area). It was fun.

Food was decent. There is fresh fruit, salmon, some type of carved meat (I don't eat that--sorry I can't comment on it), rice, pasta, veggies, and the typical kids' choices. I did think the cold salads were inferior to some other WDW buffets like CP, but overall, I'd recommend it.

The one downside I saw here, worse than at other places, would be the guests. So many of them were pushy and rude, and cutting in on your character time. I'm not sure if it's because of the silliness of the place itself, or because the CMs don't police it as well as at some other places,or what. But I'd still go there again.

 

[mseg16222]

We ate there on the 12th of August with a 6 & 7 yr old for our first night dinner. THey have never been to Disney before and we had 5pm ADR's. Plenty of time to see the characters come around a least twice and the food wasn't bad after hearing all of the mixed reviews I was a little worried. Would definately take the kids there again and an hour and a half should be plenty of time.