Dining budget ideas

[mommymanda]

I am early stage planning of this trip. I am first to admit I am a Disney girl all the way, but have finally been out voted and the rest are ready to try Universal.

I will do my best to survive this . The main thing I am trying to understand is dining. We are a family where (up until this year) the "free" dining package worked perfect for us.

I have read reviews and understand the universal dining package is not comparable and probably not worth it. What I am thinking is adding gift cards to my booking to count as prepaid meals.

I'm trying to figure out how much to add. We are a family of five. Two adults a 15, 9 and 7 year old. Thanks to Disney we are used to a quick meal, a sit down meal, and snack each day. Breakfasts tend to be groceries delivered at the start of the trip. Drinks are also preordered.
My thoughts are we would need gift card $$ to cover
2 meals arrival day
6 meals over the three park days plus three snacks for the days (this would include butter beer or treats).
2 extra meals if we decide on hotel breakfast or a dinner at city walk.

What does an average day of meals look like? What amount is recommended? Am I on the right track here or should I look at other choices?

 

[schumigirl]

https://www.disboards.com/threads/w...do-including-menus-updated-regularly.2681315/

This is a fabulous thread.

It has every menu from hotels, parks and Citywalk.

All with prices so you can see the cost of everything.

 

[Kivara]

My family (Dh, me, DS 15, DS 13, DS 11)...I budgeted $1100 for 8 days (but I budget snacks seperately from food) We bought one FreeStyle cup to share, and everyone agreed to order water at restaurants (we gave them each a set amount of spending money, for saving us $ at meals.) We don't drink alcohol either, so that helps keep the meal costs down.

My budget: $20 breakfast (we usually eat 1 pastry or muffin each)
$40 lunch (quick service)
$77.50 dinner (sit down, we aren't big eaters, and usually DH splits a meal with one boy, I split a meal with another boy, and youngest orders from the kids menu)

Of course, some days we go over a little, and other under. I don't keep a strict eye on the budget on vacation, but we've always come home with a little left over.

For snacks, I budget for one snack per person per day (roughly $30/day) If they want another snack, they have to buy it out of their own pocket money...adults as well.

 

[bchbetha]

My family (Dh, me, DS 15, DS 13, DS 11)...I budgeted $1100 for 8 days (but I budget snacks seperately from food) We bought one FreeStyle cup to share, and everyone agreed to order water at restaurants (we gave them each a set amount of spending money, for saving us $ at meals.) We don't drink alcohol either, so that helps keep the meal costs down.

My budget: $20 breakfast (we usually eat 1 pastry or muffin each)
$40 lunch (quick service)
$77.50 dinner (sit down, we aren't big eaters, and usually DH splits a meal with one boy, I split a meal with another boy, and youngest orders from the kids menu)

Of course, some days we go over a little, and other under. I don't keep a strict eye on the budget on vacation, but we've always come home with a little left over.

For snacks, I budget for one snack per person per day (roughly $30/day) If they want another snack, they have to buy it out of their own pocket money...adults as well.

Very similar to us though we probably had 2 snacks/ day, no soda cup and 1-2 alcoholic drinks/ day. Some granola bars in your hotel room for breakfast is a money and time saver as well.

 

[Toy Story Fan]

Are you staying onsite? Portofino, Hard Rock and Royal Pacific offer Club Level rooms. For our family of five, it saves us a lot of money! Our Club reservation now for November was only about $75 a day difference than a regular room (at the time of booking). They serve breakfast, light snacks in the afternoon and a hot entree every evening and other food items. This was plenty for my family. Some say the evening meal isn't enough for a meal, but for us, it was perfect.

 

[mommymanda]

My family (Dh, me, DS 15, DS 13, DS 11)...I budgeted $1100 for 8 days (but I budget snacks seperately from food) We bought one FreeStyle cup to share, and everyone agreed to order water at restaurants (we gave them each a set amount of spending money, for saving us $ at meals.) We don't drink alcohol either, so that helps keep the meal costs down.

My budget: $20 breakfast (we usually eat 1 pastry or muffin each)
$40 lunch (quick service)
$77.50 dinner (sit down, we aren't big eaters, and usually DH splits a meal with one boy, I split a meal with another boy, and youngest orders from the kids menu)

Of course, some days we go over a little, and other under. I don't keep a strict eye on the budget on vacation, but we've always come home with a little left over.

For snacks, I budget for one snack per person per day (roughly $30/day) If they want another snack, they have to buy it out of their own pocket money...adults as well.

Thanks this is a good start. I need to do a little more research on the cups, but I had thought of letting the kids each pick a souvenir mug of some sort at the start. They can use it for the drinks and doubles as their souvenir (we rarely bring stuff home from vacations, so that they are used to). I just know there are different rules and haven't hit that research part yet lol.

When you say 8 days. Is that all Universal? I know we are only going to use 4 days at Universal areas for meals. Other days we are checking various other tourist places.

 

[Kivara]

Yes, the 8 days were all Universal day, except day 1 breakfast at the airport and day 8 dinner at the airport.

The souvenir mugs are a lot of fun, but they do charge $1.25-ish for each refill after the first (they give you a ticket for the first fill up for free when purchasing them at the shops.) For the Freestyle mugs, it is free refills all day. (I believe it's roughly $12 for the first day and $6 or $7 for each day after the first.)

Just wanted to put that out there, of course, all the decisions will be based on how you as a family eat, drink, etc.

Personally, though not a healthy habit, my family enjoys soda. It was much cheaper for us to share a Freestyle mug every day & get water at the restaurants.