Dining Budget?

[DisneyMommy403]

Hey folks!

Just curious, do you set a dining budget for your family? I'm curious as to what our spending might look like. We will be traveling Mar 1-6, and have 5 day tickets. It's Myself, My Hubs, and our four kids. Our eldest hardly eats, and our baby will only be a year old... so, I guess I'm asking how much do you predict a family of four would spend on food in the parks?

TIA!

 

[Geemo]

If you do any buffet/character meals, they're a set rate for each person age 3 and up.

There are menus online you could look up. It will show you what's available and the cost.
This might give you a better idea of what to expect for your family.

Geemo

 

[tarheelalum]

We usually budget 50 dollars per person/per day for me and my wife. Often we spend less but sometimes we go over that.

 

[Happyjenz]

I figure out if we are doing reservations, and for those I look at the menu and budget for those specifically. For snacks and counter service, I add $100/day for the four of us (2adults/2 teenagers). This has worked quite well...usually we have some left over from that budget, but if we have to get multiple orders of mini-churros from the cozy cone, we might go over! We do normally eat breakfast in our room before heading to the parks.

 

[taffy]

Its really dependant on what you are looking for. You can do it on a budget or go crazy and always eat in the nice table service places. If you decide what type of food you want for each meal then you can figure out a budget. For us we normally have breakfast on the run aka starbucks Then some counter service lunch and dinner would be a sit down in DTD each day. I would usually budget around 100-150 a day to include all the drinks and snacks. We have also done it where we spent far less by eating in McDonalds and cheaper places.

 

[JadeDarkstar]

We put money aside for any dinning reservations first. Once that's done we chose what other counter service places we want to eat. Then we budget for that its about $10 a piece unless we are shearing a meal and some times we do that. We bring water or ask for water and bring our own Pepsi's. We will get a few drinks for cups around the park sometimes.

we try and do one nice sit down meal a day Chr meals or BBQ or the pch grill this time. and one counter service a day. We get free breakfast for the days we aren't gonna have chr meals.

The rest is just extra stuff and we don't budget for it. We have extra money set aside and we will pick snacks up out of that.

 

[707MickeyGirl]

We put money aside for any dinning reservations first. Once that's done we chose what other counter service places we want to eat. Then we budget for that its about $10 a piece unless we are shearing a meal and some times we do that. We bring water or ask for water and bring our own Pepsi's. We will get a few drinks for cups around the park sometimes.

we try and do one nice sit down meal a day Chr meals or BBQ or the pch grill this time. and one counter service a day. We get free breakfast for the days we aren't gonna have chr meals.

The rest is just extra stuff and we don't budget for it. We have extra money set aside and we will pick snacks up out of that.

This is exactly what I do too!

 

[StormyCA]

No kids involved, I usually go with BFF. We usually have breakfast in our room. We do one 'splurge' per trip (BB, BTMBBQ). Other than that we figure around $15.00 per meal each. That's usually enough for burger & fries, teriyaki bowl, Flo's V8. So the budget is usually $50.00 per average day, figuring two meals plus a couple snacks & drinks and around $75.00 on our 'splurge' day. That's per person.

 

[DisneyMommy403]

I'm so grateful for all of these responses! Such a great help and starting point for me. We have one character meal with our package, so that takes care of one breakfast. I think our splurge will be WOC lunch at WCT or CC (I've never been to either, so I need to scope out menus) and maybe BB. We have $2,000 in gift cards for dining and souvenirs. My mom paid for our whole trip before she passed, and she wanted this to be a trip to remember and enjoy every second we're there.

We're at DLH, do they have good room service? Can we make reservations for DLH restaurants or DTD restaurants online as well? We ate at Rainforest Cafe last time and the food was bad, and overpriced, I'm looking into Jazz Kitchen.

 

[agamble]

We eat pretty cheaply at the parks and don't do sit down meals. One of our favorites is Rancho del Zocalo (Mexican). You could probably get away with ordering 3 adult meals and splitting with your entire family since you have 2 who eat so little.

Many people like to get fried chicken at the Carnation Café as it is easy to share too. You may even be able to get just 2 of those and a few extra sides and share.

We love the corn dogs. My kids have shared one as they're so large. They come with apples or chips. We also sometimes buy snack items instead of lunch. And we always bring food in with us.

Another favorite is the soup bowls. The soup is not so great for sharing, but the bowls themselves can easily be shared as it is a LOT of bread.

Most CS meals cost about $10 per adult meal. That should help you budget. Since you have a good amount of gift card money I would look at the menus and get an idea of where you want to eat and plan a budget that way. We kind of did this for our last trip, and ended up spending less than planned. That should give you an idea of how much you'll have left for souvenirs.

 

[darph nader]

I was gonna suggest $15/18 per person,per meal,per day.
(to be on the safe side)

 

[lalasmama]

Our family of 3 plans $100/day. That usually covers breakfast in the hotel room (PVI does a free hot breakfast--yum!), a "cart" lunch (quick service is about $10 pp), and a counter-service for dinner ($10-20pp), along with a snack or two ($5-10pp). Whatever "extra" goes toward our "splurge" meal, usually Blue Bayou, which then sets us back about $60pp.

 

[lalasmama]

My mom paid for our whole trip before she passed, and she wanted this to be a trip to remember and enjoy every second we're there.

I'm sorry to hear about your mom. What an amazing gift she left you, though! My father-in-law left us with a rather large (for us!) inheritance, and we set aside a chunk of it to take our grandkids on a trip-of-a-lifetime to Disneyland in a few years. He always talked about how much he loved taking his grandkids (our kids) to Disneyland. It seemed like something he would appreciate us setting aside to do with our grandkids as well. Any time I make a plan/piece of a plan for that trip, I like to think about FIL, imagining him looking down, smiling at the planning!

 

[Malcon10t]

We generally budget $50-60 per day per adult and $35 per day for the kids under 12. We don't really count pennies and we tend to use it more as a loose idea. We usually do come in around that budget. If we plan to do a nice meal (Steakhouse 55 dinner, or character meal) I add that amount to the budget.