? eating on plan with a 5 year old ?

[pennypooh]

I just bought the dining plan for myself, DH, and DS who is 5 years old. DS is usually a fairly adventurous eater for a 5 year old meaning he eats salads, grilled meats, all fruits, vegetables with dip, etc. at home. He does not eat mac & cheese or peanut butter which appears to be half the kid menu and I don't want him eating fried chicken nuggets and strips every day of our trip! I've chosen buffets and table service for most of our table service credits as Disney told me he could eat what we eat that way. From various things I've read it appears that for counter service and snacks we could use two counter service meals and if necessary pay out of pocket for a third from the non-kid's menu options for our son (or maybe split the two among the three of us). Has it been your experience that this would be allowed?

Second question: If we have not used the child counter service at that time but use it at a later time, in your experience, have you have to purchase that meal from the kid menu or were you allowed to purchase from the adult menu with it? For another example, if we wanted to buy one counter service meal at a time from each of 3 different Epcot counter service locations would one of them have to be a kid's meal, in your experience?

 

[Deb & Bill]

Child credits are child credits. Adult credits are adult credits. You can't use a child credit for an adult meal. You probably could use an adult credit for a child meal (but even that wasn't so easy on our trip).

 

[mom2alix]

I just bought the dining plan for myself, DH, and DS who is 5 years old. DS is usually a fairly adventurous eater for a 5 year old meaning he eats salads, grilled meats, all fruits, vegetables with dip, etc. at home. He does not eat mac & cheese or peanut butter which appears to be half the kid menu and I don't want him eating fried chicken nuggets and strips every day of our trip! I've chosen buffets and table service for most of our table service credits as Disney told me he could eat what we eat that way. From various things I've read it appears that for counter service and snacks we could use two counter service meals and if necessary pay out of pocket for a third from the non-kid's menu options for our son (or maybe split the two among the three of us). Has it been your experience that this would be allowed?

Second question: If we have not used the child counter service at that time but use it at a later time, in your experience, have you have to purchase that meal from the kid menu or were you allowed to purchase from the adult menu with it? For another example, if we wanted to buy one counter service meal at a time from each of 3 different Epcot counter service locations would one of them have to be a kid's meal, in your experience?

Having just returned from a trip with several children on varying degrees of the pickiness spectrum, I think you'll be pleasantly surprised. Our friends' kids existed mostly on burgers and mac n cheese, but that was by choice, not for lack of other options. For the TS locations, the new kids menus are actually very good IMO. Grilled fish with pilaf and chicken breast strips accompanied by pasta with marinara seem to be the standard "healthy meal" options, with some nice choices specific to each restaurant as well. DD had the healthy chicken meal and it was really good, although the yogurt as dessert thing didn't fly with her. She ate the yogurt, but that didn't count as dessert! She was content with sharing a few bites of my dessert, though. Her Daddy has brainwashed her that it doesn't count as dessert unless it is chocolate.

Some suggestions for good kids meals at CS restaurants:

AK: Tusker House has a great roast chicken leg served with mashed potatoes and carrot sticks or applesauce which was a hit with all the kids.

Epcot: Lotus Blossom Cafe in China: DD really enjoyed the eggroll with beef fried rice. The make your own sub sandwich at Sunshine Seasons was a hit as well. Sunshine Seasons also offers a kids sweet n sour chicken which looked great. On our last trip we also did the CS in Mexico and DD liked the kids plate there.

In our experience, most of the CS adult meals featured large servings and 2 of them could easily feed the 3 of you if the kids meals were not to your liking. An especially good choice for this is the chicken and ribs combo at Cosmic Rays in MK. It could actually possibly feed all three of you. The chicken and lamb shwarama platter at Tangierine cafe in Epcot is also a LOT of food.

A great strategy to use up those unused kids credits would be at you resort food court. Get your DS a kids breakfast platter (usually pancakes or a bacon and eggs meal) and use a couple of snack credits to get pastries for you and your DH. We had chocolate croissants or sticky buns several mornings for a nice continental breakfast and they were SO good! The kids really liked the kids breakfasts too.

Hope you have a good trip!

 

[pennypooh]

Thanks. Great ideas.

 

[puddleduck]

I think you may find that at cs places you and your son could share. If not you could buy an adult meal oop. For either scenario, you could use the extra credit to buy your son breakfast or cs credits can be use for 3 snack items (atleast that was our experience in Nov.)

 

[karibritt01]

Last summer my son (8) bought a couple of adult CS meals. We were expecting to be charged extra for them when we checked out, but were not. This year, I asked my travel agent about using the credits this way. She said they are just marked as CS on the receipts, and we can use them any way we wish. As for the TS meals, we chose buffets, so he was able to eat anything he wanted. IMO the kids DDp is $12 a day, which is approx what the buffet TS cost is, so the other meals are freebies anyway.

BTW, my kids loved Beirgarten in Epcot, and Hollywood and Vine in MGM.

 

[bicker]

Disney has clarified the rules (i.e., that folks aren't to use child meal entitlements for adult meals). This can be clearly seen, now, in the 2007 Dining Plan brochure.

You're correct, however, that Disney relies on each guest's personal integrity to voluntarily comply, rather than aggressively enforcing this.

 

[JimMIA]

You're correct, however, that Disney relies on each guest's personal integrity to voluntarily comply, rather than aggressively enforcing this.

That's apparently changing January 1, 2007. See http://www.disboards.com/showthread.php?t=1303335

 

[texasthree]

I know a couple of the counter service places had a kids salad with grilled chicken. I actually ate that and DS ate an adult meal. I found it pretty easy to make it all work frankly. If he wanted something off the adult menu we could easily share an adults and kids meal or he could just eat my adult and I ate his kid credit. I cant tell you how many applesauces and mickey crackers we left in our hotel room when we checked out. Its so much food!
I think at table service meals it would be very easy for you to share as well. With the appetizer, meal and dessert its so much food for one person.

 

[bicker]

That's apparently changing January 1, 2007. See http://www.disboards.com/showthread.php?t=1303335

Thanks for the pointer to the update. Good news if true, since it will surely cut down on the confusion.

However, this is just one of many, and for the rest, Disney's still going to be relying on our personal integrity for lots of things.