Favorite family & budget friendly restaurants

[dpswift]

I'm going to suggest a different tact:

Forget packing lunches into the parks -- it's not easy to carry lunch around the parks, and sandwiches that've been in a pack for hours aren't exactly yummy. Especially with kids, a mid-day sit-down break in the air conditioning will be valuable /will recharge their batteries and will allow you to enjoy the parks longer. You'll feel like you've had a real mid-day break. Look through the menus on AllEars.net and find a place where you can go with kids' meals and/or shared meals for lunch. If carefully chosen, you can do this for the same cost as the dinner meal you're considering.

Then have your sandwiches, salads, etc. in the room. It'll make for an easy evening with the kids, and it'll come out about the same cost in the long run.

Agree. We have gone several times when it has been hot and busy. It was great having a midday air conditioned break. There are some relatively inexpensive places to eat in the parks. We like Plaza at MK, Yak and Yeti in AK. Flame Tree at AK is good and shareable however the seating is outdoors. Beaches and Cream is not overly expensive and can be a good midday meal on either EPCOT or HS day

 

[FloreedaGal]

Hi all! My family is going to Orlando for the first time, family of six (four kids, 6 yrs and under) and will probably eat breakfast in our room, pack a lunchbag for midday, but we'd love to eat out for dinner (we'll have a car), or grab takeout to eat back in our hotel if we're tired. But no clue what's budget-friendly or family-friendly in the Lake buena vista area. It can be, but doesn't have to be on-site at WDW. Thanks in advance!

I'm going to suggest a different tact:

Forget packing lunches into the parks -- it's not easy to carry lunch around the parks, and sandwiches that've been in a pack for hours aren't exactly yummy. Especially with kids, a mid-day sit-down break in the air conditioning will be valuable /will recharge their batteries

We just got back, and I say pack the lunches and dinner. You can eat what you like when you need a break, be sure everyone gets enough of food they like to power on through long days, and do not have to trouble over being in a certain spot at a certain time or making the 'right choice', which you know is hard in a big family where everyone wants something different. We save our park food money for splurgey snacks, do not rely on it for nourishment.


We stayed at Dolphin 3 nights on a discount, did three parks. We made breakfast in the room, and brought lunches, and ate dinners in the room. The benefit is in the convience and saved emotional labor of trying to make the right choice for restaurants. I hate to try to get the right food at the right time in the park. I hate to spend what it costs for a big family to eat out and not have everyone like what they got. When we eat in amusement parks we end just getting something close by where we are when hunger strikes someone, and spend big money on boring food that is not satisfying to everyone when we do it . Just stopping and eating your picnic food when it strikes you is so much more relaxing than trying to find a good restaurant or a crowd when starving. You are able to eat at at of the outdoor areas. Though social distancing and large crowds mean you have to have to hover and wait to grab one. We ate early most days and that helped, that we got tables before the rush, and could be on rides during the lunch lull.

If you are a budget minded family of six, I am sure you know how to pack lunches. The beauty is you can really splurge on groceries and still save compared to Disney. We loaded up on lots of goodies at Aldis. We have a cooler backpack and put bagged ice from the hotel ice machine at the bottom and put closed packs of lunch meat, cheese, smoked salmon, cheese at the bottom near the ice. We pack sandwich boxes for each person with their bread, some of us are gluten free. We being cream cheese, guacamole, hummus in single serve packages, lots of crackers and chips. We get mayo in the park and assemble sandwiches on site so not soggy. We have one back pack of water bottles we refill ed by asking for big cups of ice. The other pack was lunch. We were going to get a locker for 10 and store it but there was no need as we could take it on the rides and it was so great to have food ready when we felt hungry. We ate at picnic tables in the shade when we found them and felt hungry.

We ate well, and could spontaneously go for treats and yummy things when someone saw something they liked, and I did not suffer over spending big bucks on treats knowing we had saved on lunch. We got fun foods we wanted from epcot food festival, stupid expensive $15 orange bird slushies the kids wanted in Epcot, turkey legs, and I tried fancy drinks. My kids wanted $6 "sprite bombs" in Hollywood Studios, and I let them. If we'd just paid $9 for a hot.dog, I would not do it. So I let the kids have their preferred splurges, even the ones I think are not good deals-but it's what they find enticing and cool. And we do that knowing everyone is already well fed.

We live a few hours way, and drove. We camp a lot and think like campers when we pack for travel. We brought the instant pot, air fryer, and electric skillet for the room ( and of course a dirty bin, dish bin for washing dishes in the tub, dish soap, scrubber, and towels). You can hard cook eggs and frozen waffles in air fryer and used it bagged hash browns and for fries, scrambled eggs in electric skillet ( can do in instant pot, too). Did coffee & cocoa water in instant pot in the morning, then used pour over. And did dinner in instant pot on slow cook. One day we took a midday break and and ate dinner by pool and cooled off ( brought it down in plastic tote with handles we brought the appliances in) and another night ate when we got back.

When we eat out at our favorite local BBQ, it's $70 for us. Hotdogs n tater tots are $10 at Magic Kingdom. We'd have paid $50-60 at least per person per meal to eat in the hotel or park for all three meals- $500 if we were lucky and ate no special treats or snacks . I bought deluxe groceries for $200, ate great, and then spent around $150 on drinks and snacks and that made the crew happy.

We were toast at the end of the day and not in the mood to spend a bunch of money or be in a restaurant for dinner out. Happy to be able to go to the room for midday swim and meal or eat when back from a long day out. If you carry food, you will have snacks to get you through.

Have fun!

 

[chaselovesnemo]

I agree after a long day in the parks you will likely be too tired to want to go to a restaurant. I’d do the meal at lunch when you are in the parks.

We LOVE Pollo Tropical. It’s cheap, fast, and delicious. We live out west and have spent months trying to develop a sauce similar to their cilantro one so we can make our own Pollo bowls.

 

[LovesTimone]

Hi all! My family is going to Orlando for the first time, family of six (four kids, 6 yrs and under) and will probably eat breakfast in our room, pack a lunchbag for midday, but we'd love to eat out for dinner (we'll have a car), or grab takeout to eat back in our hotel if we're tired. But no clue what's budget-friendly or family-friendly in the Lake buena vista area. It can be, but doesn't have to be on-site at WDW. Thanks in advance!

I read through most of the post lots of good advice and suggestions..

I went back and looked at your original post, and I saw 1st trip... and not sure where you are staying... I am assuming you have a vehicle to get around in

First off I suggest a Family suite on site... AOA or if possible a DVC rental ( lots of people on here rent with Davids DVC) - main reason being location, location... if you forget something its easy peasy to go back and get it...if you still have kiddos taking a nap, again much easier to go back to the room...

or

Off- site at a Time share - West Gate, Orange Lake, Vistana, or Margariville... cost will much less... give you more room and a kitchen which will be a life saver, 2 bathroom, and TV's ... plus some of them have washer's and dryer's which would come in handy...

Strollers - You could go with 2 - double strollers, this way you can push all the kids... Yes the 6 year old will want to ride, with the crowds, lines, heat and humidity... trust me you don't want a melt down for you or them... plus with the sunshades it will give them some protection. My other thought would be 2 - sit and stands..

Breakfast in room is the smartest way to go, I would keep it simple, cereal, milk, fruit, yogurt, pop tarts, breakfast bars, juice, toast or toaster pastries, coffee is a must... LOL... if you have a kitchen you can do things like frozen waffles, scrambled eggs...

Insulated cooler bag...for drinks, and a few snacks - bottled water, juice boxes, capri-sun, canned soda, things like cheese sticks and grapes are pretty good to go... You might want to think about some of those freezer pack... less mess...if you use ice, place it in 2 ziploc's or a combo of these...

Snack bag... chips, crackers, peanut butter crackers, gold fish, protein, bars cookies, watch out for something that melts, chocolate anything will melt... if you want you can throw in a freezer pack... use some cheap dollar store containers, so that everything doesn't get crushed...

Park bag - sunscreen, hats, sunglasses, extra change of clothing for each kiddo... extra ziploc's, cleaning wipes, hand wipes, extra mask, hand sanitizer... If you have little one in diapers you of course will need that gear as well... Pull ups are a life saver...

Lunch - I personally would do lunch in the parks... with the added temp. screening, then bag checks, getting in and out of the parks it adds more time away from the parks... You could do QS options, there is so much to choose from, I would think about TS for sure, it will be so nice to sit down and let someone wait on you... and gives you all time to relax and regroup... You can share meal at a TS for sure... Eat at off times like a later lunch...

Dinner, driving back to the hotel/time share - there are plenty of places no matter where you are staying to get something to eat or take home... Publix, has really great chicken and sides, Olive Garden you could a pan of lasagna, or baked spaghetti ( you will want to call ahead for this one)... which comes with salad and breadsticks.. which I am pretty sure is alot less than individual meals, Pickup pizza, or Chinese on the way back to room...


Meal sharing is the way to go...just let the server know that you want to split the meals... sometimes they will split in the kitchen other times they will bring you the plates and let you do it..

The parks are huge and there is alot and I mean alot of walking... just walking through the parking lot, temp check, security check, takes time...

Know that your not going to be able to get everything done... So pick out what you want to do, the kids favorites, and do them...

Rider swap... as well there baby care stations can go in handy, and the relaxation stations are another area to sit down, and take a breather...

Have a wonderful time... Pixie Dust away...

 

[FigmentFans]

I would suggest that if you eat off-site, have a few places in mind that you know you will like before you go. When we were down several years ago with friends (not planners at all), nothing was worse that driving all around the area at 7pm going debating on which restaurant to go to, with me getting more hangry by the minute.
'How about this place'...'Nope I didn't like it last time'
'How about this Italian restaurant'...'I don't feel like pasta tonight'
'How about...'
Almost as bad as 'What do you want to do'...'I don't know, what do you want to do'.

 

[DL1WDW2]

Miller’s Ale House is near the Publix. And across from the Olive Garden and Tortilla Flats Mexican that has daily specials.
Occasionally Sam’s Club and Costco have great gift card discount offers for many of the local restaurants near Disney.

 

[MissBritt]

If in Disney Springs, Early of Sandwich is a good value.

 

[Darcy03231]

La Granja, 2809 W Vine St. Kissimmee, FL 34741

One of the best places we've eaten. A co-worker of my son's recommended it. He used to live in the area. We were there for 2 weeks and everyone loved it so much we ate there three times.

 

[Jimsig]

La Granja, 2809 W Vine St. Kissimmee, FL 34741 {/QUOTE]

I read that quick and saw La Ganja and though you were recommending a CBD shop

 

[kathy884]

Ford's Garage is now in Orlando -- fun family friendly place with great theming. I have been to the one in Dearborn, Michigan and Brandon, Florida, just saw that there is one near the condo where we are staying in our next Orlando trip (March 2022) and am looking forward to taking my family there. It's a relatively new chain that is mostly just in Florida that we don't have in our area that I tried for the first time last year.