Food Budget if not on DDP?

[millerpjm]

Hi all....

I am trying to figure out/estimate a food budget for WDW...what has it cost you in the past?

7 day trip
2 adults, 1 child
staying on site
We'll probably have cereal/snacks in the room

I'm estimating probably 2 character meals, 4-5 TS meals and the rest counter service/quick service. I have no idea where to start!

TIA!

 

[PinkEars]

Have you looked at allears.net? it has all the restaurants with prices. thats how i planned everything. but we are now on the dining plan. we also have 2 adults and 1 small child. we are doing 7 (one character) table 7 counter and was coming out to $800. that included small breakfast and tips...so was planning on taking $900 just to be sure.

check out allears.net

 

[Nadjalu]

I too suggest that you look over the menus and get a feel for where you would want to eat. That will at least give you a basis as to what those cost.

But you can count on the adults meals being somewhere in this catagory:
CS meals range from $8-$15 (may or may not include soda)
TS meals, buffets will be about $22-$40 each depending which character buffets you go to. Breakfast ones are the cheaper of them.

Bottled water is $2.50-$4 per bottle, soda is about the same.

I have no idea on kids meals, others can help you with that.

Whatever figure you come up with make sure to "pad" it or add extra, because things change fast down there.

 

[quagmire0]

Was going to post a separate thread, but might as well latch onto this one. My question is if anyone knows of a master thread or website that has tips on which restaurants/eateries have the best deals? I know they have the menus available, but I'm looking for more detail like "X restaurant has really large entrees that are easy to split" or "you can find cheap snacks at XX, cheaper than at most locations". I saw some tips like that on Mousesavers, but I'm hoping to find a 'master list' that gets updated.

I actually pulled the trigger on tickets at UT before knowing that I couldn't add the DDP (well, without incurring the cost of a 1day, which would be close to $300 extra for us). So, I'm committed to budgeting my way out of the hole.

 

[wheeliefun]

I've never come across such a "master list" of dining deals. Mousesavers, wdwinfo, and disneyfoodblog have always been my best guides, in addition to personal experiences. Maybe "we" should start an official thread to seek just such a list????

Wheelie

 

[MHSweb79]

With the exception of character meals, we've found that most WDW table-service restaurants offer mediocre food at highly inflated prices. Without the DDP, we are likely to book a couple of character breakfasts and eat the rest of our meals at counter-service eateries.

You should allow $10-15 per adult for counter service, and $20-30 per person for table service. Kids meals are less, of course. You can check out menus and actual prices over at allearsnet.com