Food? how much to spend?

[disneymom71]

Hello Everyone!!!

Another quick question. We already paid for (1)Character Breakfast and (1)Goofy's Kitchen....For a family of 5, how much will be our daily expenses betwen Breakfast, Snacks, Lunch and Dinner.

We are going to stay at Hojo so there is no complimentary breakfast but we would have some items and goodies in our room, (we are traveling by car). So approximately how much will be per day for a family of two adults, a teen, 8yrs and toddler for one week.

I was thinking between 500 to 600 but this will be enough? I had not been at DL since 2001 and WDW since 2005 but for those occasions we bought the dinning plan at WDW.

Thanks in advance and it will be only 32 more night until DL.

 

[LavenderPeach]

If you want to know how much food at DLR will be you can go to allears.net (the disneyland link is at the very bottom) and see the menus with prices for all the various eating places in the resort. Of course the prices could change before you get there but it will give you a general idea so you can add up how much you can expect to spend when eating in the parks.

 

[firefly87]

Will you have a fridge & microwave in your room? If so and your family can survive on a light breakfast, I would consider doing breakfast in your room (like cereal, oatmeal, muffins, bagels, etc). If you didn't have a toaster, I think I've heard of people using the burner on the coffee pot to warm their bagel!

We take lunches in to the park for our kids. We either make PB&J's that morning (or buy Uncrustables), pack in some chips or Goldfish, fruit (grapes, apple slices, bananas), Capri Suns, string cheese, and some cookies. (I think last time I brought in Ding Dongs as a treat for my kids) It's so convenient to just pull something out of the bag when the kids get hungry instead of trying to find a place that has what you want to eat, enough seating, etc.

That is always much cheaper than buying all your meals in the park IMO. The only meal we would purchase in the park or in DTD was dinner.

 

[disneymom71]

tHANKS FOR THE TIPS AND IDEAS...I WAS THINKING TOO OF TAKING OUR SMALL MICROWAVE BUT YES WE WILL HAVE CEREAL, MILK, BREAD, CHEESE ETC....WE ARE PLANNING OF HAVING THOSE ITEMS...BUT BOTH OF YOU ARE SO RIGHT!!!! DEFINETELY I WILL CONCETRATED MORE ON LIGHT LUNCH AND GREAT DINNER AT DL OR CA.....WE ARE GOING TO BE ONLY 3 DAYS AT THE PARKS BECAUSE WE WOULD LIKE ALSO TO VISIT SAN DIEGO AND LOS ANGELES AREA.

 

[MommyWithDreams]

Also when you do splurge in the parks and get meals, most places have portions that are so easy to split. DBF and I always spend so much less on food than we budget for.

 

[firefly87]

tHANKS FOR THE TIPS AND IDEAS...I WAS THINKING TOO OF TAKING OUR SMALL MICROWAVE BUT YES WE WILL HAVE CEREAL, MILK, BREAD, CHEESE ETC....WE ARE PLANNING OF HAVING THOSE ITEMS...BUT BOTH OF YOU ARE SO RIGHT!!!! DEFINETELY I WILL CONCETRATED MORE ON LIGHT LUNCH AND GREAT DINNER AT DL OR CA.....WE ARE GOING TO BE ONLY 3 DAYS AT THE PARKS BECAUSE WE WOULD LIKE ALSO TO VISIT SAN DIEGO AND LOS ANGELES AREA.

I haven't stayed at Hojo's so I'm not familiar with their rooms, but you may be able to request a microwave in your room (along with a fridge). That might save from having to bring your own.

I also agree about splitting portions. Even the kids meals are big in the park!

 

[MommyWithDreams]

I haven't stayed at Hojo's so I'm not familiar with their rooms, but you may be able to request a microwave in your room (along with a fridge). That might save from having to bring your own.

I also agree about splitting portions. Even the kids meals are big in the park!

Some of HOJO's rooms do come with microwaves..you could call in house reservations to see if the room you reserved does come with one.

 

[MichaelColey]

You can get by with very minimal food expenses. Here's what we did on our 12-day trip (to Disneyland, Universal, Legoland, Six Flags, SeaWorld, and the San Diego Zoo) with two adults and two kids (5 and 3) a few weeks ago:

* Each morning before we left the room, we had a light breakfast - granola bars, cereal, fruit, etc.
* For lunch in the park, we brought something quick and easy - PB&J, snack crackers, trail mix, fruit, drinks, etc.
* For dinner, we went out to eat (off site). For four nights, we had discounted Restaurant.com certificates (and leftovers from one of those meals on one night). On five nights, we went to Claim Jumper - an awesome restaurant that we don't have back home. One night we got McDonalds for the kids and Chipotle for us.

We never spent a cent on food, snacks, or drinks in the parks.

We probably spent less than $100 on groceries and under $400 eating out. And that was for 12 days, and we ate really good (for dinners anyway). That was about $40/day. It could have been significantly less than that if we would have ate cheaper for dinner, but we don't mind spending the money to get one big, nice meal a day.

For our upcoming 7 day trip, we'll be doing almost exactly the same thing, except we'll go to Goofy's Kitchen one evening. We'll probably hit Claim Jumper most or all of the other nights.

The food is probably the biggest adjustment from our previous trips to WDW. We've always gone to WDW during their free dining plan promotions, so we always eat on site there and the meals are a pretty central part of the trip.

 

[wmah]

tHANKS FOR THE TIPS AND IDEAS...I WAS THINKING TOO OF TAKING OUR SMALL MICROWAVE BUT YES WE WILL HAVE CEREAL, MILK, BREAD, CHEESE ETC....WE ARE PLANNING OF HAVING THOSE ITEMS...BUT BOTH OF YOU ARE SO RIGHT!!!! DEFINETELY I WILL CONCETRATED MORE ON LIGHT LUNCH AND GREAT DINNER AT DL OR CA.....WE ARE GOING TO BE ONLY 3 DAYS AT THE PARKS BECAUSE WE WOULD LIKE ALSO TO VISIT SAN DIEGO AND LOS ANGELES AREA.

Last year I did Disney World and stayed at a HoJo and I knew ahead of time I wouldn't have a micro fridge so I brought my cooler and my small micro. Had no problems. I also brought along my propane camping skillet and did pancakes a few mornings in the parking lot of the hotel. The room service people saw me and never gave me a problem.

As for food in the park we never brought any in but instead the 2 of us would decide on one type of sandwich and cut it in half and share it. This worked good so we didn't over eat and saved some money to try something else if we saw something. We would bring in our own beverage.

 

[PinkBudgie]

For me, half the fun of DLR is eating there! However, we split meals, we ask for a free cup of water instead of buying sodas, and we might have a snack like ice cream instead of a meal. We also like to stay at places that offer a free breakfast. It just makes it easier.

Holiday Inn Express gives a decent free one, and I know Embassy Suites where we are staying in June has a very good one. We also stayed at another place with my parents that gave a good breakfast but forgot the name. I need to have some sort of protien in the morning or else I'm shakey a few hours later and need to eat again.

Although, I have to say I love Claim Jumper and we don't have one near us. Still, I just don't want to leave DLR sooner than I need to.

 

[JenDisneylandlver]

Eating and not having to do much work is part of the vacation for me! LOL Making sure we all have enough to eat is also important to me, so it's not something we scrimp on. A few mornings we would have donuts though (with a car you have a lot more options), or grab McDonalds. We eat a lot offsite which will save you money!

 

[Rivergallery]

When I stayed at Embassy Suites. We had a HUGE breakfast, and took bagels and apples with some packaged jam or cream cheese with us, a bottle of water (to refill) and clif bars. Me and my son did great, and For Dinner we ordered a pizza the first night, and ate mostly on that for three evenings. We love pizza so it worked out very cheap as we just would reheat left overs in the microwave. WE did end up paying for a couple lunches, and had a Character Breakfast the last morning before heading to the airport.

 

[BELLEDOZER]

What we did when we went to DL and stayed at HOJO's is to go down to their gift shop every morning and grab some individ portions of cereal for the kids, and a pastry or cereal bar for us. This did save us some money. We then ate lunch at DL, then went to MIMI's for dinner. Spent on the average of $70-$80 per day down at the mouse. This was for a family of 4 with DS5 and DS4. Should give you a rough idea on how much to spend on food. You'll love HOJO's, as we stayed there from Feb 3 to 10, and had a great time there. Definitely lived up to the reviews. The kids will love the Pirates Cove water park there. Have a great day!!

Trish