How many character meals per trip?

[Mom@disney]

We have never done a character meal at Disney, but have decided to go all out this time and schedule 1 each day, so far we have 1900 PF and chef Mickey. We are thinking of adding tusker house and maybe ohana. Is this overkill? Is it a once you've done one character meal you've done them all type thing?

 

[Jfsag123]

We did 5 character meals in 7 days on our last trip (1900 PF breakfast and dinner, 'Ohana, Cinderella's Royal Table, Hollywood & Vine), plus BOG dinner with Beast at the end. It was not too much for us! We have character obsessed kids and, for us, it's a great way to get to meet a bunch of characters without having to wait in line. For some people, it would have been way too much. I would go ahead and book them, as the reservations will be hard to get last minute. If after your first character meal you find that you really don't care for more, you can cancel the others and still be within the cancellation window.

 

[minnie mum]

Some people are willing to fall on their swords for the sake of their children's character appetites. Others aren't. If I was intent on this, though, I wouldn't do all breakfasts. Spread the misery with a character lunch or dinner some days instead. The AYCTE family style or plated meals like Garden Grill or Akershus would be a welcome change from buffets. We limited our character meals to one per trip. Gave the rug rats something to look forward to on the next trip. Other families seem to enjoy one every day. Only you know where you fall on the spectrum. But as the PP recommended, you can always make the ADRs and then cancel those on later days if you find they aren't something you enjoy.

 

[_auroraborealis_]

One thing I would consider with character meals are the characters involved.

If we look at your list right now, including the maybes:

• 1900 PF - if breakfast, the British crew, if dinner, Cindy + family
• CM - Mickey, Minnie, Donald, Goofy, Pluto
• Ohana - Mickey, Pluto, Lilo, Stitch
• Tusker House - Donald, Daisy, Mickey, Goofy

So that is a lot of overlap right now.

Multiple of the additional options remaining to you increase the overlap. Akershus would not, as you don't have strong princess presence right now (even if 1900PF is dinner, Cindy is a rarity at Akershus). You could stretch the point and call Be Our Guest dinner a character meal, although it's really a meal with optional meet and greet. Crystal Palace is the Pooh friends, which overlaps a little if 1900PF is breakfast. Garden Grill gets you Chip & Dale, but also Mickey and Pluto AGAIN. Hollywood & Vine breakfast/lunch is unique (Disney Junior characters), but is best with the Junior demographic. Dinner gets you the Big 5 again, in new costumes again.

So to me, it comes down to a few things:

• How many times do you want to meet Mickey, or Goofy?
• Do you want to spend 90 minutes a day (plus travel, in some cases) for a character meal a day? If you get PPO, you may still be eating at Rope Drop. If you don't get PPO, you're wasting prime touring for breakfast times.
• Do the menus even appeal?

 

[barbaraann]

My friend and I have 5 day tickets, and we are doing three character meals. I am 68, and my friend will celebrate her 69th birthday on the last park day of our trip. I will be taking her to Crystal Palace for lunch our first day, Tusker House for lunch our 2nd day, and Park Fare for a birthday dinner on our last night. I have been to WDW many times, but my friend has not. I am looking forward to taking many many pictures of my friend with the characters. I want her to have the best experience possible, since it will most likely be her only Disney trip ever.

 

[StirlingSilver83]

We LOVE Character meals, lol...I find them entertaining and the kids love them, when we went last year we were there for I think 8 or 9 days and we did these character meals in that time:

- Mickey's Backyard BBQ (wouldn't really call this a "character meal" but it was still a TON of fun!)
- Ohana
- Cinderella's Royal Table
- Garden Grill
- Crystal Palace
- 1900 Park Fare (dinner)
- Hollywood & Vine
- Akershus Royal Banquet Hall
- Chef Mickey's
- Be Our Guest (Not a Character meal but we still got to meet the Beast!)
- 1900 Park Fare (breakfast)

So in my opinion you can NEVER have too many character meals, LOL

 

[TXAKDisneyFan]

Prior to this past May, we'd only ever done one character meal (1900PF dinner). In May, we did Tusker House 'brunch', CRT breakfast, Akershus dinner, and BOG dinner (Beast).

Menus and food quality aside, I thought the character interaction wasn't as good as at regular M&Gs. The characters didn't spend much time at each table, the dining rooms were crowded so there wasn't room to really interact with them, and the lighting wasn't great for pictures. Additionally, besides pics with Cinderella outside CRT, there were no Photopass photographers (unlike at M&G locations). Our pictures obviously have other diners in them, as well as food/utensils/etc, whereas the M&G pics have cute backgrounds and only our family members.

I thought the food was fine (note we didn't dine at Chef Mickey's or Hollywood and Vine, which get terrible food reviews). We'll do character meals in the future, but we'd probably limit it to one or two a trip, and we wouldn't do them solely to meet the characters. (We'd book bc of menus, locations, for PPO,...)

 

[unwritten01]

We typically do 3 over 5 days - always Chef Mickey's on arrival night (tradition and photos of kids as they grow up in front of plate)..we also went to Crystal palace for littlest one, and CRT for our daughter (outmanned 5-1) .

 

[aaarcher86]

We do at least one day. Even with repeat characters they're always fun.

 

[ChasingLeslie]

We are doing Akershus, Crystal Palace, and Tusker House (for sure).

I have Minnie Dine and 1900 Park Fare dinner booked as well but I may cancel one (or possibly both).

 

[Lisa F]

When I took my then 6 year old son last September we did:
Ohana Breakfast
Crystal Palace Lunch
Tusker House Lunch

This was a pretty decent variety in characters... we were there for 6 days (one day at Kennedy space center) so it was kind of like every other day.

Ohana Breakfast was great, especially for a single mom to not have to deal with buffet, and if my kid could live on mickey waffles and bacon he'd be a happy camper. We both love stitch so that was the highlight.

Crystal Palace was as always, I love the pooh characters myself and we added that one last minute at an odd time because the counter service options in MK were tough with my picky kid. I find CP one of the easier buffets to deal with because you can see the buffet from most of the seating and vice versa and can time trips to not interfere with character visits. I think having it at an odd time (between lunch and dinner) probably helped as well for crowds.

Tusker House was probably the best food of the 3... interesting things for mom who loves ethnic food and plenty of things he liked too, but being in so many different rooms it was almost the most difficult for me to navigate - we were far from the buffet and it seemed to take longer for characters to come around than in Crystal Palace, which always operates with great efficiency and seems to time and space everything just right. It just felt a lot darker and noisier and more chaotic than CP and that is saying a lot (but we were also there at a prime lunch time).

We are going back in December and he has requested we do Ohana Breakfast and Crystal Palace again... and will swap out Garden Grill (maybe with Candlelight Processional package) for Tusker House.

I am also considering Hollywood and Vine with Fantasmic Dinner Package but only because I want to do the reserved seating. My kid LOVES sci fi dine in so that will be 2 ts in one day, although for his meals it is not a big difference in price and I can eat light while I am there I think. In reading recent reviews it seems like Hollywood and Vine is better than it used to be... can anyone comment? I hate paying for crappy food and chose character meals before at least partially based on food reviews.

I am also considering CRT. for me. I love the castle. My son is not into the princesses one bit but the castle is just... the castle. What do moms of boys have to say about that? Love some feedback.

I will say that overall while the pictures were not the best (as pointed out above) my son really enjoyed the character meals... it was a great way to meet a few characters with no standing in line and something to do while waiting (eating!) He is on the spectrum and waiting can be tough for him. I ended up adding the Crystal Palace meal on our last trip also because of how great Tusker House and Ohana had been. We also go maybe once every two years so that is a long time to anticipate your next character meal. if we went a few times a year it would be different but our vacations are kind of blowouts "let's do everything awesome" affairs

 

[butterfly71076]

We love character meals!! The ones we are not doing in June are CRT and Akershus, DS has no interest in princess dining. We have: Crystal Palace-dinner, Hollywood & Vine Fantasmic dining, Tusker House-breakfast, Garden Grill-breakfast, 1900 Park Fare-breakfast, Chef Mickey's-dinner,

 

[addiln]

We have done a 3 in one trip. We did Chef Mickey's, 1900, and Crystal Palace. It was nice since each one was different characters. I would not do much more then that since I would not want to do repeat characters. Also this is a great way to get some nice pictures with them without all the standing in line at the meet and greet spots.

 

[LurlaDisney]

We are doing Akershus, Crystal Palace, and Tusker House (for sure).

I have Minnie Dine and 1900 Park Fare dinner booked as well but I may cancel one (or possibly both).

We LOVE 1900 Park Fare!

 

[Mom@disney]

I have 2 DS and a pre teen DD, so we didn't really go for the princesses, but 1900 we did do the dinner. I have heard bad things about buffet food at Disney but with 5 people of many ages it seemed the least painful way to go. We are also celebrating DS 1st birthday so I wanted to make it extra special and have lots of picture opportunities since this will be his "party". Plus these character meals are $$!!

 

[figmentfan423]

We have never done a character meal at Disney, but have decided to go all out this time and schedule 1 each day, so far we have 1900 PF and chef Mickey. We are thinking of adding tusker house and maybe ohana. Is this overkill? Is it a once you've done one character meal you've done them all type thing?

LOL I'd add Crystal Palace to that list! No they're not all the same, I'm a bit over 21 and I still love them. My ds wants to do one for his 14th birthday.

 

[Lisa F]

Scratch off Hollywood & Vine Fantasmic Dining. Has anyone seen the prices for 2016?
Adult: $53.99
Kid: $42.99

that is way too much for me to pay for a character buffet!!! If I'm dropping $100 on dinner for me and my kid it is going to be at a signature restaurant with a nice cocktail for me!

 

[figmentfan423]

Scratch off Hollywood & Vine Fantasmic Dining. Has anyone seen the prices for 2016?
Adult: $53.99
Kid: $42.99

that is way too much for me to pay for a character buffet!!! If I'm dropping $100 on dinner for me and my kid it is going to be at a signature restaurant with a nice cocktail for me!

Not to mention I call lunch and dinner there Hollywood and Vile

 

[Lisa F]

Not to mention I call lunch and dinner there Hollywood and Vile

Glad I started my research there early. If it were edible (I don't think Crystal Palace is any gourmet meal either but it's alright and I love the character interaction) I'd be ok but with how much of a greater value Mama Melrose is and other planned character meals, this one is off the list.

I have seen some decent reviews on it. Back when I was going sans kids 10 years ago would not touch it with a 10 foot pole.

 

[got15]

When I took my then 6 year old son last September we did:
Ohana Breakfast
Crystal Palace Lunch
Tusker House Lunch

This was a pretty decent variety in characters... we were there for 6 days (one day at Kennedy space center) so it was kind of like every other day.

Ohana Breakfast was great, especially for a single mom to not have to deal with buffet, and if my kid could live on mickey waffles and bacon he'd be a happy camper. We both love stitch so that was the highlight.

Crystal Palace was as always, I love the pooh characters myself and we added that one last minute at an odd time because the counter service options in MK were tough with my picky kid. I find CP one of the easier buffets to deal with because you can see the buffet from most of the seating and vice versa and can time trips to not interfere with character visits. I think having it at an odd time (between lunch and dinner) probably helped as well for crowds.

Tusker House was probably the best food of the 3... interesting things for mom who loves ethnic food and plenty of things he liked too, but being in so many different rooms it was almost the most difficult for me to navigate - we were far from the buffet and it seemed to take longer for characters to come around than in Crystal Palace, which always operates with great efficiency and seems to time and space everything just right. It just felt a lot darker and noisier and more chaotic than CP and that is saying a lot (but we were also there at a prime lunch time).

We are going back in December and he has requested we do Ohana Breakfast and Crystal Palace again... and will swap out Garden Grill (maybe with Candlelight Processional package) for Tusker House.

I am also considering Hollywood and Vine with Fantasmic Dinner Package but only because I want to do the reserved seating. My kid LOVES sci fi dine in so that will be 2 ts in one day, although for his meals it is not a big difference in price and I can eat light while I am there I think. In reading recent reviews it seems like Hollywood and Vine is better than it used to be... can anyone comment? I hate paying for crappy food and chose character meals before at least partially based on food reviews.

I am also considering CRT. for me. I love the castle. My son is not into the princesses one bit but the castle is just... the castle. What do moms of boys have to say about that? Love some feedback.

I will say that overall while the pictures were not the best (as pointed out above) my son really enjoyed the character meals... it was a great way to meet a few characters with no standing in line and something to do while waiting (eating!) He is on the spectrum and waiting can be tough for him. I ended up adding the Crystal Palace meal on our last trip also because of how great Tusker House and Ohana had been. We also go maybe once every two years so that is a long time to anticipate your next character meal. if we went a few times a year it would be different but our vacations are kind of blowouts "let's do everything awesome" affairs

Mom of boys here- our boys LOVE character meals- never enough. Always Chef Mickeys, Garden Grill, and TH. SO- CRT they loved as well. We have been twice. Once at 4 and 1.5, and the second time at 5 and 2. They requested the second time. They loved the princesses, the castle, and the attention that the characters gave them. Cinderella whip nay nayed with my oldest. It was awesome! They most especially loved the swords that were given to them- it added to the collection that they were getting from the Pirates of the Carib. gift shop. The second time- they asked for wishing star wands.. go figure (then sword fought w/ those). We did a lunch there and a dinner- food at dinner was better, we thought.