Meals

[traveler_t]

Visiting Disneyland for the first time with 3.5yo, 5.5yo residing in the Disney hotels.

1. Meals. For regular meals (not special character or fine dining) do we need to plan / reserver ahead? either in-park or hotel (Disney hotels) meals. How much time reserve before: weeks, days or same day ok?
2. Which special meals are recommended? Honestly my daughters are not big eaters and it's only for the atmosphere.
3. It seems if we take one of the character breakfast we lose precious times in the park when it is less crowded... is it worth it or better lunch / dinner with characters?
4. What are our options for breakfast in the days we want to be in the park in 7:30?
5. We couldn't find any tickets for princess breakfast for the next 60 days... is it that busy or not operating or only opens for reservation the day before?


Thanks!

 

[mouschievous]

1. Meals. For regular meals (not special character or fine dining) do we need to plan / reserver ahead? either in-park or hotel (Disney hotels) meals. How much time reserve before: weeks, days or same day ok?

It depends on the restaurant. They take reservations 60 days in advance. Some go super fast - like booked within minutes of becoming available. Some will still be available when you leave. And of course, you don't need a reservation for any Quick Service restaurants. Are there specific places you want to know more about?

2. Which special meals are recommended? Honestly my daughters are not big eaters and it's only for the atmosphere.

DL is less about the amazing or unique Table Service restaurants than WDW. If you want to do a character meal you have 4 choices

1. Storyteller's Cafe, which has characters for breakfast and brunch (not dinner) and is located in the Grand Californian Hotel
2. Plaza Inn, which is the only one in a park at DL, and has the most characters. Again, characters are only at Breakfast
3. Goofy's Kitchen, which is at the Disneyland Hotel and has characters at all meals
4. Princess Tea at Grand Californian. People love this one but it's also very expensive, I think like $125 per person

Beyond the character meals, I don't feel like there's really anything that is a must do. In fact we prefer to do QS at DL, since our day is much more flexible that way.

3. It seems if we take one of the character breakfast we lose precious times in the park when it is less crowded... is it worth it or better lunch / dinner with characters?

I think I saw in another post that you are doing a half day either on your arrival or departure day. If you decide to do the half day on departure day, you could book Goofy's Kitchen for dinner on your arrival day. Or, some people like to book a late breakfast at Plaza Inn, say at like 10:30 or so. That allows you the great early morning hours, and gives you a break when it may be starting to get crowded.

What are our options for breakfast in the days we want to be in the park in 7:30?

Depends on where you are staying. There's a quick service place at the GCH. You can always do food in your room, which we find the be the easiest. We do fruit, hard boiled eggs, etc. and eat it while we walk to the gates. There's a Starbucks in DTD but it was jam packed when we were there.

5. We couldn't find any tickets for princess breakfast for the next 60 days... is it that busy or not operating or only opens for reservation the day before?

I see times for parties of 2 on Sept 29, so they are released, just likely there aren't reservations left for larger parties or on other days. Make sure when you search that you use a time instead of "Breakfast," sometimes that makes a difference. Also, there are sites where you can set an alert and it will let you know of openings on days that you're interested in. And just checking back frequently, as people cancel all the time (especially the 24-48 hours prior).

Thanks!

 

[Pluto468]

Visiting Disneyland for the first time with 3.5yo, 5.5yo residing in the Disney hotels.


1. Meals. For regular meals (not special character or fine dining) do we need to plan / reserver ahead? either in-park or hotel (Disney hotels) meals. How much time reserve before: weeks, days or same day ok?
— You do need to reserve ahead for some places. They open up 60 days out and some are harder to get than others. But there are plenty of restaurants that you can just walk into the day of your visit. We used mobile ordering for almost all of our meals last time. I had booked SO many reservations but ended up cancelling them on our first day at Disneyland because I wanted more flexibility for our trip.


2. Which special meals are recommended? Honestly my daughters are not big eaters and it's only for the atmosphere.
— If they like characters you could do Minnie's at Plaza Inn (in the park) or Goofy's at DLH. The other special meals would be Fantasmic dining, World Of Color Dessert party or the parade package. All of the restaurants have nice theming, so the atmosphere would be good at most places.


3. It seems if we take one of the character breakfast we lose precious times in the park when it is less crowded... is it worth it or better lunch / dinner with characters?
— We usually do those on a non park day. Some people like to do the Minnie's breakfast at Plaza Inn around 10:30 as a break/brunch. We do Goofy's sometimes after we're done for the day in the park.

4. What are our options for breakfast in the days we want to be in the park in 7:30?
— Tangoroa Terrace at DLH has a nice breakfast menu, and there's also a coffee shop.

Disneyland hotel has club level rooms available. You would have breakfast there plus snacks all day and dinner appetizers. This was SO convenient when we stayed, especially for breakfast. Club level rooms cost more but it was really worth it for us to have food and drinks available all day.

In the parks I like Jolly Holiday for breakfast, but you could also go to Red Rose Tavern or Galactic grill. For breakfast reservations at the hotels I think Goofy's and Storyteller's start at 7:00am I ate breakfast at Pym's in DCA.

In the past when we've stayed at hotels without breakfast we just have muffins or cereal in the room.

Have a wonderful trip!

 

[milieu_mouse]

Hi! We are taking our first family trip in a few weeks - with two kiddos. While I can't speak to recommendations, I'd be happy to share some information I've compiled from a wealth of others during my planning, specifically for quick service meals and snacks.

For Disneyland:

	Meals	Where
Harbor Galley	Lobster roll, salad, soup/bread bowl, power pack	Critter Country
Hungry Bear	Burger, chx sando, salad, kid burger/nuggets	Critter Country
French Market	Po boys, salad, jambalaya, kids pasta/chx breast	New Orleans Sq
Bengal BBQ	Skewers, hummus	Adventureland
Tropical Hideaway	Dole whip, Bao, lumpia	Adventureland
Jolly Holiday	soup/grilled cheese combo, salad, turkey sando	Main St
Little Red Wagon	Corn Dogs	Main St
Rancho del Zocalo	Enchiladas, burritos, etc - kids bean and cheese burrito	Frontierland
Stage Door Cafe	Corn Dogs	Frontierland
Ronto Roasters	Ronto-less meatless wrap is supposedly yummy	Galaxy's Edge
	and Milk Stand for drinks
	Snacks/Sweets	Where
Golden Horseshoe	Chocolate chunk cookie sundae
Jolly Holiday	macaroons, macarons	Main St
Maurice's Treats	Boysen apple freeze	Fantasyland
Kat Saka's Kettle Corn	Kettle Corn	Galaxy's Edge

For Disney California Adventure:

	Meals	Where
Flo's V8 Cafe	burgers, salads, chx fingers	Carsland
Corn Dog Castle		Paradise Gardens
Pacific Wharf Cafe	bread bowls, kids turkey sando	Pacific Wharf
Pym Test Kitchen	sandwiches, pretzel	Avengers Campus
	Snacks/Sweets	Where
Adorable Snowman	frozen treats	Pixar Pier
Cozy Cone	so many snacks	Carsland
JackJack cookie nums	big warm cookies	Pixar Pier
For DTD & hotels:
Ralph Brennans to go	Beignets
Napolini	Pizza
GCH Craftsman Grill	Many choices

Apologies if formatting is bad!