Multiple sit-down meals

[tom1944]

The last 2 years we have been eating one sit down meal while at Disney with either a meal at our room or a quick service to fill out are food for the day.
This trip there is a day or 2 where I am looking to schedule a breakfast and either a late lunch or an early dinner. We would spend the time between and after at the park- MK for sure. The 2 reservations I am considering is an Ohana breakfast and a Hoop Dee Doo 4 pm dinner. The second would be Epcot breakfast at Garden Grill and lunch or dinner at Space 220.

For those of you who eat multiple table service meals how much of an hourly gap do you take, and does it negatively impact your park time? THis will be our 3rd trip in a row, so we are targeting a limited number of rides although they are the more popular rides.

 

[Chupaca bruh]

It is fine giving up park time if you feel comfortable with it. The more often we have been to the parks the more comfortable we are spending time at meals or other things. We have found, for some reason, that two sit down meals are too much for us as far as food goes. We have had a breakfast or lunch sit down a few times and then canceled our dinner as we were still full. But I do enjoy the full service restaurants and wish we could do more. Of course the cost has gotten so high we have curtailed our choices.

 

[vivigrace611]

On our last trip, for Epcot day, we had an 11 am brunch at Topolino's followed by a 6 pm dinner at Space 220, which was the 3 course menu. The spacing and amount of food was fine for us, and we're not heavy eaters. It did impact our park time because the time had to come from somewhere and our kids noticed that we didn't do as many rides. It's not as significant of an impact if you're not leaving the park. For example, your GG and Space 220 day all within Epcot should be seamless. One thing to consider -- are you getting LL Multipass those days? If yes, know that to get the most of the system you'll want to swipe into a ride first thing in the morning to unlock your next selection. If you're unable to within the first 1-2 hrs of park open, all the desirable Tier 1 and Tier 2 selections will likely be sold out. Due to this, I'm avoiding scheduling breakfasts on park days on our upcoming trip. If you're satisfied with just getting the three priority selections, then you should be able to schedule them in between your ADRs.

 

[Marthasor]

The last 2 years we have been eating one sit down meal while at Disney with either a meal at our room or a quick service to fill out are food for the day.
This trip there is a day or 2 where I am looking to schedule a breakfast and either a late lunch or an early dinner. We would spend the time between and after at the park- MK for sure. The 2 reservations I am considering is an Ohana breakfast and a Hoop Dee Doo 4 pm dinner. The second would be Epcot breakfast at Garden Grill and lunch or dinner at Space 220.

For those of you who eat multiple table service meals how much of an hourly gap do you take, and does it negatively impact your park time? THis will be our 3rd trip in a row, so we are targeting a limited number of rides although they are the more popular rides.

IMHO, the 'Ohana breakfast/Hoop Dee Doo combo would take up way too much park time simply for the travel time factor. You would need to be at the MK boat dock to Ft. W by 3 pm and you wouldn't be done with the show until 6 pm. You wouldn't be back in MK until 6:30 pm at the earliest. If that fits into your MK plans, go for it. HDDR is a great show.

If you want to save park time, I would opt for the EP meals. If we do a breakfast and dinner sit-down in one day, I typically schedule them about 6-8 hours apart and just snack in between as needed.

 

[tom1944]

The factors that may make this possible is we will have 1 1/2 to 2 days at each park and we only have to do 4 rides at MK. We would be fine with missing any rides except the 4.

 

[CraigInPA]

My wife and I used to do two sit down meals per day. Usually, we'd do very early lunch (11-12) and a late dinner (7-9), versus your strategy of breakfast and dinner. We just found that having the late dinner didn't leave us hungry in the morning, and all the walking during the afternoon meant that we were hungry for dinner even though we'd have a sit down lunch.

 

[jimmymc]

Both Ohana and Garden Grill breakfasts are a lot of food, so I would make sure there's a long gap between them and the dinners. Epcot doesn't have a ton of rides you need to wait for, so if you're spending a whole day there, you can still probably do everything you'd like. Magic Kingdom has a lot more, but if you have another day there or don't mind missing out on a few bigger ones, I think it's a good plan.

 

[Anthony1971]

All that you list is a lot of food. If you were doing non all you care to enjoy - space is a prefix menu- with spacing and places where you can order and entree only I would not say this. HOWEVER I am not you only you can say how much you can eat or if you are willing to pay the premium for the atmosphere which is fine as well. Personally we could do one TS and one CS if the TS was not a Buffet and even then the CS would be lighter food a Buffet and snack with bagel for breakfast was it and that was years ago.... Now a Buffet/ all you care to enjoy are not worth the cost for the food period as we just cannot eat that much at one meal but we still occasionally do them for the atmosphere.

 

[NickC]

We've done 2 sit downs quite a bit. A few things:

-Some WDW restaurants, like HDDR and Sci Fi, are attractions themselves. So, I don't view them as 'just a meal.' HDDR is part of why I love going to WDW. More so than SWGE, etc.
-We did character dining a lot when the kids were little. This kind of aligns with the first point, but it also saved us some park time since we didn't have to wait in multiple lines for meet and greets.
-Sometimes you just need a break. There were days when we might have gone back to the resort earlier, but a nice dinner pepped us up.
-Since it's your 3rd trip in a row, you should be more efficient at navigating the parks, etc. You know what you want to ride and what you want to miss.

That said, I personally would try not to do Ohana and HDDR on the same day, but I'm not opposed to doing it. MK is our favorite park and we wouldn't want to miss that much of it. I think the last trip, we did Yak and Yeti for lunch and the late show at HDDR for dinner. AK closes pretty early, so it's a great park day for multiple sit downs. HDDR can be a lot of food, but we mostly pay for the show and get 'bonus' chicken--so we just eat what we need to there.

The other 'trick' that we like to do is schedule a late (park) breakfast. This allows us to RD and get a few attractions in before breakfast. This works well for Tusker House or Garden Grille. Not so much for Ohana and resort restaurants. But, knocking Soarin' and Spaceship Earth off the list right away is more valuable to us than eating a bit earlier.

 

[WhitneyMB]

We usually do two sit down meals each day about 7 hours apart. We grab a snack in our room for breakfast, rope drop, and are ready for a relaxing lunch by 12/noon. We usually have more park time and a rest in the afternoon, before heading back for a dinner around 6:30 and park until close.

We avoid all-you-can eat places generally because otherwise we end up too full and we really enjoy the table service experience, as it helps us slow down and relax. Occasional we do one (because some are so fun!) but would not do two all-you-care-to-eat in one day.

We eat more at Disney because we walk more at Disney! Happy planning!

 

[tom1944]

We usually do two sit down meals each day about 7 hours apart. We grab a snack in our room for breakfast, rope drop, and are ready for a relaxing lunch by 12/noon. We usually have more park time and a rest in the afternoon, before heading back for a dinner around 6:30 and park until close.

We avoid all-you-can eat places generally because otherwise we end up too full and we really enjoy the table service experience, as it helps us slow down and relax. Occasional we do one (because some are so fun!) but would not do two all-you-care-to-eat in one day.

We eat more at Disney because we walk more at Disney! Happy planning!

I really would like to skip 2 all you can eats but I have a 6-year-old that is hooked on Ohana and Hoop Dee Doo and since we are only at Disney for 6 days and have other stuff, we want to do it squeezes us to one day.

Last year we did both on different days and my travel party of 5 included 4 non-eaters. This year it will be only 3 with 2 non-eaters. We never get value at buffets or all you can eat.

 

[WhitneyMB]

At least Ohana and Hoop De Doo are fun. I think we’ve all compromised our eating plans at Disney sometimes for the love of a family member. I hope you all have a blast.

 

[Brian Noble]

For those of you who eat multiple table service meals how much of an hourly gap do you take, and does it negatively impact your park time?

For me, this isn't the right question.

This comes down to something I say a lot: What is the point of going to WDW for vacation? Is it to ride a bunch of rides? Or is it to spend focused time with friends or family without the distractions of the day to day?

It's very tempting to think it is the first thing. After all, tickets are expensive, these attractions are unique, and it makes sense to get as much out of being there as you can! But, it's easy to make that more important than it is.

I find that the better I am at holding the second thing in my head, the more fun my trips end up being. When I am able to think this way, the attractions---and, even the theme parks themselves---become just a part of the stage on which the action happens. I have as many memories doing silly little things that are not at all special to WDW, but that are special to our family.

For example: There is a connecting path between Tomorrowland and Storybook Circus. Many years ago---well before TRON was even an idea, let alone a hole in the ground---we were in MK, it was mid-morning, and we had just completed a rope-drop swing through Tomorrowland. The kids were maybe 7 and 9 or thereabouts and it was maybe 10 AM or so. It was clear that they were overloaded and overstimulated. If i'm being honest, we probably were too. We normally get muffins or pastries after the first hour or so in the park, but this time figured we probably needed to get some protein, so I bought a turkey leg, and we retreated to a couple of benches that were along this path halfway between Tomorrowland and the Train Station.

For whatever reason, that moment---sharing a turkey leg at ten in the morning when we all needed a time out---became a core memory for the four of us. Forevermore, that path is known to my family as "The Turkey Trail." My son hasn't been in the Magic Kingdom for probably ten years, but if he were walking up Main Street right now, and you told him: "Let's take the Turkey Trail," he would know exactly what you meant.

 

[Brian Noble]

We never get value at buffets or all you can eat.

This is another one of those "maybe this is the wrong question" things.

One year I was with a group that was not going to be into sitting on astroturf and waiting for a good spot for HEA, so I splurged on one of the dessert parties. Was it worth it? Not if I measure it by how much we ate or drank---especially because I'm sober and one of the others was under age.

But it made it easy for us to all enjoy the fireworks together in a low-stress way, so it was worth every penny.

 

[WinterSolider]

It's smart to get feedback from other families but I think the most important thing when it comes to these types of decisions is to know YOUR family in particular, and the nuances that makes you guys tick and enjoy the time you spend together.

For us, we absolutely thrive with an early-bed, early-rise schedule on vacation. My kids do best when they're asleep by 8:00, which usually means back in the room for showers and pajamas by 7:00, which cascades down the rest of our day to mean early dinner, early lunch, and we're cooking breakfast in our room before 6am most days. Because of all of that, there just aren't enough hours in the day where we want to commit another 90 minutes to a sit-down meal outside of one per day, at most.

This is another one of those "maybe this is the wrong question" things.

One year I was with a group that was not going to be into sitting on astroturf and waiting for a good spot for HEA, so I splurged on one of the dessert parties. Was it worth it? Not if I measure it by how much we ate or drank---especially because I'm sober and one of the others was under age.

But it made it easy for us to all enjoy the fireworks together in a low-stress way, so it was worth every penny.

Sure but this is another "know thyself" kind of thing. Some people absolutely will not be able to relax in a low-stress way if they're constantly thinking about the price they paid for an experience relative to the tangible value of what they received, no matter how much they try to talk themselves into it. If someone is neurotic about the idea of "wasting money," I would recommend they skip such experiences because that anxiety is something they're unlikely to be able to escape.

I share no such compunction.

 

[Brian Noble]

I would argue that such perspectives needn't be fixed. At least, I have observed that they have not been for me----and about things much more important than "is this buffet a good value?".

But that's getting awfully off-topic for a WDW restaurant thread.

 

[NickC]

For me, this isn't the right question.

This comes down to something I say a lot: What is the point of going to WDW for vacation? Is it to ride a bunch of rides? Or is it to spend focused time with friends or family without the distractions of the day to day?

It's very tempting to think it is the first thing. After all, tickets are expensive, these attractions are unique, and it makes sense to get as much out of being there as you can! But, it's easy to make that more important than it is.

I find that the better I am at holding the second thing in my head, the more fun my trips end up being. When I am able to think this way, the attractions---and, even the theme parks themselves---become just a part of the stage on which the action happens. I have as many memories doing silly little things that are not at all special to WDW, but that are special to our family.

For example: There is a connecting path between Tomorrowland and Storybook Circus. Many years ago---well before TRON was even an idea, let alone a hole in the ground---we were in MK, it was mid-morning, and we had just completed a rope-drop swing through Tomorrowland. The kids were maybe 7 and 9 or thereabouts and it was maybe 10 AM or so. It was clear that they were overloaded and overstimulated. If i'm being honest, we probably were too. We normally get muffins or pastries after the first hour or so in the park, but this time figured we probably needed to get some protein, so I bought a turkey leg, and we retreated to a couple of benches that were along this path halfway between Tomorrowland and the Train Station.

For whatever reason, that moment---sharing a turkey leg at ten in the morning when we all needed a time out---became a core memory for the four of us. Forevermore, that path is known to my family as "The Turkey Trail." My son hasn't been in the Magic Kingdom for probably ten years, but if he were walking up Main Street right now, and you told him: "Let's take the Turkey Trail," he would know exactly what you meant.

This sounds like something that I would post. I've been saying for years that we make more memories in the mundane things like riding the Monorail or waiting in line.
We were on the Monorail one evening and it was pretty full. When it stopped at the Contemporary, there was a woman with a stroller. As she was getting off, the doors started to close. So, I reached out my hand and held the door from closing. That was maybe 10 years ago and we still tell the embellished story of how I 'saved that kid's life on the Monorail that one day' and that I'm a hero, but I don't do it for recognition.
We have tons of stories like that. I couldn't tell you the plot to RotR though. Even after riding it numerous times.

 

[NickC]

A few restaurant specific memories...
My son got called up to be part of the ending of HDDR. But the real memory of that day was when we saw a selfie that I took of me and my wife waiting to get in. It's a great picture of us smiling, and just barely noticeable off to the side, slightly cut off of the camera frame, is my daughters scrunched up face and my son's hand poking at her. I love that picture to this day. It captured the essence of the time.
Or the time at Beaches and Cream when we told the kids that you "had to win" the Kitchen Sink sundae, you couldn't just buy it. And their faces every time one came out. Luckily, we did 'win' one that day.

 

[Brian Noble]

I couldn't tell you the plot to RotR though.

I think Something Goes Terribly Wrong.

I'm not sure though.