On Dining Plan, do you spend additional money on food?

[pixistix]

This will be our first experience with the free dining plan. It certainly sounds like we'll have enough food but I was wondering if you spend additional money on food/snacks/drinks. I'm trying to figure out how much money to take along. TIA.

 

[beattyfamily]

I did spend a bit extra on things like water, ice cream, cookies, muffins so basically the snacks.

Also, we went one sit down (TS) meal over what the plan covers.

 

[WantToGoNow]

Since we are planning to use our snacks credits for actual snacks, we will need to buy waters. Also, there are a few of our restaurant choices where I will need to buy meals for my dd2 (she will be 3 weeks shy of 3 and eats more than ds5). We are also planning to pay for one character breakfast since we have 9 ADR's for a 8 night stay. We figured the character breakfast is probably the cheapest of our choices.

 

[minnie61650]

The DDP allows for 1 CS meal 1 TS meal and 1 snack a day.

We would buy a quick grab and go for breakfast most days and then head to the parks.

Since we do not usually have a snack in the day I would use my snack credit for bottled water or Iced tea.
Then we used our CS and TS for our dinners and lunch.

So I would say if you are planning on eating 3 meals a day than plan on paying for 1 meal a day. If you choose to use your snack credit for a "munchie" than you may want some money for extra drinks.


Enjoy the DDP!

 

[The Sweetness]

I imagine I will be paying for 1CS a day, and lots of extra drinks. Maybe some of the specialty drinks in TS

 

[brat5063]

This will be our first time on the plan too. We have 8 ADRs and staying 7 nights, so I am planning on paying OOP for our character breakfast. We will probably pay OOP for most our breakfasts, eat in early lunch at a CS and then are eating most TS dinners around 5ish.

 

[ReneeA]

We spent approximately $100 on food/drink items not covered on the DDP. We each had an alcoholic drink on occasion, and last August there weren't many items covered under the snack credit. I plan to spend less OOP this time as most of the snacks we paid cash for are now covered under the DDP.

 

[n2mm]

We like to eat breakfast at restraurants, so yes, we pay OOP for breakfast. Especially when staying at the WL. We are DVC members, so do often have extra food in our frig. We also pay for adult beverages too. We visit the grocery store and buy water and beer and fruit and breakfast foods.

 

[aubriee]

We used the dining plan last Sept and the only things extra we bought were kaki gori's in Japan, a chocolate covered cashew cluster in Germany, and Dole Whip floats at MK. (Dole whip floats are now included on the DDP ). Oh, and we also bought a couple of adult beverages.

This past May the only money we spent was for a kaki gori in Japan again and for a pint of milk at the food court.

In Sept we are paying OOP for two dinner shows (Spirit of Aloha Luau and HDDR) as well as five extra TS meals (my mom has to eat breakfast and prefers TS). I also plan to pay OOP for some sushi at Tempanyaki and my ex will be buying a few adult beverages. Of course I'll also have to buy at least one kaki gori again. If we are allowed to share we may have two less TS to pay OOP for.

 

[kcashner]

I spent a grand total of $3 on additional food on our last trip--this for 1/2 gallon of milk. We frequently used snack credits for breakfasts (a whole box of donuts or a quart of milk was available as a snack credit). We also did the mug thing...so I guess that counts as $20 on food (DVC was having a discount so the mugs were only $10 each). I did bring along a box of DD's favorite cereal (which isn't sold at WDW).

We ended up with way more food than we needed on the plan. We typically split CS lunch...more than 1/2 the time anyhow. We didn't eat a lot of snacks in the parks, but did use them elsewhere. We got CS "to go" from the resort to eat at the airport!

 

[sorul82?]

Yes, we will spend some money oop. Mostly on water!

 

[Tam1067]

We did spend extra money on breakfast items like muffins and cold cereal at the hotel. I ordered bottles of water from Garden Grocer to save there (that was the best thing I did by the way). We also paid OOP for one TS lunch when the kids were all wiped out from MK and we didn't feel like dealing with the madness over there--we stopped at Kona and spent about $50 for lunch.

 

[siestakeys04]

I will be spending on some character breakfast and trying to see if myself and 10yr old dd can split my meal and use her ts credit for her for a character breakfast.

 

[Melee's Mom]

Last year when the first free dining plan was introduced, DH and I quickly jumped in and reserved the package. With Disboards helps, I know what restaurant we like. With a 7 days package, we ate for breakfast and dinner at TS (with DD only 1.5 years old) it's easy for us to get her to go with us but since she is 1 there is no credit for her and we will need pay OOP. Here are what we ate and total OOP close to $400. We could spent more if we didn't have to cacel some dinner plans.

Day 1 -
Lunch -Chef De France - OOP
Dinner - Le Ceillier - 2 TS

Day 2 -
BK - CRT - OOP
Lunch -Columbia Harbor House - 2 CS
Dinner - California Grill - 4 TS

Day 3 -
BK - Boma - OOP
Lunch -Tusker House - 2 CS, Kid meal - OOP
Dinner - POR foodcourt - 2 CS, Kid meal - OOP
(had adrs at Ohana but baby was tired so we cancel the adr)

Day 4 -
BK - ABC commisary - 2 CS, kid meal- OOP
Lunch - Brown Derby - 4 TS
Dinner - POR food court - 2 CS, kis meal -OOP
(had adrs at 1900 park fare but baby is tired "again")

Day 5 -
BK - Crystal Palace - OOP
Lunch - Too full from breakfast
Dinner - POR food court - 2 CS, kid meal - OOP
(had adrs to eat at castle but you know the pattern, baby
tired "again" but I did call ahead to cancel)

Day 6 - Anniversary day & MNNSHP

BK - 1900 park fare - OOP (Marry poppin save the day!)
Baby saw pooh and wanted to go in while we are waiting to be called, MP saw it and "used her magic" to get us in within seconds!

Lunch - too full from breakfast
Dinner - Citrico - 4TS

Day 7 - Used all DDP Credit

All the snack points are for water and we need the 12 waters beside the drink from the TS/CS places.

To sum up that we ate well (use all our TS credits for signature restaurant) and paid OOP for breakfast charactor dinning. It's so easy to spent $200 plus for DH and I in NY for one dinner so extra $400 for 7 days for feed all 3 of us were great!

Enjoy and eat well

 

[Nancyg56]

We did spend money OOP because we chose to go to a 2 TS restaurant, an extra breakfast, and used a TS at lunchtime at CRT, so we needed o pay OOP for dinner that evening. We also forgot we had snack credits and bought some. This August I have another 2 TS meal, and am paying OOP for Mickeys BBQ, as well as a character breakfast. Still a bargain for us.

 

[the Fidge]

Happily I can say not a dime! So glad I did and I have a DH and DS that are not lightweight eaters! I even had extra credits the day we left to get lunches and snacks to go! Who could ask for more! The great thing was I did not have to concern myself with the budget and got sit back and enjoy without my calculator in my head ringing up at every meal!

 

[Mariposa]

We spent a little OOP on ou last trip (just on snacks that weren't covered then, mainly), but we'll be doing 2 character breakfasts OOP on this trip as we have too many meals planned. Luckily, all our snacks will at least be covered this trip (and we'll be bringing water down with us), so that's a little saved, I guess.

 

[dumbotink'smom]

My family really enjoys eating well so based on our dining choices we will spend about 200.00 on meals not covered by the plan. However, we are eating at Flying Fish, Artist's Point and CRT which are all 2 point options. I did not factor in extra drinks but doubt we will need many since we are going in Nov and I plan on bringing some breakfast foods along to eat in the room before hitting the parks.

 

[littleelvis]

We also spent a little oop but again that's when the snack plan was not as good as now. But we also spent a little oop on meals because of some meals being 2 ts credits. All and all the ddp is so worth the money.

 

[bluejasmine]

We bought a light breakfast each morning, bagels or pastries used refillable mugs. I didnt pay for drinks if we didnt use a snack credit we got ice water at CS places..