One kid's meal, two plates?

[GusGush]

This may help us decide to do the Dining Plan or not:

1.) WITHOUT the dining plan, if I'm at a table-service restaurant and I order a kid's meal and ask for an extra plate...because I intend to split the kid's meal between my three-year-old and four-year-old...will there be any sort of "sharing fee" or "extra-plate fee"?

Many times, with two preschoolers, one kid's meal is plenty for both. No server will look askance if I just order one meal to split and ask for an extra plate, right?

2.) Because I am coming to understand that you cannot share on the dining plan. We will all be in the same room, so I understand that everyone in our party (daddy, daughter, son, and me) will need to sign on, if we get it. Everyone served. No sharing.

Right?

Thanks!

Next trip: Wilderness Lodge November 7th

 

[Allison]

Everyone in the room must be on the same plan so you will be buying it for the 4 people in your family.

You may be allowed to share but then you would end up with extra credits you paid for anyway.

 

[jjohnson]

The kids meals at Disney are nothing like the ones in the "real world" I think most of them are small.

 

[n2mm]

The kids meals at Disney are nothing like the ones in the "real world" I think most of them are small.

I was just going to post this too. We just returned and my granddaughter (3 yo) had no problem eating her TS kids meal by herself. Actually with a 3 yo and 1 yo, we had to buy both of them meals. We got the 3 yo the regular TS kids meal with chix soup appetizer and ice cream desert and she ate the whole meal at every sitting -- and she's not a big eater at all. For the 1yo we bought a la cart items, generally mac and cheese, or beefaroni, (no appet/no desert) and she too ate the entire portion. OP, you will find out after your first meal how small it is. The soup is a small tea cup of mostly broth and a couple of noodles. My GD generally got the pizza which is the size of a pizza hut personal pizza. As for the CS, 4 nuggets and some fries, again we had to buy 2 meals for CS too. Hopefully you plan to buy both kids their own ice cream desert or give them your desert, because 2 kids trying to split one scoop of ice cream just is not going to happen. Most likely you'll find that using both of the kids TS credits is barely enough. Buffets will be the best use for kids TS credits, IMHO.

 

[ElizabethB]

We just returned, too. My 4-year-old niece couldn't begin to eat all the food in a kid's meal. Every meal seemed to come with a main course and two sides (in the Mickey Ears of the plate). She wasted a lot of food.

Having said that, you'll have to purchase the dining plan for both your three-year-old and your four-year-old if you decide to do the dining plan.

So, there is no benefit whatsoever in having them share (other than the fact that you'll have a slightly smaller carbon footprint that way!).

 

[ExtinctDino]

We have shared both adult and kid's meals on the DDP. There is a benefit to sharing, because you save credits for more meals. We've never left a restaurant hungry by splitting meals. There's always been enough food. But that won't work for every family.

We've never been charged a plate fee or other sharing fee. Sometimes when sharing a kid's meal, the server has even been nice enough to bring the kid's dessert out in 2 dishes without being asked.

 

[alison91501]

How much does a kids meal cost usually if you have to pay OP?

 

[Disneynutbsv]

How much does a kids meal cost usually if you have to pay OP?

I suggest going to www.allearsnet.com and going to the dining section you can see the menus of what each place has and the cost for each as well. For example at Cosmic Rays (a counter service) the approximate cost is $4.49 + tax.

For a Tableservice say at Boma, kids age 3-9 can eat for 12.99...

 

[DCDisney]

At TS places with menu's the kids meals are $8 with the tax included. The kids meals are not like you get at regular casual places with 3 big chicken strips. They come with 4 nuggets or 1 chicken leg or 4 small slices of grilled chicken. Yes, the bags of carrots and carrot/celery app are big enough to share but the protein part of the meal is typically really small. Someone else mentioned about the dessert and drink too. For CS meals it is easy to share because we had extras of adult food (assuming your kids will eat what you like to eat). With the extra credits we just bought CS breakfast to share 1 of the days which was nice. Even now at 9 and 11 my kids can share 1 chicken tender kids meal at most casual places but at WDW when they were preschoolers there was no way they could have shared 1 kids meal.

 

[robinbutterfly]

This may help us decide to do the Dining Plan or not:

1.) WITHOUT the dining plan, if I'm at a table-service restaurant and I order a kid's meal and ask for an extra plate...because I intend to split the kid's meal between my three-year-old and four-year-old...will there be any sort of "sharing fee" or "extra-plate fee"?

Many times, with two preschoolers, one kid's meal is plenty for both. No server will look askance if I just order one meal to split and ask for an extra plate, right?

2.) Because I am coming to understand that you cannot share on the dining plan. We will all be in the same room, so I understand that everyone in our party (daddy, daughter, son, and me) will need to sign on, if we get it. Everyone served. No sharing.

Right?

Thanks!

Next trip: Wilderness Lodge November 7th

I have a 3 and 4 year old as well and we are going in December. I totally agree with you that they can split a kids meal. HOWEVER... we did do the dining plan because almost all the meals are buffets where each kid has to have their own meal anyway. The dining plan was cheaper for us this way. If you do not intend on doing many character meals which are mainly buffets, then maybe the dining plan is not the best option for you.

 

[perturbatrix]

We just got back and I'd say that my 4 (almost 5) y.o. twins could have easily shared every meal. We had the DxDP so they always got the complete meal (mickey plate) or an appetizer, entree, and dessert. We had dinner at Narcoosee's and DS plate was overflowing with chicken nuggets. DD got fish at Citricos and Tony's and both times the portion was fairly large. Spaghetti and meatballs and Tony's had 1 meatball. The beef and macaroni meal was also a lot of food. My kids could have split that with some leftover. The pizza is the size of a personal pan pizza but even then my kids who normally devour pizza ate only about 1/2. I guess it depends on your kids. I would consider mine good eaters but between the excitement, snacks, exhaustion, and nibbling from our plates they would be classified as very poor eaters on this trip. I also wasn't fond of the limited selection in the kids meals. I wished they could have ordered 1 adult entree and split it to have better quality food and a wider variety.