We ate breakfast in the room- brought cereal, breakfast bars, and stopped and got apples, bananas and yogurt at the store. I also brought a whole suitcase full of crackers, pringles, cookies, fruit snacks, trail mix, etc. I bought a case of bottled water at Publix on the way into the World & that saved us a ton of $$. Bottled H2O is $2.50 a pop at the parks. I often had our two boys (ages 2 & 5) share an adult's fast food meal- cheaper than two kids meals. Depending on the kid's meal, sometimes they shared that and then picked off our plates if they were still hungry. Our 2 year old was free at the buffets, so at Chef Mickey's, Cape May Cafe, 'Ohana & Whispering Canyon (I got the all you can eat skillet) he pigged out and it was free! And like you are planning, we ate about 1/2 of our dinners just at Counter Service, so it wasn't as $$. And, a few days we just shared a lunch or got snacks and then had a huge dinner (Cape May, Ohana, etc). In hindsight, DH and I probably could have shared several meals and saved a few more $$, but we were very go-go-go and by the time dinner rolled around I was STARVING and didn't want to share! LOL!
Definitely check out the meal combo at Animal Kingdom- we weren't able to do it cause my group was so hungry we got stir fry at just some random window, but at Tusker House, Pizzafari and the BBQ place (And maybe one other place I am forgetting) for $12 you get your lunch, a soda, and then two vouchers- one for another bottled soda/water and one for either a popcorn or an ice cream! Not bad considering most counter service meals are about $10-11 for the entree and the soda.
PS- I lived in San Jose the majority of my life---where abouts do you live? I lived in the Willow Glen area.
