Tusker House for dinner or not?

[Alice777]

My grown up son and I said "No" to character meals but I changed my mind and made reservation for Garden Grill. I felt we needed at least one character meal. I chose Garden Grill because I read most of the seating is booths so it's kind of "private" when characters visit.

Now after reading so much about Tusker House, I'm thinking we should do Tusker House too since we are going to be at AK for couple of days but I am having little doubts.

1. How crazy is it during dinner? We are not asking for "quiet" dinner but when the character visit us, I would like to able to take pictures without any interruptions from "other guests". Do we get our "private" moments or are there "followers" of the characters?

2. We also have ADR at Boma, and I think I read food is similar to Tusker house? I've looked at both menu and it doesn't look like it. What do you guys think?

3. Is dinner food same every night or do they rotate like Boma?

4. If reservation is at 6:55 pm and park closes at 7 pm, will they still have "fresh" food or will they stop bringing out foods?


Thank you

 

[goofyintoronto]

My grown up son and I said "No" to character meals but I changed my mind and made reservation for Garden Grill. I felt we needed at least one character meal. I chose Garden Grill because I read most of the seating is booths so it's kind of "private" when characters visit.

Now after reading so much about Tusker House, I'm thinking we should do Tusker House too since we are going to be at AK for couple of days but I am having little doubts.

1. How crazy is it during dinner? We are not asking for "quiet" dinner but when the character visit us, I would like to able to take pictures without any interruptions from "other guests". Do we get our "private" moments or are there "followers" of the characters?

2. We also have ADR at Boma, and I think I read food is similar to Tusker house? I've looked at both menu and it doesn't look like it. What do you guys think?

3. Is dinner food same every night or do they rotate like Boma?

4. If reservation is at 6:55 pm and park closes at 7 pm, will they still have "fresh" food or will they stop bringing out foods?


Thank you

Not sure how private you would like it....but at Tusker its like any other character meal. They come to your table, you take pics, sign autographs, then they move on. I've never had another family intruding on my time with the characters, ever. So i wouldnt worry about that.

From what I heard, they keep the food plentiful and fresh even towards closing time. You will not be scraping the bottom of the barrel, dont worry.

 

[isabellea]

TH is the ONLY dinner my family requests every visit. We love it! The characters are awesome and we never had issues with other guests. We often get more than 1 visit from some characters (usually Daisy). Food is good and fresh and the parade is cute for young kids.

 

[ebradley23]

We just did TH for dinner for the first time this month. We've always done breakfast before. The food was good. Definitely not your typical buffet fare which was nice. The character interaction isn't as private as GG, but I've never been interrupted before either. We actually had multiple visits from a couple of characters at TH because it wasn't very busy when we were there (5:30 pm ressie) which was a first. Breakfast was always much more hectic feeling than dinner.

 

[shortnsassy730]

Tusker House is my favorite character meal on property. The food is much better than Garden Grill. To me Garden Grill is very cafeteria like quality. The character interaction is quite good at Garden Grill at though.

 

[Alice777]

Thank you everyone.

Do you guys think Tusker House food is almost same as Boma's?

 

[Hopefully]

Its similar but not the same. There are enough differences to make it so that folks do do both.
I do have one thought though. You stated that you and your adult son decided together to not do character meals. Now this will be your second one. Is he on board with this change in your agreed upon choices?
I know my adult son does not want to do Tusker House because of the characters at dinner. So we chose other places.

 

[kwdw]

Two very different experiences - and food choices!

I've been to Garden Grill as an adult couple for dinner - and we thought the food was great. Salad fresh, bread warm and yummy, beef flavorful. But the food is totally American Classic. Because of the booths - it feels a bit more private in nature. And because it's family style - they bring the food to your table. YOu can ask for more of something. It's definitely quieter than TH.

Tusker House - definitely yummy food! African influences - but not as strongly as Boma. Boma's food is better, in comparison, but I do really like TH, too. Here - it's the standard buffet where you have to go get your food, so that adds more chaos to the meal than you would find at GG. TH has only tables, they are relatively close together, and there's few "soft furnishings" in the rooms - so its noisy - especially at the middle of the meal time. It's more hustle and bustle like than GG. But if you are looking for non-average food - the food is a reason to come here.

As for the character experience - I've only been to GG once - and we had great interactions as a couple with the characters. I've been to TH 4 times now - and I can rank two of the character experiences as great, one as bad and one average. The bad one was simply because they didn't take the time to get my 3.5 yo niece to warm up to them. They just didn't seem to try that day. The average one was lunch as an adult couple - and I think they just wanted to fly by us. But one of the great times, I was solo and the other great time was with my niece/SIL when my niece was about 16-17 months.

 

[Alice777]

Its similar but not the same. There are enough differences to make it so that folks do do both.
I do have one thought though. You stated that you and your adult son decided together to not do character meals. Now this will be your second one. Is he on board with this change in your agreed upon choices?
I know my adult son does not want to do Tusker House because of the characters at dinner. So we chose other places.

We are doing 2 ADRs a day (all my choices) LOL! He is all in for new food experiences. I've asked him and he said "whatever you want" so I think we'll be okay. Eventhough he goes to Disneyland almost every week, I don't think he has ever done character meals so it'll be new experience for him! LOL!

It's funny but I was also against character meeting...thought its embarrassing for adults but we end up meeting few in April and we actually had fun. Lots of good photos and since I'm into scrapbooking, pics with character are great!

 

[bumbershoot]

1. How crazy is it during dinner? We are not asking for "quiet" dinner but when the character visit us, I would like to able to take pictures without any interruptions from "other guests". Do we get our "private" moments or are there "followers" of the characters?

I have never had followers at character meals, except for the occasional excited little kid who is quickly wrangled by a parent. Not sure where the concern over that is coming from.

I would eat at Tusker in a heartbeat, and if it were just me I would just tell the CM that I don't want characters.

 

[zorro77]

We like lunch but its always way to loud to even talk.