Which character meal is best for us?

[sherry_car]

I know you must answer this question all the time, but I don't seem to be able to find exactly the info I am looking for. We are a family of 5 (Grandparents, parents, and a 4-year-old). With only 1 boy, we are interested in a non-princess character meal, either dinner for our first night (Mon.) or an early breakfast the next morning. Probably Mickey and some group of his friends. Which has the best food? Which has the best interaction with the characters?

Right now I am considering Chef Mickey's (either breakfast or dinner), Donald's Safari Breakfast at Tusker House (we are staying at AKV), Garden Grill (dinner), or Crystal Palace (breakfast or dinner). I don't want it to interfere with early morning touring of the parks, so a breakfast would have to be before the park really opens to everyone else (we are all comfortable with early mornings). I am open to other suggestions as well.

Thanks for the help!

Sherry

 

[Lynn5700]

CP breakfast is very good and so is CM breakfast.

I think your kids will like CM the best if they love Mickey and the gang...the food is sooo good there!

 

[summermac]

I'd probably do one in a park b/c if you do a resort, you'll have one heck of a time making rope drop whereas if you're already in the park........

Disclaimer: I have not dined at any character meal.

But, I'd say Tusker House since you said Mickey, etc.

Other park options:
Crystal Palace (Pooh)
Hollywood & Vine (Playhouse Disney but it appears to be Jojo, Goliath, etc. My 4 year old son isn't into Jojo that much now)
Garden Grill

This might be helpful:
http://allears.net/din/cb.htm

 

[KatMark]

Crystal Palace is our favorite -- especially if you get the 8:05 adr so that you have Main Street basically to yourself and great photo shots of the castle. However, this is NOT Mickey, but Pooh, Tigger, Eeyore and Piglet. We love the puffed french toast and potato casserole.

Our next favorite would be Cape May Cafe with Minnie, Goofy and Donald or Chef Mickey's with Mickey, Minnie, Donald, Goofy and Pluto.

We've never done the one at the Animal Kingdom (it is relatively new) and we've not done the one at the Polynesian (Ohanas) since it changed over from Minnie, Goofy, Pluto and Chip and Dale and to family style (we don't like Stitch, and we don't think they offer enough variety in the family style as compared to a buffet).

 

[jewelmicky]

Our personal favorite is Ohana's......we are HUGE Stitch fans! And they have the best coffee! The OJ is really good too.....it has mango or something in it.

We also like the Donald Breakfast on our AK day...it's fun to get into the park early and Goofy is always a blast. The food here is not as good tho.

 

[SomDayMyPrnceWillCom]

I think it will depend on which park you plan to do that day.

If you are going to AK - Tusker House is a good option.
If you are going to MK - Crystal Palace would be my first choice, 'Ohana's and Chef Mickey's would be close as both are great.
If you are going to be in Epcot - Garden Grill was a great character interaction when we went and food was good.
1900 Park Fare also has Pooh and Tigger at breakfast but haven't had breakfast there so can't comment

I don't think you can go wrong with any one of those that you choose however.

 

[MHSweb79]

We love the Pooh & Friends breakfast at Crystal Palace, but if your little guy doesn't love Pooh, Tigger, Piglet and/ or Eeyore, then you can't go wrong with Chef Mickey's. You get the classic characters- Mickey, Goofy, Donald, etc. Last time we had Daisy there which was cool. It's very noisy and chaotic, but the food was very good.

Instead of a very early breakfast, you could do morning EMH at the Magic Kingdom and book the last seating for either Crystal Palace or Chef Mickey's. You could certainly get all of Fantasyland done in that time, as well as a headliner or two, before heading over to eat. The advantage of the last seating is that you often get more time with each character as the place clears out.

 

[Pakey]

I think the Tusker House breakfast has the best food by far. We did enjoy Crystal Palace dinner too but the food was not as good.

 

[AMB1]

I agree that the Crystal Palace, Chef Mickey's or Tusker House would all work for a boy. We ate at all three last month. The quality of the food was very similar at all three. As far as character interaction goes, we found Tusker house (for breakfast) rather chaotic. We definitely received more attention from Mickey and his pals at Chef Mickey's rather than at Tusker House.

 

[sherry_car]

I'd probably do one in a park b/c if you do a resort, you'll have one heck of a time making rope drop whereas if you're already in the park........

Disclaimer: I have not dined at any character meal.

But, I'd say Tusker House since you said Mickey, etc.

Other park options:
Crystal Palace (Pooh)
Hollywood & Vine (Playhouse Disney but it appears to be Jojo, Goliath, etc. My 4 year old son isn't into Jojo that much now)
Garden Grill

This might be helpful:
http://allears.net/din/cb.htm

I would never try to make rope drop after a breakfast outside the park - it likely wouldn't work and I'd be stressed trying. That's why I like Crystal Palace or Tusker House for breakfast. My son has shown no interest in Jojo, so I think Hollywood & Vine is out. I only thought of Garden Grill for dinner, but I've heard very mixed reviews of the food.

 

[sherry_car]

Crystal Palace is our favorite -- especially if you get the 8:05 adr so that you have Main Street basically to yourself and great photo shots of the castle. However, this is NOT Mickey, but Pooh, Tigger, Eeyore and Piglet. We love the puffed french toast and potato casserole.

Our next favorite would be Cape May Cafe with Minnie, Goofy and Donald or Chef Mickey's with Mickey, Minnie, Donald, Goofy and Pluto.

Crystal Palace sounds GREAT! My son likes Pooh and Tigger, so that could be a lot of fun. The only problem is he LOVES Mickey, so we'd probably have to do another character meal with Mickey. I don't suppose that is a bad thing though.

 

[Cinderella94]

LOVE Ohanas! I think the idea about getting to CP at 8:05 is a good one. You could also eat early at Chef Mickey's and hop the monorail to MK after.

 

[freewill]

Is the Tusker House character breakfast ultra-popular, meaning how hard is it to get ADRs for?

(sorry for the mini-thread hijacking)

 

[braydensmom]

Hollywood & Vine would be a great idea for a Character Breakfast for your son. I do daycare and have several 4 year olds and they love Little Einsteins, check out my review below

http://www.associatedcontent.com/ar...ollywood_vine_playhouse_breakfast.html?cat=22

 

[Girly_Qs]

Yeah, if you do breakfast I think I'd go with Crystal Palace for the early entrance into the Park myself.

Dinner, I think I'd go with Chef Mickey's - we sometimes like to do that if we aren't doing the Parks on the day we arrive, since it's in the Contemporary (thus doesn't require admission).

 

[sherry_car]

Yeah, if you do breakfast I think I'd go with Crystal Palace for the early entrance into the Park myself.

Dinner, I think I'd go with Chef Mickey's - we sometimes like to do that if we aren't doing the Parks on the day we arrive, since it's in the Contemporary (thus doesn't require admission).

That's what I was thinking, but I hadn't heard of anyone who had done Chef Mickey's for dinner. Is the food good? I'm used to a lot of good sit down restaurants in Houston.

Sherry

 

[sherry_car]

Is the Tusker House character breakfast ultra-popular, meaning how hard is it to get ADRs for?

(sorry for the mini-thread hijacking)

I don't mind my thread being hijacked - I'd like to know too! I have the same question, for Tusker House, Crystal Palace, and Chef Mickey's.

 

[seadd67]

Your going to get a Million diffrent oppions here ,every one finds each place diffrently. For the Breakfast for the Most part there all the same,cooking methods are diffnetly diffrent, now lunch and Dinner they vary but take a look on the menue section here on dis they will give you a good idea of what they have.

 

[lindsmom]

For the Breakfast for the Most part there all the same,

I found Tusker House breakfast food to be very different - somewhat more african themed. But there were still the standards (quiche, sausage, carving stations, waffles, and bagels). But there was bobotie, and a whole bunch of stuff I can't spell or pronounce that was DELICIOUS!

Characters were great @ Tusker House also.

Chef Mickey's dinner was great for our first night arrival - we took a monorail ride to get in the mood for the next day. Food seemed pretty standard, but good.

 

[SGMCO]

Tusker House is very good if you're going to AK.
We Love Ohanas at the Poly and eat there every trip.
Both have very good food and atmosphere.
We've ate at CM before and it seem very noisy (ate dinner)
and the food was not good at all, maybe breakfast is better.
I thought the cost of dinner at CM was outragous and we had
Free Dining plan--If not for FD, It would have cost us $104.00 for 3 of us
and that was 3 years ago--I don't know how much it cost now
but if I weren't on the FD I would have been very upset.