Eats + Treats I | Pre-Trip Report 2014
Home » Everything Disney » Pre-Trip Planning Reports »The Disney Dining Plan – our ADRs!
We are staying onsite this year for the first time ever and we booked Old Key West with the free Disney Dining Plan. After much thought, we decided to upgrade to the Deluxe Dining Plan, as this may well be our only time staying on property and we wanted to make the most of the Disney dining experience – hence the name of this trip report/pre-trip report!
I know people say it’s a lot of food and a lot of credits, but each to their own I always say! We love our food when we go on holiday and pretty much always have a breakfast and a dinner. With my growing boy last trip, we found us ordering quite a few times from counter service places, so I’m confident we’ll be using up most of the credits
As for snack credits, they’re likely to go on bottles of drink and things to bring back home – oh, and cupcakes – lots of cupcakes!
The plan is to have breakfasts as early as possible and dinners as late as possible, giving us enough time to walk off all the food in between! We are also making the most of signature dining (worth 2 points per person) as well as dinner shows (also 2 points) We would also like to try and book in the Tomorrowland Terrace Dessert Party for our last full day at Walt Disney World – I know that’s extra, but hey, it’s our holiday to enjoy ourselves to the max!
This morning was our 180+10 day window to book our ADRs (Advanced Dining Reservations), and I can happily say that we got every single one we wanted! Just a couple more days to book for, although, one of them is a day at Epcot World Showcase where we plan to snack around the world!
We’ve tried to do as many places we haven’t been to before, and we’re really looking forward to trying out the whole Disney caboodle!
Breakfasts:
- The Crystal Palace, Magic Kingdom
- Cape May Cafe, Beach Club
- Chef Mickey’s, Contemporary Resort
- Boma: Flavours of Africa, Animal Kingdom Lodge
- Olivia’s Cafe, Old Key West
- Akershus Royal Banquet, Norway Pavilion, Epcot World Showcase
- Trail’s End, Fort Wilderness
- Cinderella’s Royal Table, Magic Kingdom
- 1900s Park Fare, Grand Floridian
We’ve done Chef Mickey’s before for breakfast, but everything else will be new! We did go to The Crystal Palace in 2013 for lunch.
Lunches:
- Sci-Fi Diner, Disney Hollywood Studio
We’ve only got this one lunch booked – it’s an early 11am reservation. We did want to try out 50s Prime Time and Tusker House (only done breakfast here) but don’t think we’ll fit them in!
Dinners:
- House of Blues, Downtown Disney
- Narcoosee’s, Grand Floridian
- Kouzzina by Cat Cora, Boardwalk
- Flying Fish Cafe, Boardwalk
- Sanaa, Animal Kingdom Kidani Village
- Yachtsman Steakhouse, Yacht Club
- Whispering Canyon Cafe, Wilderness Lodge
- California Grill, Magic Kingdom
- Jiko The Cooking Place, Animal Kingdom Lodge
- Tokyo Dining, Japan Pavilion, Epcot World Showcase
- Be Our Guest, Magic Kingdom
These are all new to us!
Dinner Shows:
- Spirit of Aloha Dinner Show, Polynesian Resort
- Hoop Dee-Doo Musical Revue, Pioneer Hall, Fort Wilderness
- Mickey’s Backyard BBQ, Fort Wilderness
So that’s our dining plan! It’s going to be so weird for us not to be eating off-site, but we’re going to enjoy trying out (and reporting about!) all these restaurants. You know me, so you can expect lots of photos, and I plan to be even better at keeping a track of things in my diary like our first visit.
I’ll be telling you more about each of the restaurants in further posts, so look out for them!
Want to know more about our next trip to Walt Disney World in Florida? Check out the Dine Around Disney 2014, Pre-Trip Report Index
NewMumOnline
February 18, 2014 @ 12:06 pm
Oh my God I don’t know if I could get my head around all of this. Thank God Aaron is only 3 and it’ll be a few years before we go ;-) You sound like a real fan of Disney – I have only been to the Tokyo one myself. Liska xx
Michelle Ordever
February 18, 2014 @ 12:26 pm
It’s a lot to wrap your head around, and admittedly, it’s a lot more regimented planning for us this time because of the dining plan – we want to make the most out of it! Normally I’m a lot more relaxed – we have a rough idea of what parks we want to do and a list of places to eat, but that’s generally it.
LOVE Disney and going to Florida – brings so much happiness to my soul! Would love to visit Japan one day – it’s on my bucket list, how fab that you got to go there xx
Emily
February 17, 2014 @ 3:08 pm
Looks like such an amazing place and I now want to go just to try the cupcakes! Have fun x
Michelle Ordever
February 17, 2014 @ 4:50 pm
I’m collecting cupcakes with snack credits this year!! x
mummyoftwo
February 16, 2014 @ 9:43 pm
Thanks for the info! We are going next Easter so need to start looking into all of this soon!
Michelle Ordever
February 17, 2014 @ 4:51 pm
Easter 2015? You’ve got a while yet, but deffo start thinking about it, especially if you are doing Disney dining – so many places need advance dining reservations, so it’s worth getting them in order for when it’s time to book them!
Jenny
February 16, 2014 @ 8:40 pm
I think I’d be taking a packed lunch but it sounds like you’re having an amazing time planning your holiday. How long are you going for? And what is ADRs?
Michelle Ordever
February 17, 2014 @ 4:52 pm
Often saw people bring their own sarnies into the parks – theme park food is expensive!
I thought I’d mentioned in my post that ADRs are advanced dining reservations, but looks like I forgot to do that – going to add it in now! It’s 2 weeks for us this time!
Cass@TheDiaryofaFrugalFamily
February 16, 2014 @ 2:15 pm
This looks fab – that cake really needs to come to my house ;-)
Michelle Ordever
February 17, 2014 @ 4:52 pm
It was a really yummy cake! Disney do know how to do sweet treats!!
pinkoddy
February 16, 2014 @ 10:47 am
OMG wow I’m so jealous. We need to sort so much with our house before we can start saving for this but def on our list. Have a fantastic time and can’t wait to hear all about the dining experiences.
Michelle Ordever
February 17, 2014 @ 4:53 pm
Now that we’ve been, we just love saving to go back! although, we’re doing home improvements this year, so it is likely to be a few years before we go back again -_- I need to win that lotto!!
Kara
February 16, 2014 @ 8:26 am
Looks better than Disneyland Paris
Michelle Ordever
February 16, 2014 @ 9:19 am
Having been to both, I can say that they are two different experiences. I prefer WDW because of the weather, the number of parks and the magic that I didn’t feel as much in Paris!
Sarah Bailey
February 16, 2014 @ 3:36 am
I am not jealous at all nope, nope – ok I am VERY jealous – have a wonderful time – hoping your blog about it once you have been so I can live the Disney dream through you :) x
Michelle Ordever
February 16, 2014 @ 9:19 am
I’ll definitely be blogging about it! Can’t believe we’re going back again so soon x
Aly
February 16, 2014 @ 12:08 am
We’ve never thought about going to Disney.The idea of not eating any fruit and veg at each meal freaks me out.I don’t think our bodies could cope.
Michelle Ordever
February 16, 2014 @ 9:21 am
Normally we stay in a villa so I stock up on fruit and veggies because I need to have them! But, most, if not all of the restaurants we have eaten in have got vegetables on the menu, and all the buffets do for sure, as well as fruit. But I hear ya on bodies not coping.
Vaichin@RamblingThroughParenth
February 15, 2014 @ 11:52 pm
I think I know who to ask when the time comes for us to book a trip to Disney World! Thanks for sharing x
Michelle Ordever
February 16, 2014 @ 9:22 am
If you ever do, then I’m always happy to help! My friends know that they can come to me for Disney advice! x
Jen Walshaw
February 15, 2014 @ 10:29 pm
We did three weeks back in November and have to say that I would only ever eat a proper meal at Disney. I am not sure we could stay there as my hubby got Mickey’d out!
Michelle Ordever
February 16, 2014 @ 9:23 am
We have previously stayed in a villa and I do love that – having our own space and pool, but, we wanted to give the onsite thing a go a see what it’s like – I think by the end of the two weeks though we’ll have had enough of each other – it’s the sharing of a room that’s going to do my head in – but it just means more time in the parks!! x
Twinsplustwo
February 15, 2014 @ 8:39 pm
We haven’t been back to Disney for some time (EuroDisney) mainly because the two trips we made we were so disappointed with the food. It was either expensive junk food or slightly less expensive junk food, they don’t cater for those with food allergies and the coffee was appalling lol! We did have great meal at the Buffalo Bill show, and the Breakfast with Mickey was ok but by far the best lunch was the takeaway baguette meal from the train station which goes into the park. We worked that out at the end unfortunately!
Michelle Ordever
February 16, 2014 @ 9:25 am
The restaurants in Walt Disney World bend over backwards for food allergies – can’t comment on Paris though – we only ate at Pizza Planet!! All theme park food is expensive, so we factor that in, and if it wasn’t for the free part of the dining plan that we have, we wouldn’t be spending to eat in Disney every night! It is a small fortune! We often eat off site where you can meals at half the cost of at WDW! Going to miss offsite dining this year, we have our favourites!
Twinsplustwo
February 16, 2014 @ 10:10 am
The Americans are usually amazingly good at catering for food allergies :)
Aby Moore
February 15, 2014 @ 8:26 pm
Wow that cupcake looks amazing! I have never seen anything like that before, it’s huge :) x
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