We are going to WDW in Dec and my travel agent wants to sell me the Dining plan for myself my wife and three kids ages 7, 5 and 1. ; The one year old is free I know, but I don't know if my 7 and 5 year old will eat enough to make this worth while. ; What do you think???
Hmm... tough call. ; I think it sort of depends on what KIND of dining you plan on doing and what kind of plan you'd be considering. If you're going with the basic plan, you'll still be paying for one meal per day (probably breakfast). ; And you also get one 'snack' per day (that's a lot of snacking, I think, considering the size of meals). You'd know best how much food your kids would eat... and how they'd eat it. ; If they're more of the 'portable food' kind of kids, instead of the '3 square meals' kind of eaters, then you might be better off making an off-site trip to a grocery store and stocking up on portable nibbles and just budgeting for limited meals. ; If they're going to want to do Character Dining, or you're going to want room-service (not including pizza), then you have to consider that you'll use up more of your food allotments booking those (or 'dinner show' options). For us, it wasn't worth it. ; But we had also booked a concierge level room, which comes with a certain amount of food availability. ; I think we actually had a proper lunch maybe twice in our week at WDW... apart from that we stocked up on items available at breakfast (concierge level stays include, generally, breakfast offerings like cereal, donuts, coffee, tea, juices, fruit etc. and afternoon snacks. ; Depending on the hotel, it may also include pre-dinner appetizers and after-dinner desserts and sometimes afternoon tea) and then grabbed something from the afternoon snacks to tide us over 'til dinnertime. ; But we're two adults with very strange eating habits, so we know it's not for everyone. I've seen some 7 year-olds who can put away almost as much as an adult in terms of things like counter-service combos... but in other cases, a 7- and 5- year-old could probably split one counter service combo and still be quite happily full. I'd suggest reading about the meal plans and what they include, and then think about your family (you know you & yours best). ; Sean and Minnie have put together a decent list of restaurants at the various parks and how much you can expect a meal to cost per person at each of them as well as what kind of service and food offerings they each have. ; There are also resort restaraunts to consider, and generally each resort has one restaurant in each category (counter, moderate table service, and then a slightly pricier option that's a little fancier).
So Sean and I did a bit of investigating and found out that everyone that is registered in the room will have to get the meal plan if you choose to go that way with your tickets. ; So you really can't cheat the system by getting only two dining meal plans for you and your wife and not for the kids. I would agree with what Treelo said, you do know how much your kids will eat. ; If you don't go Disney Dining Plan you could probably save some money by splitting portions of food with you kids. ; I find when I go down there and all I eat is the counter service meals (so I can't comment on portions on a lot of the sit down restaurants), I still can't eat everything and half goes to waste. ; It is too hot and too exciting to be eating a whole lot of food anyways. ; The best tip is to plan your meals ahead of time if you can. ; You should make reservations at restaurants that offer both fun and good food. ; Places like Liberty Tree Tavern, Tony's Town Square, Garden Grill, Mamma Melrose & 50's Prime Time Cafe are just some of the places that offer excellent food for the adults but are loads of fun for the kids (Some of these have characters).
If you want some more information on Disney Dining, Check out our NEW (god i am so happy to say that) http://disneymagic.ca/dinning.html section with detailed information on each park and what they offer.
Geat insight!!! ; Thanks Sean and Minnie. By the time we go back, the dining plan might be worth it. ; Right now, with a 6-year old (4 when we were there last time) it was defintely good to share!!
