Dining a la Disney..it begins

Planning where to eat and for what meal at Disney is a job in itself. After weeks of research I'm still lost.  Just when I think I've selected enough the right options, I find out I'm doing it all wrong.  Is there really a wrong way to to this? I have no clue.  But here's what I do know:

• we are on a budget aka making a bunch of our own meals
• traveling with a very large group including lots of kids aka picky eaters
• not able to get the Disney Dining Plan  
• we try to do at least one nice sit down meal 

Now.  Where to go from there? www.allears.net is a fantastic resource for researching dining options.  They have every menu (including prices) for every restaurant in all of Walt Disney World. 

Taking into consideration the above criteria, I first checked out all the buffets. Narrowed it down to the parks.  Narrowed again to the parks we would be visiting. Came up with: Crystal Palace (Magic Kingdom), Tusker House (Animal Kingdom), Hollywood & Vine (Hollywood Studios). We won't necessarily be going to each of these places but I figure we'll do at least one. It will really depend on our Itinerary. We could set an early morning ADR (Advanced Dining Reservation) and get into the park a little early (not sure if that's possible in every park, but definitely in MK).  Or we could have a good breakfast at the villa, hit the park early, do the latest morning ADR possible and make it an early lunch which I'm sure we'll be ready for by then, before going home and taking a nap which we'll inevitably need. ::sigh:: See what I mean?? Well at least that's one set of options.

Next, I picked out a quick service/counter service (NOTE: there's no difference between QS and CS!) in each "land" in Magic Kingdom.  Since we'll definitely be spending two days in MK, I thought it prudent to pick a spot in each land because who knows where we'll be when the midday fussies strike and I don't want to have to haul ass across the park with a pack of wild animals hungry kids just because I spent hours  days weeks selecting the perfect place to eat a cheeseburger.  Whether or not the places I picked are the best or even acceptable - I cannot yet attest to.  However they are as follows:

Main Street: Crystal Palace Buffet.  Character meal. Bang for your buck.  Cost is roughly $25/per adult for breakfast, $40 for lunch or dinner. Kids under 3 are free.
Main Street: Casey's Corner. Rumored to have some fantastic hot dogs.
Liberty Square: Columbia Harbor House.  Seem to have some different (and healthy shhh!) sandwich options
Frontierland - Pecos Bill Cafe. Some yummy (hopefully) burgers.
Tomorrowland - Cosmic Rays.  There are a bunch of options here.  Which is important with a big group like ours. 
Fantasyland - Pinocchio's Village Haus.  The idea of flatbread pizza hits my yummy zone.
Adventureland - Tortuga Tavern.  Mexican food. 

There are also lots of food carts scattered about full of things like popcorn and pretzels and turkey legs, but we'll be bringing snacks in an attempt to avoid the potentially expensive snacking.  It seems like it'll cost about $10 per person for the quick service options.

I am as of right now planning to only spend half a day in each of the two other theme parks we'll be visiting so I didn't pick as many options and also relied heavily on reviews I found (also on allears.net, among others) to make my selections.  I picked one buffet and one quick service for each. They are thus:

Animal Kingdom: Tusker House Buffet. Character meal. Cost roughly $27 per adult for breakfast, $32 for dinner. Kids under 3 are free.
Animal Kingdom: Flame Tree BBQ.  Rumored to have some awesome bbq and portions big enough to share.  Cost about $12 per person (unless sharing).
Hollywood Studios: Hollywood & Vine Buffet. Character meal.  Cost roughly $28 per adult for breakfast,  $32 per adult for lunch.  Kids under 3 free.
Hollywood Studios: 50s Prime Time Cafe.  Possible kid-friendly dinner option.  $15-$21 per entree for lunch or dinner.
Hollywood Studios: Pizza Planet. Selected partially because pizza is a crowd pleaser.  Partially because, well, its Pizza Planet! 

Since we'll also be hitting Downtown Disney at some point: 
Earl of Sandwich - $6 for a sandwich, salad or wrap. They also have a kids menu
Wolfgang Puck Express - I'm still confused as to whether this place is a sitdown or a grab n go (maybe both?) but the food is supposed to be fantastic and they have a wide selection.  Cost around $10-15 for breakfast, lunch or dinner. 
T-Rex Cafe Restaurant: Super fun themed sit down. $19-32 an entree.  There's another similar restaurant called the Rainforest Cafe. The disboard-ers were split on which is the best so I picked T-Rex because Dinos rock. duh.

In my opinion, if one is in Orlando, Florida than he or she is in Disney.  No amount of reason will sway this opinion.  Having said that - yes, we are going to be visiting Disney's archnemesis - Universal Studios. ((shocked noise from the crowd)) Now that we've gotten that out of our system, I did the same thing for dining options in the Universal parks.  Naturally, allears.net does not have information on these parks.  The boards for the Disney obsessed (disboards) DOES. After poring over menus and reviews and grilling other dismembers, I came up with this:


Islands of Adventure: Confisco Grill. Sit down with pitchers of sangria. Yes please. $15-20 per entree. 
Islands of Adventure: Thunder Falls.  Rumored to be one of, if not the best, quick service in Universal. Probably sharable portions. $15/pp
Islands of Adventure: Three Broomsticks. Quick service (to my surprise!) I may be splitting up the group by going here but I am a Potterfanatic and WILL NOT leave Orlando without consuming a butterbeer. End of story. Under $15/pp, serves breakfast, lunch and dinner.
Universal Studios Orlando: Finnegan's.  "Authentic" Irish sit down. $15/pp
Universal Studios Orlando: Monster Cafe. Quick service with sharable portions ($11/pp) and hot dog combos ($10/pp).
Universal Studios Orlando: Louie's Italian.  Another disboard recommendation.  You can get whole pizzas here. Though they are a painful $20 a piece. 

Again, all these are not necessarily where you will achieve heaven in your mouth. But they are what I have determined to be the safest bets for a large group, on a budget, traveling with a peck of tots.  I will be SURE to report back after the fact on how will I did.

Other Tips I've Stumbled Upon

• Greengrocer.com.  It's how I plan on stocking up for snacks and bag lunches and crock pot dinners.  You can order all your food online, have it delivered to your resort.  Doesn't really get any easier than that.  The site comes highly recommended by the Disney community. Plus, orders over $200 deliver free.  For a group the size of ours, this will be an easy accomplishment and save us LOTS of money. Hopefully.
• You can bring coolers into the theme parks. In Disney the coolers have to be soft sided and less than 24"x15"x18"h (like my sweet thirtyone bag). In Universal, soft sided coolers under 8.5"x6"x6"h (like a small lunch bag.  I plan on bringing several.)
• If you book a "Fantasmic Dinner Package" at Disney Hollywood Studios you get reserved seating for the Fantasmic show that night.  NOTE: "Reserved" is not the same as "Guaranteed".  You won't have to show up two hours in advance to get seats (which I've heard is the norm) but you do need to be punctual (no later than 15 minutes early). If you're late and the rest of the seats are filled, they'll start filling the reserved seats with the regular old walk ins.
• Disney ADRs can be made 180 days in advance.  This is a tip I've picked up from some hardcore Disney vets.  This is especially true for the high demand meals/times of day.  Not necessary but certainly falls into the better safe than sorry category.  I, for one, will be making my ADRs 180 days out.

Keep reading for another YumPost on recipes I'm collecting for breakfasts/lunches/dinners to make at the villa.