Good morning Liners! Wondering if you could help me with deciding on a character meal. We are NOT doing the meal plan, but would like to do 2 character meals. I think we will do both as breakfasts so that we get the most food for the best price (since we aren’t doing the meal plan). I believe we will do Tusker House for breakfast on the day that we go to the Animal Kingdom, and I had planned on Chef Mickey’s, but it seems like people recommend Garden Grill more often. What do you guys think? I have two boys, 3 years old and 1 year old.
Overall I prefer Garden Grill more but do think Chef Mickey’s is worth doing at least once to experience it. Chef Mickey’s offers the big 4 in a pretty loud environment, but still a fun one with the monorail nearby etc. The breakfast is a solid buffet, but a pretty standard breakfast buffet. My understanding is the food at lunch/dinner isn’t as good, but we have only done breakfast there. Garden Grill is family style instead of buffet which I prefer as I’d rather not get up and carry my food around. Selection is a little more limited at GG, but we liked everything they had and they got us extra of whatever we wanted. GG is a little better character experience as it is less wide open and thus feels more intimate. Love Chip & Dale and they never disappoint.
Given a choice between the two, I would take GG. Add in the benefit that if you book it pre-RD you can slide onto Soarin’ early with no wait and it is a real winner. But Chef Mickey’s is iconic and worth doing sometime…
I’d decide based on the characters first, and the food second.
I think TH and CM have the same characters, and Garden Grill has different ones?
If you and the boys would be happier with the characters at one place over the other, go that route.
Personally, I’d choose TH and GG if it worked out for you, because the food might be a little better than cm’s, and if the chars are the same at TH, then for the price, might as well try for better food.
I don’t hate CM’s, at ALL, either.
So, if the boys would be happy with ANY characters, I think, I’d do TH and GG for the secondary priority of the food.
At 3 and 1 years old, however, I might only do one char meal unless the parents want to do more to get pictures themselves. Just my opinion.
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Love these suggestions! We LOVE breakfast so that’s why we were going to try and do 2 character meals, you make a valid point. We will definitely think this through some more. Thank you so much!
I recommend GG instead of CM for kids those ages. Buffets are hard with two parents and two littles so until my kids could carry their own plates, we minimized buffets if possible. Last trip my two younger kids only request was to meet Chip and Dale so GG it was and we loved it. We prefer to tour for a couple hours at RD and then get the latest breakfast ADR and then start our FPP so we don’t feel rushed to make RD with PPO ADR but that is us.
We enjoyed TH for lunch but have not done breakfast there.
Garden Grille for sure in my opinion - you will get a more intimate experience with the characters whereas at Chef Mickeys the kids at the next table are trying to interact before your own experience is done and it is much, much louder - plus the food is better at Garden Grille too.