Saying "no" to Chef Mickey's?

Thank you to all the Liners for the input. You guys are great! Right now, my head is saying “no”, but my heart is a sucker for the @disney1974 line of:

“they’re only little for so long make them happy and cherish the memories”

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May I make one added suggestion. Maybe you should try Norway and eat there. They have the princesses and it is NOT a buffet. :roll_eyes:

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Well, it is a combo buffet and table service. But definitely a good one to do if you have kids that like princesses.

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Thanks for the suggestion. We are going to CRT for lunch (non-buffet) with the Princesses so I’m not sure that another Princess lunch would be a substitute in her mind for Mickey and the rest of the Fab 5.

Truth—but if you don’t like buffets, maybe try Garden Grill? Mickey, Pluto, chip and dale. Too many things to do at WDW to repeat things you aren’t thrilled about. But I do agree that she’s little and wants to repeat things she knows, not necessarily dying to do Chef Mickey again, although it is quintessential Disney. How is that for not helping??

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A few people have mentioned Garden Grill. A very good idea. The sacrifice on my (and my wife’s part) would be that we will only be in Epcot for 1 meal and we both love La Hacienda de San Angel and San Angel Inn. We will consider it, however, as the trip is really about the kids (not us).

We have set a “rule” wherein we try as many new places as we return to old favorites. That has helped. We haven’t been to CM in a while. Kept putting them off. We are going in April though. They’ve been patient enough.

If you are staying there…before dinner starts the characters all walk down or at least did when we visited… Since I’m guessing she mostly wants it for the characters maybe waving to them outside the restaurant would be fun!

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Easy: “Are you paying? I didn’t think so.”

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What about Tusker House? It is still a buffet, but from what I understand they have a more varied and interesting variety of options, especially if you go at lunch.

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Absolutely. I generally hate buffets, and other than BG, TH is the only one I will go to by choice.

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What’s BG?

No kids, so I can’t comment from the parent perspective, but on the few time we took “family vacations” (none Disney), I was given NO say in what we did or didn’t do - at least not until I was well into my teens. Typical conversation from my childhood:

Me: Can we do (fill in the blank)
Mom: No.
Me: Why not?
Mom: Because I’m your mother and I said no.

I learned at an early age that it was completely pointless to try to push an issue past this universal “ends all discussions” statement.

I suspect I might have been a bit more flexible as a parent, but I would still be the primary decision maker.

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Biergarten in Germany - one of my top favorite restaurants in WDW.

So can you sell me this then?

To my mind German food is sausages and suaerkraut. I struggle to conjur up anything particularly appetising about it, even looking at the menu. Plus I’m going to be sitting on picnic benches outside with a bunch of strangers.

Yet knowing a little about you, I must be missing something. Please enlighten me! :smile:

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I’m mostly German (if you go back several generations). But I have to say, I pretty much despise German food. Okay. Sausages are fine (some of them, anyhow). Beyond that? :stuck_out_tongue_closed_eyes:

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After hearing that line from my parents as a kid, I have told myself that as a parent that I will never use that line with my kids. I have always tried to give them a reason that makes some logical sense. So far, so good, but many years to go. I am fine with saying “It’s not in the budget”, “we are trying new things instead”, “we don’t have time in our schedule”, etc … but I cringe when I hear the “because I said so” type lines and hope to never hear that out of my mouth. But I can see how it happens so no promises :slight_smile:

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I wouldn’t say never. I would say, on occasion, kids need to learn to trust a parent’s wisdom without requiring their parent having to explain everything.

BUT, that trust comes from taking the time to explain the “moral reason why” (as we often say) MOST of the time.

We don’t say, “Because I said so!” very often. But on occasion, we do and expect the kids to be okay with it. And they generally are since most of the time we DON’T say that and actually explain things.

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We have said this. My DH and I do explain things to our children, but sometimes “because I said so” is what they get. This happens when there is a situation that is difficult to explain in kid terms or when they are starting to ask incessant questions just to be annoying (and in that case they laugh when we say it). In terms of Disney, if there is something that is not going to happen, I say no and tell them why. “We are not riding Barnstormer again because your father and I don’t like it” is something we have actually told them while in the parks.

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We’re doing it again this time because DS loves it and it was his number 1 request. All I ate was bread and dessert.

@bswan26 is of German descent so it must be good food, just not to my tastes. The entertainment was a lot of fun though.