WDW Daily News

The Disney quick-service dining plan can be a great money-saver… if you know how to use your credits to the most advantage. Here are some helpful hints to help you make the most of your quick-service dining plan.

Remember that opting for quick-service doesn’t mean not getting great experiences. Although quick-service dining can get a bad rap for having “repetitive” food choices or only serving “fast food,” keep in mind that this is not true at all. Many quick-service locations offer unusual options and amazing theming. For example, if you want to dine at the famous Beast’s castle, you can use a meal credit for lunch at the Be Our Guest restaurant in Magic Kingdom. There, you can eat uncommon entrees like Braised Pork Coq Au Vin Style or Quinoa Salad while dining in the forbidden West Wing or the grand ballroom. At the Tangierine Café in the Morocco pavilion in Epcot, you can sample traditional Moroccan cuisine such as the Shawarma Lamb Platter or the Mediterranean Falafel Wrap. A number of other locations offer cuisine that is a far cry from the regular hamburger and French fries, which is what many people think most quick-service locations offer.

Don’t waste your snack credits! A bottle of water might sound enjoyable, but would you rather use a whole snack credit on that or a huge caramel apple from the Confectionary? Instead, buy a bottle of water at the beginning of the trip (or bring your own from home) and refill using water fountains throughout the parks. You might be surprised to see how many delicious food items are included under the snack credit, so keep an eye out for those little purple DDP symbols.

Check to see which restaurants get you more food. While all quick-service lunch/dinner meals include an entrée, dessert, and non-alcoholic beverage, some locations allow you to get more bang for your buck. For example, a meal credit at the Kringla Bakeri og Kafe in the Norway pavilion in Epcot includes a sandwich, a salad or fruit cup, a Norwegian dessert, and a choice of beverage (which includes a bottle of Voss Artesian Water… fancy!), while other locations may only offer an entrée, a dessert, and a beverage.

Remember that you can use your meal credits whenever you want during your vacation. Just because you are given an allowance of two meals and one snack per day doesn’t mean that you have to use those three credits at the same times every day. For example, if you would rather use a snack credit to get a pastry for breakfast and save the two meal credits for lunch and dinner, that’s no problem. Or if you don’t use a snack credit one day, that just means that you have one extra snack credit that can be used later in the trip. Almost everything can be fitted to your family’s needs!

A few quick-service locations don’t offer kid’s menus, so they can order any entrée on the menu. Although the kid’s meals with some quick-service locations may be limited, a few select locations don’t offer a children’s menu so kids are allowed to order off of the “adult” menu. These restaurants include Casey’s Corner and the Lunching Pad in Magic Kingdom, Yorkshire County Fish Shop in the Great Britain pavilion in Epcot, Min and Bill’s Dockside Diner in Hollywood Studios, and Dino Diner in Animal Kingdom.

The quick-service dining plan offers some amazing deals and cuisine for you and your family to sample. So go on — give it a try! You might be surprised at how pleased you are with the end result.

During my family’s recent trip to Disney World over the Memorial Day weekend, two special events brought even more excitement and energy to the parks than usual. Not only were we able to participate in the Rock Your Disney Side 24-hour event in the Magic Kingdom, we also headed over to Hollywood Studios for Star Wars Weekends. A common denominator in the palpable feeling of excitement at the two parks was the presence of characters.

Characters were everywhere!!

Park goers showed their Disney side by showing their passion for characters in a couple ways. First of all, many, many people dressed up as characters at both events. The Magic Kingdom was full of guests dressed as princesses, fairies, pirates, monsters, and even the fearsome Maleficent. It was great fun to wait in line for our first ever ride on the Seven Dwarfs Mine Train with a young girl dressed as Tinker Bell, whose wings tried to take flight each time we passed under the thoughtfully mounted fans (it was hot that day!!) above the queue.
In Hollywood Studios, guests were dressed up as their favorite Star Wars characters from both the light and dark sides of the force, and of course there were many Disney cast members perfectly portraying characters such as Anakin Skywalker and Darth Maul. The biggest gathering of characters at the Studios took place during the Legends of the Force Motorcade, which included not only characters such as Disney’s Jedi Mickey and Darth Vader Goofy but also numerous members of the 501st Legion volunteer organization sharing their incredibly authentic-looking Star Wars costumes with the cheering crowd.

Naturally, when all these characters appear, we all want to meet them, and so another way that park goers showed their fervor for characters was by lining up for meet and greets. At the Magic Kingdom, characters appeared throughout the day as usual, but some of the more unusual ones kept guests invigorated into the wee hours. These included the Bowler Hat Guy, Dr. Facillier, Lotso, the Queen of Hearts, and Hades, among others appearing until after 5 a.m.

At Hollywood Studios, we stood in line to meet an incredible variety of Star Wars characters, including Anakin Skywalker, Darth Maul, Luke Skywalker, Princess Leia, R2-D2, Asajj Ventress, Ahsoka Tano, and Commander Cody. My boys enjoyed trading trinkets with the wandering Jawas and goofing with the wandering Storm Troopers. The rewards of meeting with these characters were huge as they all truly acted their parts. Ventress stared down many a young fan, and Anakin Skywalker chatted with my boys for several minutes by inquiring about the progress of their Jedi training.

By focusing on characters at special events, Disney has hit the jackpot in terms of getting people excited about and involved in the Disney experience. The characters at the Rock Your Disney Side event and Star Wars Weekends prove that characters are a powerful force for uniting park goers in common celebration. It will be no surprise if Disney introduces more events that highlight characters. In fact, the just announced Villains Unleashed event at Hollywood Studios on August 23 is no surprise at all. Get ready for some more character-focused fun!!!