Favorite Character Meal for food AND interactions?

[TongaToast21]

Lady Tremaine was SPECTACULAR (step sisters as well) at 1900 PF Dinner.
Garden Grill is great because it is a small restaurant, so you will get more time with characters and also more rounds.
Tusker House overall is probably the best, as the food is really unique and fab 5 are great.
Crystal Palace breakfast is just a classic way to start the day... You can't go wrong with any of them!

 

[4dents]

Our favorite is 1900 Park Fare--good food, nice variety and hilarious character interaction. Cinderella's wicked stepmother's and stepsisters' interaction (dinnertime) is the best; definitely try to engage them in conversation--sassy and memorable, for sure!

 

[Melissa55]

I LOVE the 1900 Park Fare dinner - the stepsisters are hilarious. 1900 Park Fare is also a great breakfast with a more random assortment: Mary Poppins, Alice, Mad Hatter, Tigger, and Pooh.

For multiple princesses: Cinderella's Royal Table.
For classic characters: Hollywood & Vine has some of the coolest outfits (lunch or dinner, breakfast is Disney Jr characters), Tusker House has one of the better buffets

 

[WhoDat09]

Ours is Bon Voyage breakfast for a combination of the food and interactions. I find the food high quality for breakfast and the characters are perfect for my 7 year old(even though she just blushes and nods her head to Flynn Rider and Prince Eric). A close 2nd would be dinner at 1900 Park Fare. The food there, in my opinion, isn't quite as good, but the characters are awesome.

 

[DisGhost]

We've done Garden Grill, which was wonderful and Chip and Dale won over my character-shy 4 year old son. They were so funny, peeping over the booth and playing peekaboo with him. Tusker House was also great, though our second time around was merely ok. Crystal Palace was WONDERFUL, the waitress both times we have gone has been great, and the character interaction was top notch. I have loved Tigger since I was a wee tot and that was the only character I have ever needed a picture with - both times (3 years apart) Tigger gave me a huge hug, and this last Christmas, he tried to steal me away when I told him he was my favorite. Plus, they have ice cream at the breakfast buffet my kids thought that was the best thing ever lol.

We also recently tried Topolino's Terrace breakfast and not only was the food first rate but the character interactions were terrific. Very interactive and since it was my husband's birthday week, they paid special attention to him.

 

[Oneanne]

Also a Garden Grill fan... as you can see in my avatar.

 

[Soulshift]

Tusker House 100% for us

 

[yorkieteacher]

Garden Grill-no contest

 

[rosiebean]

I’ll be the one person to say that of all the character meals we’ve been too, Garden Grill breakfast was the most disappointing for both food (greasy weird tasting sausage, hard and dry eggs) AND character interaction (tepid to be kind). Given the raves the place gets, maybe we hit an off day (our large party and the long booth arrangement also made it really awkward to interact with the characters). But we’re not interested in going back.

We enjoyed both characters and food much more each time we’ve had breakfast at ‘Ohana.

Best for both, however, has been the Bon Voyage breakfast. Food was incredible. And Flynn Rider was the best character I’ve seen at WDW ever.

 

[Melissa55]

I’ll be the one person to say that of all the character meals we’ve been too, Garden Grill breakfast was the most disappointing for both food (greasy weird tasting sausage, hard and dry eggs) AND character interaction (tepid to be kind). Given the raves the place gets, maybe we hit an off day (our large party and the long booth arrangement also made it really awkward to interact with the characters). But we’re not interested in going back.

We enjoyed both characters and food much more each time we’ve had breakfast at ‘Ohana.

Best for both, however, has been the Bon Voyage breakfast. Food was incredible. And Flynn Rider was the best character I’ve seen at WDW ever.

We also had a pretty bad experience (both food and character interaction) at Garden Grill, but it seems to be extremely popular. I always get surprised reactions when I tell people it is my least favorite dining experience I've ever had at WDW.

 

[MudQueen22]

I think 1900 Park Fair is the best combination of food quality and character interaction, with Garden Grill following at a close second.

 

[MonkeyKnifeFight]

We did a lot of character meals on our last trip and everything was good. I think storybook dining at artist point had the best food and good interactions. Bon voyage adventure breakfast at tratorrio al forno had the best interaction and environment and the food was one of the best as well. Garden grill was also great. Character interaction was great as was the food at lunch. Those 3 we are definitely doing again on our next trip.

1900 park fare for both breakfast and dinner were good. I think we liked the breakfast food better, but the dinner interactions were better.

The kids loved chef mickey and crystal palace, but the food ranked near the bottom for us. Even being at the bottom it was still good. I was expecting a lot of the buffets to be worse than they ended up being so that was good.

 

[quoo]

I am debating between chef mickeys and crystal palace for a late breakfast on our MK day... any thoughts on those two or alternatives? We did park fair breakfast last time. The kids loved the buffet and Mary Poppins, my husband and I loved the mad hatter who was delightfully weird... but didn’t love the food.

Crystal Palace might be nice for location but the kids aren’t into Pooh.

I might also bail on all this and just eat at Kona cafe.

 

[RedsDrew]

For us it's Tusker House Breakfast. A great selection and good food. Plus it's safari Mickey and his friends. It's our must do every trip.

 

[heatherenae71]

Storybook Dining and Bon Voyage Breakfast were both fantastic for food and character interaction! I also liked that these character meals aren't buffets! Flynn Rider was *the best* character to interact with (actually, him and Rapunzel together were absolutely adorable!) At Storybook Dining...you can't hep but love Dopey and Grumpy - haha - and the Queen. Whew - she was fantastically "evil" - she played her character well! My 11 year old was kind of intimated to take a pic with her!

I'm glad to hear so much love for Garden Grill....we're planning to go there on our trip this Fall (we've never dined at this restaurant).

 

[MomOTwins]

We also had a pretty bad experience (both food and character interaction) at Garden Grill, but it seems to be extremely popular. I always get surprised reactions when I tell people it is my least favorite dining experience I've ever had at WDW.

Yeah, I don't get this either. We had some bad breakfasts there as well--last time they were out of cinnamon rolls, the scrambled eggs were watery, and everything else was a puddle of grease. My husband likes it because eggs and bacon is all he ever likes to eat at breakfast anyway, but when I think of the many other breakfasts at other WDW restaurants with their massive spreads and variety (smoked salmon, eggs benedict, pastries) Despite that all I was thinkin about booking it for the Soarin advantage, but then I saw that with the price hikes, it is now over $40 for breakfast.

 

[DuskKodesh]

I'm gonna be weird here and say my favorite my last trip was Hollywood and Vine. We did a late lunch. The food, while not amazing was adventurous at least by theme park standards. Hubs and I loved the beet salad, falafel and hummus. Carving stations were tasty! And I saw all the characters go around twice! We had some of the best interactions with them. My hubs was up at the bar once so Donald, who was offended sat in his seat. Minnie showed me the bracelet Mickey bought her, Goofy did a little disco dance when I said he looked stylish! I mean you get Donald, Minnie, Daisy, Goofy, and Mickey for the price, plus we did the Fantasmic seating so extra benefit!

 

[Melissa55]

I am debating between chef mickeys and crystal palace for a late breakfast on our MK day... any thoughts on those two or alternatives? We did park fair breakfast last time. The kids loved the buffet and Mary Poppins, my husband and I loved the mad hatter who was delightfully weird... but didn’t love the food.

Crystal Palace might be nice for location but the kids aren’t into Pooh.

I might also bail on all this and just eat at Kona cafe.

Honestly? 1900 Park Fare, Crystal Palace, and Chef Mickey's are all about the same food. Personally, I like all of them, but I go more for the characters than the food. The food is good in my opinion. Not great, but good. If you were underwhelmed by 1900 Park Fare, you will likely feel the same at Crystal Palace and Chef Mickey's unfortunately. Be Our Guest, Cinderella's Royal Table, and The Plaza are the only other places I can think of that have breakfast in MK? Maybe some of the quick service places but we tend to do character dining breakfasts. We have done BOG for breakfast and it was... fine. Not even good, IMO.

 

[quoo]

That’s helpful. I think I might aim for just chef mickeys. We’re not big character dining and I do want to do tusker house. I think two character meals is enough for us.

 

[Beprepared]

My favorites are Garden Grill at Epcot & Crystal Palace at Magic Kingdom.

We had the first reservation of the morning (8am) for Garden Grill & all of the characters came out for a big group picture with us. It is still my favorite picture to this day. The food is great, you don't have to keep getting up to get food, & the characters are so funny.