Tag Archives: restaurant

Thank Disney it’s Friday – November 23!

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Well hello to another Friday! :) I hope all my American readers had a wonderful Thanksgiving day and now I guess the countdown begins to Christmas!

I am extremely proud to announce that this is the 100th post on Daydreaming Disney!!! Time flies when you’re sharing daydreams ;) I have lots of new features heading your way, plus we have the new Daydreaming Disney Facebook page….

 

And so, in honour of the 100th post here is your Friday question….

If you were given $100 to spend anywhere on Walt Disney World property what would you choose and why???

It might be a signature restaurant, a shopping spree in World of Disney, a behind the scenes tour or even 25 Citrus Swirls…I can’t wait to read your ideas! :)

 

And don’t forget…..we’re having another Daydreaming Disney giveaway!!!!! Every reader leaving a comment on ANY Friday question posed in November will be added to a prize draw. A name will be selected at random on December 1 to win a selection of goodies picked up during my trip to Walt Disney World!!!

:) :) :)

 

 

Thank Disney it’s Friday – November 9!

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Hello all, I hope its been a week full of Disney magic; whether you have been in the parks, cruising or planning your next trip!

During my October visit I used the Disney Dining Plan for the first time ever, I can’t wait to share some tales with you about that!!

But in the meantime, here’s your Friday question…..

If you had just one SNACK credit left on your dining plan what Disney food item would you use it to buy and why????

I look forward to getting hungry from reading your answers!!

 

And don’t forget…..we’re having another Daydreaming Disney giveaway!!!!! Every reader leaving a comment on ANY Friday question posed in November will be added to a prize draw. A name will be selected at random on December 1 to win a selection of goodies picked up during my trip to Walt Disney World!!!

 

:) :) :)

 

That’s a first!

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As I put the final details in place for our forthcoming trip to the World I realise that this visit could yet again be full of magical first time Disney experiences.

It’s clear to see that by simply changing the time of year for our visit it has opened up a number of new experiences and events which I will see for the first time. By visiting Walt Disney World in October I will see Magic Kingdom decorated for Halloween and get to attend Mickey’s Not So Scary Halloween Party.

This also means that I will be visiting Epcot during the Food and Wine Festival; I’m looking forward to not only sampling some of the dishes on offer but seeing how World Showcase looks with the addition of the international marketplace booths.

Due to a special promotion I was able to include the Disney Dining Plan for free on my vacation booking which means I’ll be experiencing Disney dining on a whole new level. I’ll be visiting Signature restaurants for the first time and some of our advanced dining reservations will take us into resorts that we’ve never really had the chance to explore before.

After attending the Key To The Kingdom tour on our last visit I knew that I wanted to book at least one tour or special experience on this trip….well, I decided to fit three in! We will FINALLY get to Dine With An Imagineer, we will be taking a unique look at Animal Kingdom on the Wild By Design tour and last but by no means least we will be taking in the detail of Magic Kingdom during a park tour with Lou Mongello.

Something else which will make this trip so unique is the number of friends that we hope to be meeting up with during our two week vacation. A few years ago, before I started blogging and talking to fellow Disney fans across the social networks, I had no idea that I would make friends with so many people who lived close to or worked at my favourite vacation destination.

And lastly…now this could well make or break a vacation….we have unplanned days on our WDW daily schedule!!!! That’s right, I threw out the original daily plan which I had spent so long researching and planning! So the new schedule includes the booked tours, ADR’s and a couple of planned meet ups but that’s it! We are going to decide that morning or the night before which park we feel like going to each day….if we wake up and feel like stuffing our faces at the Food and Wine Festival we’ll head on over to Epcot, if we feel like spending a morning people watching in a busy Magic Kingdom then we’ll head on over there!!! For a mega planner like me this is pretty scary stuff but there’s a first time for everything!! :)

So what about you? Do you like to visit at the same time of year or stay at the same resort because you like to know every detail of your vacation? Do you make sure that you experience at least one new thing during each trip or do you throw caution to the wind and never plan your trips, hoping that magic and surprises come along to make memories that you’ll cherish forever???

 

 

 

 

Thank Disney it’s Friday – August 31!

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Good afternoon fellow daydreamers!!

There’s a chill in the air on this Friday afternoon in the UK so let’s head on over to Disney’s Animal Kingdom for some daydreaming in a park which always seems to be sunny whenever I’m there!!!

 

It’s lunchtime in Animal Kingdom; if you could eat at any counter service or table service restaurant right now where would you pick and why?? ……I’m paying ;)

 

Thanks for sharing your Disney thoughts! :) :) :)

 

 

Thank Disney it’s Friday – June 29!

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It’s that time again…time to start making plans for the weekend and hoping that they include lots of Disney activities and thoughts.

There seems to have been yet more food news coming out of Walt Disney World this week with more details being released about the Be Our Guest restaurant coming to Magic Kingdom….so this week’s question has once again got a foodie theme…..

 

If you could eat at only ONE dining location for the duration of your next trip where would you choose and why???

 

Think carefully now….this could be a counter service, a signature restaurant or even a food court at a resort….you will be eating ALL your meals there…so choose wisely!!!!

 

:) :) :)

 

Thank Disney it’s Friday – June 22!

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Well hello Friday!! It feels like it’s been a fairly calm week with everyone recovering from their DCA excitement…. ;)

As I sit here in the dull and rainy UK staring at my soup and sandwich which I have in front of me for my lunch a simple yet effective Friday question springs to mind…….

 

If you were on WDW property right now where would you go for lunch…and of course…why???!

 

:) :) :)

DDP…easy as one, two, free!

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The Disney Dining Plan (DDP) has always fascinated me…or should that be that the people using the DDP have always fascinated me? Despite the plan providing a daily allocation of meals and snacks for your vacation there always seems to be this issue with managing the use of your table service credits and using the numerous unspent snack credits on enough snacks to take home for all your friends and relatives.

Search any number of Disney fan forums and you will find numerous threads on how to ‘efficiently’ use the DDP. Getting your money’s worth….that’s the key…the issue…the deal breaker…

So what happens when you get the Disney Plan for free? Surely that should be where the fun begins; it’s free food after all. But because it’s free does that mean you need to use the plan even more effectively? Don’t waste those credits…get the most out of it…this has cost you NOTHING!!!

Now I have never used a Disney Dining Plan. I have never felt the need. When we go to Walt Disney World we’ll plan a couple of ADRs (Advanced Dining Reservations) but certainly not one a day for the full fourteen days. We’ll book specific restaurants that we know we want to visit because of their food, atmosphere or how an early ADR will get us into a park before opening.

We love American style breakfasts so we tend to eat A LOT first thing. We love cakes so we’ll usually have at least one of those to keep us going during the day. We love hanging out at our resort in the evening so we’ll usually grab something from the food court if we haven’t already eaten at a counter service during the day. And that’s it; no regular meals, no regular meal times, no rules.

For us when looking at the cost of the DDP it hasn’t added up. Yes, you get a lot of food on the plan for the duration of your vacation. But we don’t actually spend as much on food as we would on buying the dining plan. So until now we’ve ignored all those forum threads, we’ve ignored the little notes on the food counter advising how many credits it will cost to buy this burger and cupcake, and we’ve laughed and shrugged it off when our server looks horrified when we say ‘no, we’re not paying with the dining plan’.

But that is all about to change…..for we shall be using the Disney Dining Plan on our next trip. And it will be free. When booking our latest trip we just couldn’t ignore the offers that were available if we travelled at a certain time of the year so we went for it. And now we are getting free food.

I’m really looking forward to the experience. I’ve tried to play it cool and go along with the ‘well it’s free’ philosophy, but every now and again you find yourself planning a day’s events around that ADR you want to book or how many table service points you’ll have used by that day.

Will we have an abundance of snack credits? Will we feel like we are eating all day long? Will we look for the most expensive thing on the menu…because it’s free? I can’t wait for this new Disney experience.

So what about you? Do you have any tales from using a Disney Dining Plan for the very first time? Or any traditions that you have when eating ‘free food’ in WDW?

Three cheers for All Ears!!

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I confess….I really should have mentioned All Ears when we first started talking about planning a trip to Walt Disney World….because this website covers everything you need to know for a WDW vacation. It’s one of those websites which you’ll visit to look up a specific snippet of information and two hours later you’ve wandered far from the original information you needed, probably reading a section you never knew existed before!

So, if you are one of the few who doesn’t know about All Ears.net bookmark it now!!

Deb Wills set up All Ears as a Disney information resource over 15 years ago, and the website still continues to grow every day. I discovered the All Ears weekly newsletter about 7 years ago and have visited the site on a regular basis ever since looking for Disney news and planning information.

All Ears doesn’t just provide everything you need to know about Walt Disney World; it also covers Disneyland and Disney Cruise Line. There are sections relating to Disney news, blogs, reader reviews and tips. You name it…you’ll find it on this site!

One of my favourite areas of the website is the Rate and Review section. If you want to read what other Disney visitors think of a resort, a restaurant, an attraction or a special event then this is the place to go. Now remember…..people like and dislike different things….and the Rate and Review section is based on personal and individual opinion….This means that you shouldn’t decide against something just because someone has written a negative review, just take into account what they have written and ask yourself if this would impact your experience. Personally I love reading other people’s opinion of somewhere I’ve visited on property!

The other great section which I could spend hours reading (and the reason I should have mentioned the website earlier in my planning posts) is the Accommodation section. Here you’ll find details of every hotel on Disney property; complete with resort maps, photos of rooms and menus for the various restaurants and food courts.

Okay, I’m going to resist listing every section covered on the website as it’s yours to explore….and it would take me forever to set up the links!! If you want to know what a certain room looks like at Port Orleans French Quarter, which room is closest to a bus stop at All Star Music or the height restrictions for all the attractions in WDW you’ll find it on this site.

Make sure you get to know the lovely All Ears team via their blogs and check out All Ears on Facebook, Twitter and YouTube. You’ll wonder just how you planned a Disney vacation without the help of All Ears!!! ;)

Food glorious food!

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I love American food….and I love planning and researching my WDW trips…imagine my delight when I came across a website that connected the two!

It was December 2010 and we were at the WDW Radio 200th episode party. Despite feeling overwhelmed (in a good way) I was trying to mingle and chat to as many people as I had the courage to approach. Whilst waiting to say goodbye to Lou we got chatting to a girl called AJ. We were talking about the UK, about the States, and of course the subject got onto food! Until AJ gave us her business card I didn’t know that we had been speaking to THE expert on ‘Disney’ food!!

When we returned to the UK at the end of our holiday I picked up AJ’s card and went to seek out her website www.disneyfoodblog.com and that was where my WDW food journey began!

Don’t get me wrong; I’m aware of the vast array of food choices at WDW. I’m aware of many counter service and restaurant style facilities in each of the parks. I’m aware of the Disney Dining Plan and refillable mugs. But I never really understood many of the details until becoming a regular user of The Disney Food Blog.

This website covers everything you need to know about food at WDW and Disneyland; it has food news, reviews, photographs, menus, details on discounts, food related merchandise, dietary requirements and more!

I personally enjoy the dining reviews posted on the website. AJ has a very open and honest style of writing; if she likes something she’ll say it, if she thinks something could have been done better she’ll say it. This gives me the option of forming my own opinion and deciding whether to try that restaurant, meal, or snack for myself. And there’s a simple thing that makes this website fun; if you leave a comment on a post AJ will do her very best to respond to what you’ve written, it makes you feel like every comment is appreciated :)

In the last few months AJ has also launched a series of Disney Food Blog e-books. Not only are they downloadable, so that you can have them to hand on your digital reader or phone, but they have links to various pages on the website so the information will always be up to date. A must for every serious WDW planner like myself!

Reading the information and reviews on this website has made me enthusiastic and intrigued about the variety of food available at WDW. So much so that I’ve opted for the Disney Dining Plan for my trip next year and will be using The Disney Food Blog for a lot of planning and advanced dining reservations (ADR’s). It will also be our first visit to the Epcot International Food and Wine Festival, but no need to panic as AJ has that covered as well!

And on a more serious note, I’ve been training for ‘The Disney Food Blog WDW Cupcake Crawl’….yes, you read that right…earlier this year AJ produced a map of WDW and ten different cupcakes to eat at various locations on property…now that’s my kind of exercise!!!! ;)

Why do you keep going back to Walt Disney World?

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I guess it’s only right that I cover this issue as early on as possible. The Disney nuts amongst us will know that we don’t need to ask this question of each other, we also know that the people who ask this question are unlikely to really ‘get’ our answer! I’d be interested to know if my friends outside of the UK get the same looks from relatives and colleagues when we inform them that yes, we are going to Walt Disney World…again…and no, we’re not taking any children with us!!

Now, I can see where people are coming from when they say that to them WDW just seems overpriced, crowded, loud, garish, commercial, etc etc. Sometimes I think it’s all those things but as a Disney fan I’ve learned how to put them in perspective and some of those things actually make my WDW experience even more enjoyable. When you walk through those gates at the Magic Kingdom real life doesn’t really disappear; children still cry, adults still argue, people still cut in line, and you still have to use money to buy things. But….there is magic in the air…and for the hours, day, week you are there something feels different….something that is difficult to put into words.

Picture your favourite high street or shopping mall. You know where each shop is located and you know which shop to go in to find what you want to buy. Visiting WDW is like that for me. I know where my Disney hotel is located, I know whether I need to use a Disney bus or monorail to get to each park, I know which attractions and restaurants are in each park, and I know how I want to spend my day.

So that’s the day-to-day, comfortable stuff, but what about that magic I was talking about? I love seeing families walking into a restaurant and they are all wearing the same Disney themed shirt, identifying ‘their team’. I think about sitting on a Disney bus and seeing ladies wearing Mickey earrings, their husbands wearing their matching  Mickey ears, couples falling asleep side by side after a long day at the parks. I can stand in Epcot watching IllumiNations, and as I look to my right and left I see adults crying at fireworks. I love watching Wishes at Magic Kingdom and hearing guests all around me singing along to that infectious song.

Walt Disney World represents a family to me. Something familiar, secure, exciting, and surprising. Memories are made every day at this place. Just for that one brief moment you have something in common with every single person around you and it feels great.

This is the stuff that my daydreams are made of….and this is just a brief answer to the question ‘why do I keep going back to Walt Disney World?’.