Best Character Dining

[onebadhatharry]

First time at Disney with our 5 year old daughter.

We really want to add two character dining experiences to our 16 day trip. One would be a princess but flexible about the other. What I would like to know is:

Which is the best character dining for the actual princess / character experience?

What time would you book for to maximise the experience?

Thanks all

[loldis]

I don't like the princesses so can't comment on those, but for me the best is Garden Grill as Chip & Dale have the most fun interactions of all the characters IME. Farmer Mickey is pretty cute for photos too.

[disneyonabudget]

I'd book Trattoria al forno for breakfast! Ariel, Prince Eric, Rapunzel and Flynn Rider all in the same place I plan on having breakfast here next year.

[sha9]

Cinderella’s Royal Table is inside the castle and has lots of princesses but it’s expensive. For a similar but cheaper experience you have Akershus in the Norway pavilion of Epcot.
For the other I would go with Tusker House for Mickey and friends or Crystal Palace for Pooh and friends.

[Goldia]

We have done both Akershus and Cinderellas Royal Table.

At both you get a photopass at the entrance Akershus you meet Belle, and CRT is Cinderella!

There will be about 4 princesses during the meal at both, at Akershus we had snow white, Ariel, Cinderella and sleeping beauty. At CRT we had jasmine, snow white, Ariel and another one, I honestly can't remember who! I need to go and check DD autograph books... anyway the interactions were great at both, really cannot find either better. There is a walking around the room kind of presentation at Akershus and at CRT you get given the little plastic wand or sword and there is the wishing star ceremony.

Food at Akershus is half buffet, it's a smorgasbord for the starters and then main and desserts are ordered from the menu. CRT is all a la carte. Both meals were great.

As you can tell we liked both, Lisa is right CRT is more expensive, but it's inside the castle at MK so it's a fab experience. It's hard to decide which would be best, I'm not sure I'm helping much.

For other character meals we loved 1900 park fare at the grand floridian we went for dinner which was Cinderella, Prince Charming, the evil step mother and the 2 step sisters. This was a buffet meal and the step sisters were fab, really funny and quite cheeky.

We also enjoyed crystal palace, tuskers and garden grill, all had lovely food, the first 2 are buffet while garden grill the food is brought to you at the table, which I prefer as I'd much rather just sit and eat than have to go and collect the food myself. The characters were brilliant at all of them.

Have fun making a decision.

[Cazzius]

We loved Crystal Palace from breakfast with Pooh, Eeyore, Piglet and Tigger.
The building is beautiful, the servers were good, character interaction was really nice - even though we were both adults with no kids they spent plenty of time.
The selection of breakfast food was plentiful, it was refreshed frequently and very tasty.
The characters did a parade around the dining room (a but like follow the leader) with the children.
We would go back.

Tusker house we were tucked away down the side of the room, it was hot, there is a bright green exit light glowing in all our photos, we practically needed a flare to get the attention of the server and the characters seemed rushed - maybe they were as hot and bothered as we were!

We walked past Garden Grill on the way to Soarin' one morning and it looked really good. It's on our list to try next time. Chip and Dale were messing around at the front desk/podium as people were coming in

[stink08]

hollywood and vine in hs was brilliant for our dd at that age, sophia, doc mcstuffins, jake and neverland pirates and couple of others i forget who, they had the kids up dancing and stuff, buffett breakfast which was good!

[DonnaD]

Originally Posted by disneyonabudget

I'd book Trattoria al forno for breakfast! Ariel, Prince Eric, Rapunzel and Flynn Rider all in the same place I plan on having breakfast here next year.

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This one is new and a real hidden gem IMO. The character interaction is great. The food is a real step up from the usual buffet food without being as expensive as CRT. Because it is a la carte you can sit back and relax without having to judge when the characters are coming before going up to the buffet.

[Guest]

Our favourites last time were Garden Grill and Hollywood & Vine seasonal dining with Minnie Mouse. We liked 1900 Park Fare for dinner last year but didn’t rate breakfast in terms of character interaction in October.

[jillyb]

Hollywood & Vine or Garden Grill gets a big thumbs up from us .
We did both with grandsons in October. Our boys are 8 & 3 years, both loved the character interaction