Packed Lunches

[DJStu89]

Hi all! Not really a massively exciting topic, but one that has been playing on my mind for a while...

My wife and I are heading out to Orlando in September for two weeks to celebrate our 2nd Wedding anniversary. We went for our Honeymoon and absolutely loved it, since then we have been saving hard to get enough cash together to go back!

So, we've booked our flights, our car hire, our villa, got the Esta's sorted, all the park tickets, etc etc etc. After working out our finances, we have around $150 a day for food and spending money (not including fuel, parking, tickets. that's all taken care of separately). So, we will be stopping off at Walmart on the way from the Airport to the villa to stock up. We plan on eating breakfast in the villa pretty much every day. For lunches, when we went on our honeymoon we ate a quick service restaurants in the parks nearly every day. Although not as expensive as i expected it to be, it still added up to a fair old chunk of money over the two weeks! So, I've decided that we will take packed lunches into the parks most days and then eat somewhere nice in the evening, usually off site.

My question really is what do you guys put in your packed lunches whilst visiting the parks? What travels well in a back pack all day without spoiling or getting squashed? Is it worth buying the refillable drinks from the parks each day or should we carry around a couple of litres of water in the back pack?

Thanks for your input

[dixonsontour]

Wraps eg cheese or ham freeze and by lunch will have defrosted plus don't squash. Don't carry water just ask for a free cup of iced water at any counter service place.

[Colette-S]

Originally Posted by DJStu89

Hi all! Not really a massively exciting topic, but one that has been playing on my mind for a while...

My wife and I are heading out to Orlando in September for two weeks to celebrate our 2nd Wedding anniversary. We went for our Honeymoon and absolutely loved it, since then we have been saving hard to get enough cash together to go back!

So, we've booked our flights, our car hire, our villa, got the Esta's sorted, all the park tickets, etc etc etc. After working out our finances, we have around $150 a day for food and spending money (not including fuel, parking, tickets. that's all taken care of separately). So, we will be stopping off at Walmart on the way from the Airport to the villa to stock up. We plan on eating breakfast in the villa pretty much every day. For lunches, when we went on our honeymoon we ate a quick service restaurants in the parks nearly every day. Although not as expensive as i expected it to be, it still added up to a fair old chunk of money over the two weeks! So, I've decided that we will take packed lunches into the parks most days and then eat somewhere nice in the evening, usually off site.

My question really is what do you guys put in your packed lunches whilst visiting the parks? What travels well in a back pack all day without spoiling or getting squashed? Is it worth buying the refillable drinks from the parks each day or should we carry around a couple of litres of water in the back pack?

Thanks for your input

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On our last visit we found that the sandwich supplies in publix were fairly expensive. Plus the bread is rubbish and i only like lurpak! We tend to fill up at breakfast and then take snacks for the parks. Cereal bars, crisps, apples and bananas. Avoid chocolate - I once took a pack of penguins and a couple of orange clubs that melted all over my favourite park bag!
You can get free iced water in the parks

[suehen]

When our children were younger they were both fussy eaters so I alway did a pack lunch. We would have sandwiches, fruit, crisp and muffins or cookies and cheese and biscuit alway took 4 bottles of frozen water in a back-pack but we never carried it just got a locker put it there then go a get it when we wanted to eat. Will say that it stayed cold and the bottles were still part frozen when got the bag which was good never had any problems at bag check for Disney not sure about the other parks as we they were younger. Had to take there cereal with us as DS would eat Weetabixs for breakfast as he would not eat the USA one said they were not right. Enjoy you holiday.

[WhereIBelong]

I'd rather do a decent breakfast at the villa then share a $10 QS lunch before going out for a meal in the evening. Packed lunches in a hot climate are never that great, and to be honest when you've bought all the bits to make them interesting enough to want to eat you are probably paying $5 each anyhow...

How does your wife feel?

[Mexy02]

We do a big breakfast then share snacks. We just take cookies, crisps, cereal bars in the bag . A flatbread and fries easily feeds 2 for snacks.

[scoobydooby]

I'd get a couple of sandwich size tuppaware boxes to stop squashing and take sandwiches, fruit and crisps. Nothing earth shattering in my suggestion sorry! I would personally take a couple of bottles of frozen water each to keep everything cool. You can't use refillable mugs at Disney parks. US bread is weird though. Not sure what they do to it but I don't like it.

[princess allie]

We take a small sandwich box so the sandwiches don't get squashed. Sometimes the villas have them in the cupboards too. I usually buy wraps and fill with cream cheese with ham or salami. We take grapes in a little tub and buy those individual boxes of Pringles in Walmart. We also take bananas/nectarines. We buy bottled water from Walmart and freeze it. We also half drink some and then fill again with apple juice and freeze. Lovely and refreshing and stay frozen for a long time. We have also taken in leftover pizza. If we don't fancy a picnic, we don't share meals, but instead buy kids meals for everyone - it's enough for lunch.

[COL41]

We took grapes in a pot, packets or either Lays or the goldfish crackers, and some half frozen bottles of water, and found that after a decent breakfast that generally sustained us for a few hours in a park. Particularly if we bought an ice cream or funnel cake at some point

[cinderbell]

We plan on doing the same thing and make sandwhiches some of the days at parks. The only thing is as mentioned already is the rotten bread. It tastes nice when eating out so they must make nice bread somewhere. Can anyone tell me where to buy half decent bread please? We are staying at Emerald Island in Kissimmee. Thank you. x