Disney in Details – Where Amy Ate, Disneyland Paris Edition

Welcome to Disney in Details, Disneyland Paris, post four of five! This time I’m going to be telling you all about eating in Disneyland, so basically a DLP edition of Where Amy Ate. We haven’t had one of those in a while, huh?

Before I went the one thing everyone kept on telling me about Disneyland Paris was just how expensive it was to eat there. Although I was told the same when I went to Paris and I personally didn’t find it anymore expensive than eating out in London. Anyway, I had prepared myself and now that I’m back I can see that they were both right and wrong. And here I’m going to tell you how.

First up, why they were right. Snacks in the parks (and hotels) are expensive. Cinema food expensive. We were sort of prepared for this and I had brought boxes of little raisins, cereal bars and biscuits with me from home. Mainly for Little Miss. We also stole fruit from breakfast as Little Miss is obsessed with bananas at the moment. Anyway, our first day in the park, we didn’t have breakfast at the hotel so we were completely unprepared. We ended up shelling out probably around about the 30e on snacks alone, this included 5e tubs of popcorn (or corn corn as LM calls it), bottles of water as we didn’t have anything to fill up at the water fountains in the beginning. Breakfast waffles, coffees for my mum and ice cream while we sat waiting on the show and parade. Bottles of water and bags of crisps, started at 3e, minimum and the snacks went up from there. I wasn’t that surprised, and neither was my mum. She told me that the theme parks in Florida are similarly priced which is why we always brought our own snacks. The difference between DLP and WDW is that in WDW we cannot afford to stay on site so we were always in Kissimmee or on I-Drive, this meant we were always able to find a supermarket or Walmart to stock up before heading out to the parks. Staying in a Disney hotel meant that everything on site was just the same price as in the parks. Even the little shop at the train station wasn’t that much cheaper. Thankfully, after the first day, we were wise and filled up all the bottles we had collected on the first day at the hotel. However Little Miss still managed to weedle more “corn corn” and crisp out of us at the parks.

I touched briefly on the food in my post all about Hotel Cheyenne, so I’ll not go too much into it again. Our breakfasts were included for all four mornings. It was continental only, but there was still more than enough to fill you up, well if you like that sort of thing, like my mum and Little Miss. Anyway, we were always at breakfast very early so everything was fresh and the queues were small, I’ve heard this isn’t the case the later you dine. I filled up mainly on pastries and mugs of tea. My mum however had her fill and Little Miss loved the fact she could have cheese for breakfast. We also ate here on the first night and paid for it. At the time it did seem rather expensive, 24e for a buffet and we also had a carafe of wine for 8e. However once we saw the choice, it didn’t seem to bad. Since it was a cowboy themed hotel, the food was cowboy cook out themed with chicken legs, ribs, burgers, hot dogs, loads of salad, rice, different kinds of potato. Again, we dined early and it was deliciously fresh and hot. I ate the best jacket potato of my life there! Well worth the money. 

We ate lunch every day in the parks, and again, I didn’t think it was too bad value for money, well in the main park anyway. The first day we ate at the Cowboy Cookout Barbeque which was in Frontierland. My mum opted for chicken strips, side salad and a large coke zero and I went for the same but with wedges instead of salad as they were for Little Miss. I think each meal cost roughly about 12e, and was the size of a “go large” Mcdonalds meal. Which when you work out the price to pounds, there is a small difference, however the food was much nicer! On the third day when we ate in the Disneyland Park again, I chose to eat in Bella Notre, which was where I ate when I visited with the school all those years ago. Both my mum and I went for the lasagne with garlic bread, tirimisu and a large drink, costing 14e. I have to say although it came out of a foil tray, it was the nicest meal I ate, just as I remember! The garlic bread was huge, as was the dessert. I genuinely have no fault in regards to the price for these two meals. However, at the Disney Studio’s park you have little choice on where to eat, which is so SAD! We opted for the Backlot Cafe which was a bonafied school cafeteria, even down to the not so nice and over cooked food. My mum went for a wrap which came with crisps and a hot drink and I for the pizza, again so I could share with LM. Each item was priced individually but the whole meal cost around about the 25e. I wasn’t that impressed sadly and wish we’d just popped out into the main park for lunch!

Our third night we had pre-booked a character dining experience. My grandfather had given us some money to pay for it as our special “treat” from him so we knew this was the night we were really going to splash out. My mum had wine, I had a cocktail (I think it was called Fantasia) and I even went for seafood pasta which was unreal! This was the only meal Little Miss had her own dish, not because she had to but because we felt like she should. She had Mickey Mouse shaped cheesy garlic bread but she seemed to enjoy the fresh bread provided more! Anyway, this was one of the absolute highlights from the trip and anyone visiting a Disney park with kids should pay a little extra and dining in one of the meet and greet restaurants. Our meal came to just over 64e, which is only a fraction more than the regular restaurants! I get a little teary looking at how tender Mickey & Minnie are with Little Miss, Mickey touching her face and Minnie holding her hands. In the hour & a half we spent there, each of the five characters (Pluto was also there but all the photos are on my camera) came around and spent time with us twice. No queues here, just quality time. They pose for as many photos as you want, sometimes they even sit at the table (like Goofy did!) they played with Little Miss and her Woody doll, they hugged my mum and I, looked at what we were eating, wearing and even interacted with each other. It was just heart warming entertainment! Worth every single penny. Oh yeah, and the food was rather good too haha!