Too many reservations?

[Wayland10]

How many ADRs would your family make for an 8 night visit? We're going to be at WDW from July 29-August 6, and I started by making a sensible 1 ADR a day. But there are so many places that we want to try that I find myself adding a lunch here, a dinner there... As it stands, I have;
7/29 - arrival day, nothing booked. Staying at AKL, so plan to head into AK after we arrive and eat at QS, probably Flame Tree or Satuli Canteen
7/30 - Epcot, dinner at Biergarten (requested by DH)
7/31 - MK. I started with a 4:00 Hoop De Doo ADR, then was checking idly the other day and found an 11:55 BOG. I grabbed it, but I'm not sure I should keep it. It's potentially too much, too close together. Opinions?
8/1 - Epcot, Via Napoli for lunch, Jaleo for dinner (It's our anniversary, and we are huge Jose Andres fans.)
8/2 MK, Skipper Canteen (requested by DD10) - I've heard it's going downhill? Is it true? We are all adventurous eaters, and we're doing a themed S.E.A Disneybound that day as a family.
8/3 - resort day. Brunch at Boma, dinner at Jiko
8/4 - AK - Festival of the Lion King Tier 1 dining package at Tiffins. I really want this, but the price is through the roof, given that we have a Disney adult who's only 10. What do you think?
8/5 - MK. Lunch at CRT, dinner at Kona Cafe. We have an 8 AM BBB booking for DD8, princess meets and rides until 1ish, back to the hotel, then we want to go to the Poly for a drink at Trader Sam's (probably the outdoor terrace, unless we get lucky with seating) and finish by watching the fireworks from the beach. Or we could go to Top of the World. This one I'm really struggling with.
8/6 - early lunch at Homecomin' before we drive to Hilton Head for the next three days.

So what do you think? Too many? Any you would drop?

 

[elsbit]

I personally prefer to have reservations for two meals a day. Part of the fun of vacation for us is eating at all of the restaurants, trying new foods and not having to cook! During the hot times, a lunch time restaurant lets you rest and be cool. It lets you reset. And the nice thing about reservations is that you don't have to wait in lines in the heat. We typically set an early lunch so we will be hungry when it comes dinner time. With that many reservations, I would do the math to see if the Disney dining plan works for your family (it has for us). We usually do 1 TS and a Signature at night when we are on the DXDP. Then the snack credits can be used for a simple breakfast food or a fun snack during the day. The Lion King Package Tier 2 would use 2 TS credits on the plan. With JIko, Boma, CRT, etc, I really truly would look at the math of the dining plan. You might get sticker shock, but when you add up those places, you might find you save money.

 

[elsbit]

I just wanted to answer some of your other questions:

7/31 - MK. I started with a 4:00 Hoop De Doo ADR, then was checking idly the other day and found an 11:55 BOG. I grabbed it, but I'm not sure I should keep it. It's potentially too much, too close together. Opinions? I would bump Hoop De Doo to the later show. You basically eat right after you are seated, so you won't be sitting around waiting on food.

8/2 MK, Skipper Canteen (requested by DD10) - I've heard it's going downhill? Is it true? We are all adventurous eaters, and we're doing a themed S.E.A Disneybound that day as a family. I ate there in January and once in 2018. I don't think it has gone down hill.

8/4 - AK - Festival of the Lion King Tier 1 dining package at Tiffins. I really want this, but the price is through the roof, given that we have a Disney adult who's only 10. What do you think? I personally would not pay the Tier 1 package price. I would do Tier 2 if on the dining plan, or secure the FP for Lion King and Safari. I am not convinced that the special safari is that different from what you can normally get.

8/5 - MK. Lunch at CRT, dinner at Kona Cafe. We have an 8 AM BBB booking for DD8, princess meets and rides until 1ish, back to the hotel, then we want to go to the Poly for a drink at Trader Sam's (probably the outdoor terrace, unless we get lucky with seating) and finish by watching the fireworks from the beach. Or we could go to Top of the World. This one I'm really struggling with. If you are not on the dining plan, I would skip Kona. I used to love it, but when I went in January, I found it to be overpriced for what you get anymore. You could be more laid back and do lounge/pool bar food.

 

[tinkerbella16]

We are going for 8 nights in September and last year we told ourselves that we weren't going to make a lot of ADR's. Well that didn't happen and now we have quite a few lol. We do enjoy TS meals though, and the character meals so my niece can meet the characters. We typically prefer 1 per day but there are 2 days where we have a breakfast and a dinner. We don't do TS for lunch, we like eating QS for lunch since we take resort midday breaks each day of our trip.

9/14 - Teppan Edo dinner
9/15- No ADR's
9/16- Maria & Enzos dinner
9/17- The Plaza for breakfast and MNSSHP that night so no ADR
9/18- Akershus PPO breakfast and Hoop Dee Doo 2nd show for dinner
9/19- Tusker House breakfast
9/20- Garden Grill PPO breakfast
9/21- Crystal Palace breakfast and Cape May Cafe dinner

 

[chinarider]

We agree with making the ADRs and meal planning- it works for us but some prefer more flexibility. For us it's all part of the vacation experience. We did the deluxe last time and tempting as it seems, it was just too much food for us ( there arent too many signatures that we would want to do ,it was way too much food for us and not having a car with us this trip plays into that factor as well - plus last time we had free reg dining and upgrades to deluxe and this time we got free quick serve and upgraded to reg dining).
There are a few days that we have 2 TS planned but otherwise - it's 1 TS and 1 QS a day for us - this kind of gives us the best of both worlds. We also though try to limit our ADRS to locations in the parks, DS or easily accessible resorts because otherwise, travel time would take a real big chunk out of the day. The only resort ADRs we have are BOMA ( on a AK day)- 1900PF late breakfast on a EMH morning before heading down for some pool time, and Storybook Dining at AP ( before an evening EMH-we will be using Uber or Lyft from POP to dinner )
Planning is like our own personal Disney puzzle trying to get all the pieces to fit

 

[FSU Girl]

We typically will do one ADR a day. For breakfast we grab something quick or do a character breakfast when leaving. We've done more than one a day, but it usually feels like too much food and too much time is taken up with dining. Also, portions can be really large so I would make sure you have dining spread out so you're actually hungry for your next meal.

 

[Wayland10]

Thank you all for your replies! I cancelled Kona Cafe and I'm probably going to cancel BOG, especially since I've seen some not so great reports about the menu changes. Still trying to decide about the FOLK Tiffins package.