As a parent who’s wound up wearing countless meals at Disney Parks, trust me: You’re going to want to know these tried-and-true toddler meal tips in advance.

As any toddler mom or dad knows, young kids are unpredictable. And that’s especially so when they’re visiting Disney World or Disneyland. They’re excited, they’re experiencing a ton of new sights and sounds and emotions, and they’re often overstimulated. They’re also still toddlers, and when things aren’t quite the same as they are at home, toddlers are likely to melt down, throw food, and have some very big feelings. (If you’ve ever seen pieces of a Mickey-shaped pancake go flying in Fantasyland, I apologize on behalf of my toddler.)

As a mom who takes her toddler to Disney Parks at least once a month, I’ve learned firsthand that feeding little kids can be a serious challenge. Sometimes, it’s a straight up nightmare. With logistical challenges, strange foods on the menu, and limited resources, getting a toddler to eat peacefully requires strategizing and careful preparation.

So, to make your next Disney World or Disneyland dining experience with a toddler smooth sailing, I’m sharing the biggest challenges – and tips to get around them – below.

Why Feeding a Toddler at Disney World and Disneyland Is So Difficult

Photo by Cliff Wang

High Chairs Are Often in Short Supply

Disney Parks do an excellent job catering to families with kids of all ages. For the most part, high chairs will be readily available anywhere you’re hoping to dine – a godsend for toddler parents. 

However, when you choose a quick-service restaurant, sometimes those high chairs can be in high demand… which means they may not be as readily available as you’d planned. In my experience, this is particularly the case when you choose to dine at peak hours. The breakfast, lunch, and dinner rush can leave parents scrambling for a high chair (and toddlers very annoyed they can’t reach the table’s surface). 

Choose to dine during a peak time and on an exceptionally crowded day, and you’re likely to be out of luck when it comes to high chairs.

I’ve had the bad luck of dining at quite a few quick-service restaurants without a high chair, and it’s less than ideal. My son winds up frustrated, and so do I. While you can make do with options like bench seating or even your stroller, it’s often messy and requires a careful plate balancing act to get through the meal without anyone wearing some of it.

Not All Tables (and Restaurants) Are Toddler-Friendly

When you have to dine at Disney World or Disneyland without a high chair, it’s no surprise that your little one won’t be able to reach the table’s surface. But, as I discovered the first time I pulled my son up to one of the tables inside Red Rose Taverne at Disneyland, sometimes even a high chair won’t do the trick.

That’s right: Not all tables at Disney Parks are a suitable height for little ones. There’s no guarantee that your toddler will be able to reach the tabletop and eat off its surface easily. It really varies from restaurant to restaurant, theme park to theme park.

This slight difference in height can pose a real problem and plenty of frustration. I know my son has wound up too frustrated to eat (and even had a slight meltdown) because he couldn’t easily get his food off a too-high tabletop. And, if you’re a parent who’s already stressed over getting your picky toddler to eat, that’s an added challenge you really don’t want to face.

Toddler-Friendly Silverware Isn’t Readily Available

Lastly, when you finally find a high chair and a restaurant that has tables of just the right toddler-approved height, there’s one more challenge Disney restaurants can throw your way. All of the silverware used at Disney World and Disneyland is your average silverware – which means it isn’t going to be ideally suited for the littlest guests.

Before becoming a parent, and before my son reached the age of two, I figured this wasn’t a big deal. After all, I assumed I’d be able to just help him with his silverware skills, or even feed him.

That, I quickly learned, would absolutely not be happening. I underestimated just how stubborn toddlers are, and I have since found out (the hard way) that attempting to help my son use adult-sized silverware is a surefire way to wind up wearing spaghetti or syrupy Mickey waffles. 

In addition to not wanting help wielding large silverware, toddlers also get frustrated very easily when tasks are unexpectedly difficult. So, when it’s too hard to stab a bite of food with a fork, a quiet meal can quickly turn into a tantrum. While there’s no reason Disney Parks should provide toddler-sized silverware, it’s an unexpected pain point I never anticipated previously as a child-free Disney Adult.

Tips to Make Meals With a Toddler at Disney World or Disneyland Easier

Photo by Heather Adams

Choose Your Disney Restaurants Wisely

To avoid common pain points and meltdown-worthy moments like a lack of high chairs or too-tall tables, I recommend choosing your Disney restaurants carefully. This is really something you’ll have to learn over time, as every toddler has different preferences and needs. But, based on my experience, restaurants that offer flexible seating options are always a great choice.

For example, while the indoor tables at Disneyland’s Red Rose Taverne are too high for my son, the outdoor seating area is perfect – and the tables are lower. So, if we’re hanging out in Fantasyland, we’ll only dine here if we can eat outside. 

Similarly, over at California Adventure, there’s usually a lack of high chairs at Boardwalk Pizza & Pasta. As a result, if my son wants spaghetti from here, we’ll take our food over elsewhere (like over to Sonoma Terrace) where there’s a mix of seating options to suit his height.

Disney’s quick-service restaurants can be a pain when dining with a toddler, but they also tend to offer the most variety in seating. So, I recommend scanning the seating options when considering any quick-service establishment. If you have at least two choices, it’s probably a safe place to dine. Plus, high chairs are often tucked inside the restaurant so anyone can grab one.

Bring Your Own Essentials (Like Silverware)

After a few forks and spoons went flying at different Disney Parks restaurants, I realized I just needed to start packing a toddler silverware set in my diaper bag. While plastic silverware tends to work better than a heavy metal set in a pinch, it’s a far safer bet to have a smaller set on hand.

So, I recommend packing a travel set of your kid’s favorite or most frequently used silverware. I go as far as to bring not only a fork and spoon, but also a couple reusable straws. Disney’s paper straws are fine, but they tend to disintegrate – and in the hands of toddlers who are slow to drink their water or tend to chew on the straw, they’ll fall apart even faster. 

In a Pinch, a Bench Is Always a Great Idea

While table height is tricky, there is a convenient alternative scattered all over Disney World and Disneyland: benches. 

If you’re snacking or grabbing a festival bite at EPCOT or California Adventure, benches are the way to go. You don’t have to worry about trying to let your toddler eat in the stroller – an always messy affair – and you don’t have to wander around hunting for an appropriately-sized table. Benches work just fine, as long as you’re not working with something especially messy (don’t ask what happened when I gave my son spaghetti on a bench). I find that, when there are no high chairs available, a bench is usually the better option for quick-service meals, too. If you eliminate the table entirely, odds are there won’t be any frustration over not being able to work with the table. 

There will be more mess, of course, but if your toddler is mostly into finger foods, it’s an almost effortless way to get them to eat without a battle.

Don’t Be Afraid of Fancy or Fine Dining Options at Disney Parks

Lastly, I know toddlers and fine dining sound like a very unlikely pairing. After all, the unpredictability of toddlers during meal time makes a refined restaurant the last place any parent wants to wind up. But in my experience, sometimes splurging on a fancier meal can be just the solution to eating a hot meal yourself.

That’s because Cast Members tend to go above and beyond for everyone in your party when you’re dining at a Fine/Signature Dining Restaurant. Kids are welcome in nearly every one of Disney World’s and Disneyland’s restaurants (there are only a couple of exceptions). And, in my experience, they’re not just tolerated. They’re warmly welcomed.

The first time I took my 18-month-old into a Disney Fine/Signature Dining restaurant, I was terrified. But the Cast Members really made the experience smooth. 

They asked how we’d like my son’s food timed (earlier than the table’s, to let it cool down, or at the same time), for example, and offered extra sides of fruit when they noticed it was all he was eating. When he was too wiggly to sit still and needed to take a few laps outside, they encouraged us to let him hang out in the hallways and struck up conversations with him to help entertain him. And, of course, when frustration hit, they had crayons handy.

While it can be more stressful if you’re a parent who’s worried about disrupting the overall dining experience inside a fancy restaurant, Disney does make it easy for parents to enjoy Fine/Signature Dining. And trust me: The high chairs will be just the right height in these restaurants!