ADR's!!!

Sounds like an amazing sampling of the best at WDW.

Right after Thanksgiving is such a great time to visit WDW! My DH and I go every year around that time. Your trip sounds great.
There are just a few things I might suggest to get the most out of your dining plan. First, Liberty Tree Tavern in MK, is a table service credit, so you couldn't use a Quick service credit there. The same goes for Via Napoli in Epcot. They are also a table service credit. IMO, Les Halles Boulangerie & Patisserie is a great choice for a Quick service credit meal in Epcot.

I would suggest if you are having breakfast at Starring Rolls in HS, most of their pastries are about $3.00. Even if you get a cupcake for breakfast~which I HIGHLY recommend, especially the Red Velvet , they are about $5.00. I'm not sure, but the cupcakes might even be included as a snack credit. If they aren't you may want to pay out of pocket at Starring Rolls and save your Quick service credit for a more expensive meal later.

I would also say that since you are both foodies, you have limited time, and you want most of your vacation to be planned around eating experiences, leave lots of time open for the World Showcase in Epcot. The WS is a foodie's paradise. There are so many options for food and drinks. My DH and I love to walk around WS and get a few snacks from several different countries, and make a meal out of the various snacks. It's our favorite way to eat dinner in WDW. If are looking for a great breakfast on your Epcot day, we love to have a pastry for breakfast from Les Halles Boulangerie & Patisserie in France in the WS. They are awesome! But, the WS doesn't open until 11:00am so if you're there earlier, I would recommend the cronut. When they are fresh, they are better than any funnel cake I've ever had. You can get the cronut starting at 9:00am.

Hope you have a wonderful vacation.

Hello Shawna Lee and welcome to WDWForGrownups. We will be in WDW at the same time, great week to go. Some some advice though, V & A is a lot of food & the Chefs table is a whole lot of food! I would recommend not eating to much food for lunch. The Chefs Table is a 10 course, 3 hour long meal and I would not want to waste any of it.

Hi Shawna Lee and welcome. The only piece of advice I can give is don't eat the day you do Chef's Table. Did it last year for my 50th and it is a fantastic experience but you get a lot of food and although the portions are small you get very very full. I was fine until the final dessert which was a chocolate mousse. I took one mouthful and did puffer fish impression! (Feeling fine to feeling overfull in one mouthful) We had to decline the chocolates(which they packed up for us) and waddled out of there.

I second Les Halles for counter service! Such Via Napoli is Table Service, you may consider paying for it on your own and splitting a pizza. That is a specialty for them as they import the special water they use in mixing the dough. As Annie said, there is much food to enjoy in Epcot, and splitting a pizza will give you more room to sample other goodies! YUM!

I absolutely agree with these comments!! We've done V&A several times and going in with a healthy appetite is a must!! I would recommend a hearty late breakfast, high in protein (eggs, etc) and then a light snack only if you really need it in the mid afternoon! That breakfast will get you through your day and set you up to be really ready for dinner!! Victoria and Albert's is an experience you don't want to waste!!

Exactly what I was going to say. I think our "serves 2-3" pizza was $31 and we ate half and took half home for dinner that night. Of course, maybe you want not pizza, in which case, it's a bit pricier, but still reasonable relative to other table service meals if you have to do it out of pocket. While I love La Cantina (taco fanatic), I agree that Les Halles is about as good as it gets for World Showcase counter service. They have a very extensive menu and their new location is SO much better for traffic flow and efficiency.

Also, even though your trip will be food-centric, you happen to be visiting during one of the most beautiful seasons on property! If you can make it work with your touring schedule, try to get back to DHS in the evening after dinner to see the Osbourne Spectacle of Dancing Lights. Also, the hotel lobbies are decorated particularly beautifully at AKL/Grand Floridian (where you'll already be), Beach Club, Boardwalk, Contemporary, and Wilderness Lodge. If you can make time, check them out. Be sure to grab a times guide at EPCOT. After Thanksgiving, Holidays Around the World begins at EPCOT and they are both fascinating and fantastically delivered! Each story is about 10 minutes long, but the schedules are different for each country and there are some overlaps and break periods on the schedule. In one day, you won't be able to catch them all, but based on our experience, I would prioritize in this order: Italy, Morocco, Norway, Germany, UK, France. Japan and Mexico were ok, but if you have to give them up to see the others, do it. I would skip US and Canada (not terribly well done last year) and even with three days at EPCOT, we missed China, so I can't comment on that one.

My understanding is that your credits can be used up until midnight on your check out day.

That is correct.

Some restaurants you must, must, must reserve as soon as the 180-day window for making reservations begins. Even at a time of year when crowds are low. That's probably why you couldn't get Cinderella's Royal Table and had to do some juggling with some of your other ADRs.

CCP's assessment is spot on. Some places are booked within an hour or so at the 180 mark, but what does happen is that during the slower times, you may luck into an opening if someone has to back out of their reservation for one reason or another. For example, one of the hottest tickets in dining is Be Our Guest. Last December during the same week that you are traveling, I was checking for a last minute same-day ADR for Tony's and Be Our Guest popped up as available for that night. So keep checking for Cinderella's Royal Table. You may get lucky!!

Another thing to note is that the traditional "slow seasons" are rapidly disappearing off the calendar as Disney adds more special events. Aside from mid-week (which was so amazingly slow that I walked-on nearly a dozen MK rides in less than 3 hours on a Tuesday morning), we found the first week of December to feel more crowded than the last week of August, which is a typical time for us to take a trip. Thanksgiving was late last year, so we hit the end of Thanksgiving and the Pop Warner kiddie football/cheerleading thing was the following weekend, so we ran into large groups of scantly supervised adolescents. That being said, we have also been in MK on New Year's Eve when the park was at capacity at 10am. Relative to that, the first week of December was practically empty. Incidentally, we also somehow managed to score a walk-up for Cinderella's Royal Table that day. (Of course, it was our honeymoon, so that might have been Disney magic.) But you never know. Don't count yourself out just because you miss an ADR at 180 days.

I agree with the others - keep trying if it's something you really want.

I have also found that how you search for a reservation matters. On more than one occasion, a search for "dinner" reservations comes up empty, but a search for "7:00pm" reservations comes up with options within an hour either way.

The Ghirardelli Ice Cream & Chocolate Shop at DTD has some amazing sundaes. Several sundaes have cookies in them. If you like really rich, filling sundaes, they are #1

If you are in MK and you want a cookie ice cream sandwich, Sleepy Hollow's are great. They are two big cookies with ice cream in the middle.

Beaches and cream also do nice sundaes! And you can use your dining plan in there

Storybook Treats at MK (Fantasyland) also has a cookie sundae. It was good

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That looks incredible, Spook!