Erin Foster, our Disney Food for Families columnist, is back with another useful post about making food when staying in the Disney Vacation Club villas!
In part one of The DVC Villa Kitchens series, I showed you the tools you’ll have to work with if you’re cooking in a Walt Disney World Vacation Club villa kitchen. Here in part two, I’m going to show you what foods you’ll have ready access to cook.
Beach Club one-bedroom villa kitchen and dining area
If you have a car, your own or a rental, you can easily make a stop at a local supermarket to get any of your favorite food items. There are also a number of local Orlando area services that will deliver grocery items to your hotel. Among the most popular of these is Garden Grocer at gardengrocer.com. I’ll get to exploring those options in my next post. For now, I’m going to go over what types of foods you’ll typically find for sale at your WDW resort hotel.
What Groceries Will I Find At My Disney Vacation Club Resort?
The good news for guests wanting to do some bare bones cooking during their vacation is that the resorts that house the villa-style rooms all have a mini convenience store section in their gift shops and all DVC resorts also offer guests the chance to order groceries ahead of time to be in the room when they arrive.
The foods and supplies listed below can be found at the Disney World resorts that host Disney Vacation Club villas: Animal Kingdom Lodge, Beach Club, Boardwalk, Contemporary (Bay Lake Tower), Old Key West, Saratoga Springs, and Wilderness Lodge.
Typically, the items you’ll find in the convenience store at the resort are the same items you can pre-order using the resort’s grocery order form.
Of course guests staying at any WDW property are welcome to make purchases at these shops. There may be slight variations on brand or package size of each item depending on when you travel, but in ten years of two to five annual DVC resort stays per year, I have found the overall offerings to be very consistent.
Breakfast
You can count on finding all the fixins for an American-style breakfast, from simple toast and fruit to hardier helpings of eggs and bacon. Breakfast items typically available include:
- Boxed cereal, regular and single-serve sizes
- Frozen waffles
- Loaf bread: white and wheat
- English muffins
- Boxed pancake mix
- Maple-flavored syrup
- Quick oatmeal
- Boxed grits
- Frozen toaster waffles
- Bacon
- Butter
- Cream cheese
- Fresh eggs
- Yoplait yogurt
- Pop tarts
- Fruit: single apples, oranges, and bananas
- Packaged bagels
- Boxed Entenmann’s doughnuts
Boxed donuts and pastries
Bread, English muffins, hot dog and hamburger buns
Cereal
Packaged goods for Lunch/Dinner
Most of the selection here is shelf-stable or frozen. With the exception of bread and fruit, not much is perishable.
- Canned ravioli and Spaghettios
- Canned baked beans
- Jarred peanut butter and jelly
- Boxed dry pasta
- Jarred pasta sauce
- Canned soup
- Boxed crackers
- Canned tuna
- Boxed macaroni and cheese mix
- Hot pockets or frozen burritos
- Frozen pizza
- Frozen French fries or tater tots
- Single serve and “family size” frozen dinners such as fried chicken, macaroni & cheese, lasagna or chicken nuggets
- Hot dogs
- Packaged sliced luncheon meats: turkey, ham, bologna, salami
- Sliced and chunk cheese
- Single serve size prepared green salad
- Cut fruit cup
- Hamburger and hotdog buns
- Canned peas
Frozen savories
Refrigerated dairy and protein
Packaged goods
Snacks and Desserts
- Microwave popcorn
- Lay’s potato chips
- Doritos
- Fritos
- Vanilla wafers
- Boxed Entenmann’s cookies
- Smartfood
- Beef jerky
- Jarred salsa
- Jarred cheese sauce
- Single-serve novelty ice cream bars
- Pints of ice cream
- Many Disney-branded sweets
- Many Disney-branded crunchy snacks
Munchies
Typical Disney-branded snacks and sweets
Beverages
- Supermarket quality wine
- Small bottles of spirits: vodka, gin, rum, tequila, etc.
- Mixers: Club soda, tonic, ginger ale
- Domestic and imported beers
- Tea bags
- Half & half
- Half gallons: orange juice, whole milk, skim milk, 1% milk
- Single servings: chocolate milk, strawberry milk, soy milk, orange juice, apple juice, grapefruit juice, cranberry juice, V8
- Single servings: Coca Cola family soft drinks – Coke, Diet Coke, Vitamin Water, Nestea iced tea, Minute Maid lemonade, Powerade, Dasani water, Barq’s root beer
- Two liter: Coke, Diet Coke, Sprite
- Gallon-size bottled water
- Folgers ground coffee
- Instant coffee powder
Refrigerated beverage case
A selection of spirits
Other Supplies
Because I am evil, I’m personally not above improvising some of the items from the list below by using what’s available at the resort quick-service restaurants. For example, if I just need one little smear of mustard for a hot dog, I feel comfortable taking a single-serve mustard packet from the quick serve condiment racks. However, if you’re feeding a crowd, it makes sense to go ahead and buy the bottle.
- Paper plates, bowls, cups
- Plastic forks, knives, spoons
- Zip top bags
- Jarred baby food
- Good Start baby formula
- Condiments: ketchup, mustard, relish, mayonnaise, shaker-style parmesan cheese, salt & pepper, BBQ sauce, steak sauce
- Chocolate syrup
- Jarred pickle slices
- Vegetable oil
- Charcoal briquettes
- Sugar and equal
- Styrofoam cooler
- Paper napkins
- Garbage bags
- Aluminum foil
- Plastic wrap
- Coffee filters
Supplemental supplies on the lower shelves
What’s Missing
A glance at this list quickly tells you what you WON’T find at the DVC resort shops: vegetables, fresh meat, spices, baking ingredients, and ethnic foods.
If you want to cook in your DVC villas using those items, you’ll have to go off property to find them. I also haven’t mentioned what the convenience of grocery shopping at your resort will cost you. More on that in the next post in this series.
Stay tuned!
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We have only stayed at a villa one time but we ALWAYS get grocery delivery. We use WEGOSHOP.com but there are a couple others out there also. What we save on bottled water alone pays the delivery fee. They will also bring you wine and beer for the same delivery price.
I love convenience but honestly the prices that the resort stores charge is outrageous for some items. For example, an 8 mini box pack of cereal that you can get at your local grocer for $2.50 to $4 can be purchased at a Disney resort store for $10. Garden Grocer at least has it for $5. Perishables are the tough thing that cannot be packed so the Garden Grocer or resort store depending on your needs is good to have available.
We always stay at a DVC villa for the full kitchen to save a bundle of money on food. We pack lots of dry goods such as mini cereal pack, oatmeal, bread, coffee, and drink mix packs and replace that space with Disney souvenirs when we return home. We also don’t being down as much clothes because we have a washer & dryer in our unit so we can do as much laundry as we want before returning home.
It’s not very expensive to even take a taxi to a grocery store. We usually rent a car when we are in Orlando. Last time we were there we didn’t and it cost $10 to get to the Super Walmart to buy some groceries by taxi. We don’t buy many groceries from the resort, because of the prices and lack of selection i.e. vegetables, fruit etc. It’s nice to be able to make breakfast and lunch and then head out for dinner.
Another excellent article on this topic! I usually stay in a studio and eat breakfast in my room. I don’t usually rent a car, so I’m limited to what I can pack in my suitcase. I usually have instant oatmeal, applesauce, hot tea and (sometimes) string cheese. It works out rather well, actually!
Really great look on the topic. I remember being in Florida for Holiday and we had to go the market late at night to get everything we needed since our flight came in late.
I have also heard suggestions of sending food to your hotel room before time, as well as a few places that will send food to your room. Looking forward to the next post! 😉
Food in the Resort shops is very expensive. We paid $4.15 for a loaf of bread! We go to Walmart and stock up when we arrive.
Not sure if it’s the same in all Studios, but we only had paper plates and bowls in our BLT Studio, which we ran out of towards the end. Cutlery was plastic, but cups and glasses were real ones. Normal plates, etc in our Bwk one-bed villa.
Thanks for sharing, but I never buy at those stores unless I’m desperate! Save money by going to Whole Foods, Walmart, or Publix right off I-4 on the way to Disney!
Bridget – All the scoop on pricing and delivery services coming in my next DVC kitchens post. Stay tuned.
CJ – I’ll also be covering the bring-your-own-food topic. Thanks for the ideas on things to bring.
Jenna – We rarely rent a car. And you’re not the only person I’ve heard of that travels with cheese.
Josh – The Disney shops do tend to close by 10:00 or 11:00 p.m. If you’re arriving later and want groceries, you will have to go off site.
Jo – As I mentioned in the first DVC villas post, disposable plates, bowls and cutlery are standard in the studios. If you need more, you can buy them in the store or just ask for a few extras at the resort quick service counter.
Erin,
These posts have been very helpful, Thanks! We are staying in a 1 bedroon villa at the BW in August, so excited! One quick question, do they supply any coffee filters or do you need to get your own? Looking forward to REAL coffee at Disney.
I’ve never stayed in a villa or studio but we did stay in a family suite at ASMu a couple of times. The last time, I placed an order with Garden Grocer and it was a great experience. It was nice having everything delivered (including produce, yay).
I’m really enjoying this series, Erin. I had no idea that this variety was available on any Disney property. That’s probably because we’re always at Pop, where there’s a food court…;). Still, this heads into my ‘things to contemplate about DVC’ file.
Great article Erin – Very informative and loved the photos!
Love this! When you Part 3 be posted? Looking forward to it 🙂