Cinderella’s Royal Table Review: Why It’s Still Worth It
Of all the restaurants and dining experiences at Walt Disney World, it’s tough to beat Cinderella’s Royal Table in terms of location.
Located inside of the Magic Kingdom’s Cinderella Castle, guests at Cinderella’s Royal Table can enjoy breakfast, lunch, or dinner in a medieval-style banquet hall with stained glass windows overlooking Fantasyland!
Once upon a time, Cinderella, the Fairy Godmother, and a rotating array of other Disney royals would meet with guests at their table; however, at the time of writing, only Cinderella makes a socially-distanced appearance.
When passing through the castle breezeway from Main Street, U.S.A., guests will find the check-in desk and entrance for Cinderella’s Royal Table to their right as they enter Fantasyland. Once inside, guests can reach the dining room via a winding staircase or elevator.
What You Need To Know
Now, Cinderella’s Royal Table is considered a signature dining experience meaning it’s one of the pricier options within the park and around Walt Disney World. It’s also one of the more difficult dining reservations to secure; however, thanks to Be Our Guest, it’s not as impossible as it once was in years prior and there is a walk-up list on the My Disney Experience app.
Guests can also make their dining reservations on the My Disney Experience app or on the Disney World Dining website. However, if you’re already within that 60-day window, check out our handy TouringPlans Reservation Finder!
At the time of writing, the restaurant is open for breakfast, lunch, and dinner, but its opening and closing hours tend to vary. Be aware that you must have a Magic Kingdom theme park pass reservation to enjoy Cinderella’s Royal Table, and an Annual Pass discount of 10% is available.
Despite Cinderella’s Royal Table’s popularity, the food has long been considered fine – not bad, not amazing, just adequate. But has this changed now that Cinderella’s Royal Table is no longer a character meal? Is it still worth that coveted reservation and the price?
Our Experience
To answer that question, our park reporter Chrissy visited Cinderella’s Royal Table to check out its fixed-price dinner to see just how enjoyable this fairytale feast could be.
Dinner was priced at $62 per adult and consisted of an appetizer, entree, and dessert. For kids, the meal was priced at $37 per child (ages 3 – 9) and came with the option of two sides in addition to an appetizer, entree, and a dessert.
Upon entering the banquet hall with its rich tapestries and stone archways, Chrissy and her party were seated right by the stained glass windows!
While the views don’t get much better than this, there was a downside.
Since Cinderella has to greet guests from a distance, the tables near the windows are actually the farthest away from the princess. It’s something to be aware of if a Cinderella sighting is a priority for you and yours.
Appetizers
Heirloom Tomato Salad
The menu describes this item as mixed heirloom tomatoes, roasted pork belly, bleu cheese mousse, candied walnuts, and a balsamic vinegar gelée.
According to Chrissy, the salty pork belly and sweet tomatoes paired with the vinegar makes this dish something special.
Entrees
Pan-Seared Sea Scallops
This pasta with sauteed onions, mushrooms, garlic, and a parmesan cream sauce was Chrissy’s server’s pick for an entree, and she was wise. This dish was perfectly cooked, filling, and delicious.
Tenderloin of Beef
In our opinion, the Sauce Bordelaise remains the best sauce on property. Seriously, even if you order something else, make sure someone at your table gets the beef so you can taste this sauce.
It also comes with a side of whipped potatoes, maple-glazed brussels sprouts, and seasonal veggies.
Desserts
Chrissy noted that this was the second visit where she and hers couldn’t decide on a dessert and the second time a sweet server just brought out everything. All were gorgeously plated and scrumptious, and she’s happy to report that you can’t go wrong.
This clock-shaped dessert is appropriately called “The Clock Strikes Twelve” is a dark chocolate mousse with caramel, a crunchy praline center, and comes with chocolate sauce and hazelnut gelato.
Next was the Coffee Pots de Creme, a plant-based treat consisting of coffee-infused coconut custard with chocolate-espresso beans.
Lastly, Jaq & Gus is a cheesecake with seasonal flavors and garnishes!Drinks
As one of the many anniversary-themed items available through Walt Disney World, Cinderella’s Royal Table features the Royal 50th Celebration Flight – a trio of champagne cocktails using Enchantée Champagne.
It was a fun way for grown-ups to toast a special occasion – like getting a reservation here!Souvenirs
Being the hostess that she is, Cinderella has made sure her guests won’t leave empty-handed but with three souvenirs: a wishing star, an autograph card, and a wand or sword.
Are they small things? Yes; but they make a special setting even more exceptional.
Final Thoughts
Whether it’s the setting and views, the food, or the small, thoughtful touches, we predict you’ll love dining here. It’s pricey, but it remains one of our favorites and a truly memorable, fairytale experience.
Have you dined at Cinderella’s Royal Table? What did you think? Let us know in the comments!
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It seems WDW is gouging families and giving less n less. This will be our last time going I can tell you that.
Offering characters to make kids happy cost Disney ZERO DOLLARS.
WDW makes billions a month, and they are getting greedier by the year.
From all the reviews it seems to be a waste of money and time. I took my niece in 2019 and crt was so worth it. A one on one with Cinderella and all the other princesses came around to each table for hugs and photos. Wands and special waving for special wishes. Now, it’s 3 years later and I’m taking my granddaughter and was hoping for the same experience but it seems Disneyworld has taken the magic out of the park
We dined at Cinderellas Royal table last week. There were 0 princesses and the cost was still the same. There’s a beautiful entry for which at least one princess could greet guests, but it was empty. Without princesses, they added more tables. We were rather squished. The menu on paper was similar to Be our guest but food was different. There were no sea scallops offered as in your post. The clock strikes 12 chocolate dessert was good, but the cheesecake was awful. The view is the back side of the castle. The staff could have offered a bit more theatrics with 0 princesses. We were very rushed. It was loud with all of the tables and people. It was not the enjoyable experience that I had hoped it would be. I knew there wouldn’t be a princess the weekend of, but when we left I felt we had not had the experience that we deserved for the price.
We recently had breakfast at this venue (I think on the same day as Chrissy), and I believe that to be a better value. We got a good, hearty meal to start our day, the kids were happy with Mickey waffles, and the price is lower than a fancy-pants dinner. That said, we also did a breakfast a few years ago pre-pandemic when they had FOUR princesses greet each table for pictures and autographs AND you got to meet Cinderella for a formal photo session. THAT was definitely worth the money spent. Here’s hoping that time will come again. But like Chrissy said, in these times, what we recently received was still worth it.
I just returned home yesterday from taking my elementary school aged daughter to WDW for the first time. We spent four days at the theme parks, two of which were spent at Magic Kingdom. We had reservations for BOG for lunch on one day, and we had reservations for CRT for breakfast on the other day. We kept our BOG reservation and had a lovely meal there (and my daughter was greeted at her table by the beast, which was very cool). I struggled with whether or not to cancel or keep our CRT breakfast reservation. We ultimately opted to cancel it, on the basis that my daughter wanted to spend more time exploring the other attractions at MK, rather than to have a “fancy meal” with a “socially distanced” princess. Particularly since we had already enjoyed the BOG experience, we figured our time was better spent enjoying more of the MK attractions than doing another fine dining experience at MK. Perhaps if and when we go back to MK again someday hopefully the “socially distanced” covid protocols will be dropped and we will be able to enjoy CRT at that time.
My family of seven (six adults and a 6 yr old) had dinner at the Castle two weeks ago to celebrate my granddaughter’s 6th birthday. The best part of the dinner was being so close to where Cinderella came out to the dining room. The food was ok but none of us were overly impressed and would have liked some additional choices. If you have a seafood allergy, your choices are limited to just a couple items. Our little one liked the beef and the cupcake…. That was all she ate….. For $37!!! Our server was very sweet but we were not impressed with the dinner and probably would not book again. We also cancelled our lunch reservation at Be Our Guest due to the price and same type of food.
My partner and I had breakfast here several years ago. It was a fun experience, though the food isn’t memorable. Like Space 220, it’s something we checked off our list but won’t do again. Without tableside character visits I wouldn’t bother.
This review makes sense from the perspective of an adult who enjoys fine dining. It would probably make a lovely date night. However, consider the plight of my family of 6, which is 2 adults and 4 children age 10+ who Disney nevertheless considers to be “adults”. For 6 “adults”, the cost is $372 plus tax and tip, so well north of $400.
And yet, my 10-year old is going to want nothing to do with balsamic vinegar gelee, sea scallops, or sauce bordelaise. He’s going to want chicken fingers or pepperoni pizza, so the $62 (plus tax and tip) is largely wasted on him, and probably on the 12- and 13-year olds as well. That’s $400+ for a bunch of fancy-pants food the kids don’t want to eat and a distant view of Cinderella as she appears across the room. I don’t think this is even close to being worth the extreme cost.
And it’s not just Cinderella’s Royal Table. Disney has ruined many of their table service restaurants for families (including Be Our Guest) with the combination of prix fixe pricing and a bizarre definition of “adult” that prices most families out!
I’m willing to bet Disney servers would be happy to allow 12 and 13 year olds (and likely even older) to order mac ‘n’ cheese or chicken nuggets off the kids’ menu as long as they paid adult prices!
But you are right about pricing many families out. But Disney has the luxury of doing that at a venue that often was booked solid 180 days in advance prior to the pandemic.
For me and my family, this food is a bit too fancy, not to mention too expensive. I’m not even sure if I could tell you if it tasted good or not!