Character meals at Walt Disney World can be a bit of a mixed bag. On one hand, the food scene at Disney is often unmatched. It really has become a high-quality foodie destination with some world-class restaurants and stellar dishes.

Character meals, though? Most of them are breakfast buffets with your typical breakfast buffet fare. Though the food is good, it’s hardly the point of the meal. In other words, families don’t go to a character meal for the food.

They’re also often on the pricey side, but if you have kids who want to “meet and greet” various characters or maybe get an autograph, you can knock out a few A-list characters in one meal and not have to waste time queuing up inside the parks. This was the selling point for us.

I really wanted to like the Lilo & Stitch character breakfast at the Polynesian Resort. Stitch is a personal favorite of mine, and the little Roarbots love meeting characters. However, we were coming off of a 17-hour day in the Magic Kingdom the day before. The kids were on very little sleep, and they just weren’t feeling it. I fully admit this was on us.

We showed up late for our reservation time, and I was worried we wouldn’t even get seated. We were told to wait, however, and we did eventually get a table. The staff kicked up very little fuss for our being about 45 minutes late, which was nice.

The buffet at ‘Ohana is unique in that there’s no actual buffet. Skillets of food are brought to your table. They’ve given the food cute Hawaiian names to make it sound more exotic–hua paka (scrambled eggs), uala kahiki (friend potatoes), and pua’a (sausage links and bacon). Ubiquitous Mickey waffles are also on the menu, of course, to remind you that you’re eating breakfast at Walt Disney World. So far, it’s all pretty standard fare.

There are a couple standout items on the menu, though. They are the items that are unique to this location: pineapple bread and a special juice that is a blend of orange, pineapple, and guava. That juice? Amazing.

The meal is billed as “all you care to eat,” but the selection is noticeably slimmer than other places. There are almost no healthy options—no fruit, cereal, yogurt, etc. With four people, we ate what was included in the skillet, but, disappointingly, we were never offered seconds. We had to repeatedly ask to get a simple refill on the juice.

Perhaps we were just there at a particularly busy time. However, we visited two other character breakfasts that same week and didn’t have any service issues with either of them.

Still, as I said, one does not go to a character meal for the food. The characters are the stars here. Mickey and Pluto were there in Hawaiian garb, along with both Lilo and Stitch. All four make the rounds and visit every table, pausing for hugs, high-fives, photos, and autographs.

If you’re obsessive about characters, I do have to admit that this is a great meal to see some unique ones.

• Mickey and Pluto seem to be almost everywhere, but their Hawaiian versions (in Hawaiian shirts and leis) are exclusive to this event.
• Stitch pops up in both the Magic Kingdom and Hollywood Studios, but he typically has very long lines.
• Lilo, however, is a bit of a rarity, which makes this meal all the more enticing. (Apparently, she also appears at Typhoon Lagoon, though I’m not sure with what regularity that occurs.)

Lilo is also one of the few human characters (maybe the only?) who isn’t a “face character.” In other words, you don’t see the actual person in the costume (like you do with the Princesses). Her head is huge, and it’s a bit disconcerting. The kids loved her, though, and that’s what counts.

Several times during the meal, one (or more) of the characters leads a parade around the restaurant, and all the kids are invited to join in. It’s a great excuse for them to jump up and stretch their legs (and digest some of that hua paka).

If you’ve never been to the Polynesian, it’s certainly worth a visit by itself, despite the current construction in the lobby. The ‘Ohana restaurant is also very cool with an open kitchen design that the kids really dug.

Verdict? At the time, this character breakfast was the biggest disappointment of our trip. I wonder how much of that was due to our exhaustion from the previous day, though. This does seem to be many people’s favorite character meal in all of Walt Disney World. So who am I to argue?

We’d certainly be willing to give it another shot.

The character meal is during breakfast only, from 7:30-11 am. Advanced reservations are highly recommended. Prices vary by age and time of year but should be in the $15-$30/person range.