In general, I don't think Universal really has lousy theme park food unless you are just big into health food or high end cooking. For instance, the Three Broomsticks (quick service) in the HP area has a family meal consisting of salad, rotisserie chicken, ribs, roasted potatoes, corn on the cob, and roasted veggies (carrots, broccoli, and red peppers). This was a huge favorite of my kids when they were younger and far from the typical greasy hamburger or hot dog and fries you think of from a theme park.
I recommend taking some time to look through the menus for the quick service restaurants. I feel like some of them may surprise you. Same with the quick service options at the different resorts. It's very easy to hop over to one for dinner. For instance, I keep hearing how amazing and huge the wok bowls are at Aventura. We will probably try them out one night. The pictures I've seen look great.
If possible, I also recommend trying Cowfish for lunch instead of dinner. We went for dinner on a weekend night in November, and it was awful. Extremely crowded, loud, and the service was horrible because they were so busy (slow service, wrong food, drinks sitting empty entire meal). Some of our group also went for lunch that same weekend and said that lunch had been way better.
Something else to keep in mind is that Universal is offering the dine and ride promotion now for Mardi Gras where you get a meal and a seat to ride on one of the parade floats. I'm not sure how popular this promotion is, but it may increase the volume at the 4 restaurants they are offering it at (Lombard's, Cowfish, Finnegan’s, and NBC Sports Grill).
Like you, we will be going the first week of February. Honestly, we are staying a full week on property, and I have not made one reservation yet. I don't plan to until the last minute, probably during the trip on the day of, but there's only two of us. We also don't particularly care where we eat as we have so many favorites and a whole week to fit them all in. I'll just see what is available when we get hungry, but if I had a larger group, I'd make any must do reservations ahead of time just to be safe. Still, it is usually easy to make same day reservations and to change reservations, so you can be quite flexible with your plans. I was able to move and change our plans for our party of 6 in November at the last minute, and all the restaurants were packed, so many people never even bother that reservations sit unclaimed, so don't stress too much.
We usually do a mix of table service, counter service, and snacks during our trips at our favorite places (Three Broomsticks, Leaky Cauldron, Confisco, Mythos, The Kitchen at HRH, Cow Fish, Bubba Gump, RPR Pool Bar, Today Cafe, Dr. Seuss bakery / candy shop, HP bakery/ candy shop, Toothsome (for dessert only, not food)) with our bigger meals at lunch. We then take the leftovers back to the room to save for a snack or dinner later. I'm not a big fan of being in the parks during the most crowded middle part of the day, so we tend to take longer lunch breaks mid-day when the parks are the most crowded and in summer, the hottest. Sometimes in the park. Sometimes in Citywalk or at a resort restaurant.
As far as park hours, I'm expecting the parks to close no later than 7, possibly 6 that week. Universal lists 7 for the last week of January which should be comparable, but Orlando Informer lists 6 for the first week of February. My guess is those are last year's hours. Either way, the parks will most likely close early unless there is a concert. Universal still has not announced the concert dates. If there isn't a concert, I expect Citywalk to be crazy busy at park close with everyone leaving right at the same time at 6 or 7 and wanting dinner, so I would definitely plan for reservations for that time. Parks closed at 7 in November and reservations were needed. Personally, after our November experience, I think we will try to avoid Citywalk at night and either eat quick service, at resort restaurants, eat leftovers in the room, or do room-service, but I get that those probably aren't great options for a family only there for the weekend.
I'd go ahead and plan dinner reservations for around 7 / 7:15. If the parks close at 7, you only need to leave a few minutes early to make your reservation. If the parks end up closing at 6, take the time to go look in the giant Universal gift shop in Citywalk, take a bathroom break, go show the kids the Berlin Wall behind Hardrock, take some pictures, etc. 45 minutes will fly by, and souvenir shopping not during park hours is a better use of time anyway when you only have the weekend for the trip. The other option is make early reservations around 5 or 5:30 to beat the crowds, but then you'll be forfeiting sometime in the parks that you might not want to miss. Last option is to make lunch reservations which I think will provide you better service overall but will definitely eat into the most park time. There are quick service options in Citywalk you can eat for dinner as well, but I'm not sure they are quite as good as the options inside the parks.
Hopefully, I haven't confused you too much.
