boatseller

Here's the thing, in the current DD focused setup, all work during service hours is dedicated to production. All prep work must have been completed, like slicing carrots, between services. This allows the galley crew to prep and plate on demand so pan to table is relatively short, as you would find on land.

To prepare for a large single seating, they look at it like a banquet where everything is served at once. The problem with this is you cannot prepare 2200 meals all at once. To optimize this pattern, managers have to guess how many of each dish will be ordered and plate ahead of time. This means your Chicken Cordon Bleu may sit for an hour or more after plating. You really don't want that. (Those fancy covers aren't to keep the food hot, they are so the plates will stack.)

Anyway, the Traditional vs DD is entirely a software problem. The user should be presented 4 slots, say 6, 7, 8 and 9pm and you are assigned a rotation, same table number in all venues. Similar to how Disney does it.

On my last 4 cruises, Dynamic, Anytime or Freestyle, I/we have never waited more than 5 minutes for a table without a res.

True, and it would be interesting of someone on a longer sailing could try ordering from another menu. The POS clearly supports this so there's no technical limitation. China might be an issue, but overcomeable.

I recall another post where someone stated this is possible, except Coastal Kitchen as it had an isolated galley.

Either way, I was more (educated) speculating on the venue optimization DD offers rather than menu choices.

It was at least open very, very late, like 0330.

If they are cleaning (pressure washers) you might not want to be in there though.

I believe that is incorrect.

It was exactly that way on the March 4 sailing. 8 appetizers, 8 mains, 4 or 8 desserts. 4 themes (2 per).

The venues share the same galley so it would actually be harder to segregate the menus. Besides, having only two options would draw more ire then DD.

Norwegian's Breakaway class is the same with all three MDR's sharing the same menu and galley.

On a related note, each venue, except American Icon oddly, had a dedicated themed cocktail menu.

On Anthem, the same menu is offered in all four MDR's. The items are themed and grouped by venue, but you are in no way required to stick to the current venue's specialties. Meaning, one can select an item from The Grand menu while sitting in Chic.

The problem they were likely trying to overcome with DD is unused capacity where a table would go completely unused for the entire sitting because the reserving party elected to not show up, basically cutting utilization in half. If a table can be turned 3 or 4 times during dinner, a reasonable goal for most restaurants, dining capacity increases and venue size decreases. This is why the MDR's have a capacity of roughly 1/3 pax count and feel relatively small compared to other ships.

The number of tables has likely not decreased, just moved from MDR venues to specialty venues, Wonderland, Chops, etc.

I'd bet a whole $1 that they could have saved themselves a lot of grief if they just never mentioned changing from sittings to reservations. Instead, when pax requests a seating, the floor management app just makes a rotating res at the same time every night. To the restaurant, all tables are Anytime tables.

Since Anthem has been in port for 2 days now, is it possible/realistic that the staterooms will be ready at boarding time instead of in the afternoon?