Decline of buffet quality, especially in evening?

In the past 2 years, we have cruised Celebrity 4 times with our 2 adult sons--Eclipse and Equinox in the Caribbean, Silhouette in the Baltic, and most recently on Millie from Vancouver to Seward, returning a week ago. Our sons prefer to eat the evening meal in the buffet, because they prefer casual dress, eating at their own pace, being in control of their portions, and trying new and varied combinations of food. Up to the last Millie cruise, they had been delighted with the buffet, both lunch and dinner, but we all were extremely disappointed with the buffet in Millie.

I know that Millie carries fewer passengers and the buffet layout is different compared to Solstice class ships, but that can't explain the difference. I had trouble finding appetizing lunch offerings, often resorting to a tuna salad sandwich. Often the entrees were some sort of mystery meat floating in an oily sauce, and some of the evening entrees appeared to be warmed-over lunch entrees. (The sign posting "gourmet entrees" was a joke.) No daily Mexican offerings (fajitas and tacos) on Millie but lots of weird Asian entrees. I know Millie had just returned from Asia, and it looked like they were trying to get rid of their Asian food.

We have an Australia/NZ cruise booked on the Solstice for later this year, but our sons say they will not go or they want us to change to another cruise line. The cruise food is pretty important to them, and they would not want to face 2 weeks of food like the recent cruise.

Has anyone else observed a decline of buffet offerings, especially on Solstice?

Thanks in advance......

The mclass ships, being smaller, have more limited offerings. Did you talk to the food/beverage management about your concerns? Often they are able to create, or offer, alternatives.

That being said, you should find Solstice similar to the other S class ships you are used to.

While I appreciate their attempt at variety, I think they need to ease off the "world tour" fare that dominates the tables. Not everyone wants Sri Lankan, Indonesian, and Indian every meal, which seemed to be the case on our last couple of sailings. There are only so many stations, especially on M-class, so the "variety" isn't so varied in the end.

Just off the Equinox and the Buffet was fairly similar to my other S class cruises. I was on the Millie April 2016 and also thought it wasnt as good as the S class ships. I didn't see anything as bad as you describe but it was not S-class in variety or quality.

I have always found the food in the buffet to me great on Celebrity ... much better than other lines as a matter of fact.

We were on the Equinox in February and the Solstice in May and both had very good food in their buffets....but fair warning, I've also thought the food on the M class ships was excellent as well.

We were on the April/May trans-Pacific on the Millie and agree about the buffet. But, the main diningroom food was excellent (when we followed the advice of our waiter). There is no need to dress up anymore and we really enjoyed the variety and quality of dinner in the dining room. Choose select dining so you aren't tied to a time and give the dining room a chance, you can always go back to the buffet if you aren't pleased.

Theme nights can be interesting. On Equinox in February one night they custom prepared ceviche and another they cooked crepes to order. If you're not into that all X ships offer fresh grilled beef / chicken / pork / fish and a variety of pastas and sauces. For years we enjoyed the sushi, but sadly no more.

What we have found disappointing is how repetitive the lunch buffet on some ships has become. Same proteins cooked same way day after day. There are hundreds of ways to cook chicken, need to use some imagination.

I can only speak to the buffet for lunch, and IMHO the M class offerings are in serious decline from years past. On our recent Infinity Panama Canal crossing, we ate there several times for lunch (we often skipped lunch). I was very disappointed in the offerings to say the least. I was yearning for the good Mexican options often found on S class but they were few and far between. I also felt there were a lot of Asian offerings, most often Indian type food. Nothing against that food or the people but I personally don't like it and I didn't understand why there was so much of it! (for the record, the previous cruise was in South America, and the passengers onboard were primarily German, Canadian, and US ). From what I observed, I was not the only one not fond of those particular options day after day after day. The pizza was awful (I admit being spoiled as I am used to fabulous Chicago pizza, but still....). What used to be the sandwich bar in the back was half pasta, and half sandwich with primarily mystery meat, tuna salad, egg salad and little else. Ugh! Loved, loved, loved the cruise but the buffet - not up to my standards for sure.

Lots of pasta and rice....... basically cheap high carb foods with diff flavors for mass feedings...,,Also, the sandwiich area not as good as it was in the past.

Bufffet food will be an extreme disappointment low quality cheap food.

I'm not a fan of Oceanview lunch buffet (on S class) but was looking forward to trying it for dinner on my next cruise as I read it was a completely different experience with grilled to order steaks, seafood. Hoping this hasn't changed recently.

We just finished the 18 night Sydney to Honolulu cruise last month. The buffet on the Solstice was the best we have ever had. I loved the grilled to order steaks, chicken and salmon in the evening. The stir fries were very good and the pasta station had lots of choices. We mainly ate dinner in Blu but the few times we ate in the Oceanview it was very good.

Selected at random

From 2011

I found the food on the Century to be inedible. I was shocked that this was actually a Celebrity ship, as we had been on the Millenium and Solstice twice and enjoyed the food. For us, it really was "that bad"

From 2008

I'm one of those who love Celebrity and in the "early days", when I was cruising Crystal pretty much exclusively, I tried Celebrity with my family and was very pleasantly surprised by the quality of food on X. The menus were very good and varied, the ingredients were high quality, and the presentation was lovely. BUT, in the past couple of years, I have seen that the food has deteriorated to a degree. The cuts of meat aren't as high quality, taste and menu choices have gone down in both the main dining room and even more in the buffet area. I love fish, and I don't know if the problem is with purchasing lower quality of seafood, or poor preparation, but on my last two X cruises, I've found the fish to be poorly prepared and in the case of the tuna steak, it was so dry it was inedible. I think the same can be said for some of their beef options. The NY Strip was tough as shoe leather and you needed a hacksaw to cut through it. While X used to compare quite favorably with Crystal in terms of food, that's no longer the case, unfortunately.

 

I'm wondering, is there a correlation between the advent of the extra cost alternate dining venus and the decline in the food in the main dining room?

Been declining for ever apparently ;)

Lots of pasta and rice....... basically cheap high carb foods with diff flavors for mass feedings...,,Also, the sandwiich area not as good as it was in the past.

I must agree with you!

Sorry to hear that so many people are disappointed in the buffet. Since we never eat in the buffet I can't offer an opinion.

The mclass ships, being smaller, have more limited offerings. Did you talk to the food/beverage management about your concerns? Often they are able to create, or offer, alternatives.

 

That being said, you should find Solstice similar to the other S class ships you are used to.

We had terrific buffets on Summit (to Bermuda) several years ago. Not inferior by any means to a terrific buffet on Silhuette last December.

Summit's even offered more choices of eggs Benedict. :)

Theme nights can be interesting. On Equinox in February one night they custom prepared ceviche and another they cooked crepes to order. ]

 

On our Silhouette cruise last August (our previous cruise before Millie), they had a theme most nights in the buffet. One day they had a big risotto station, with delicious results. By contrast, recently on Millie in Blu, my husband had crab and mushroom (porcini, I think) risotto. The portion was as big as a ping pong ball, he counted exactly 4 small pieces of mushroom, and you needed a magnifying glass to see a few tiny threads of crab.

 

On Sillie, we usually had a crepe station in the evening. Sillie had a wonderful German night the day we visited Berlin, with German band, sausages, beer, and other tasty German specialties. There was a Greek night with gyro spit, moussaka, etc. One night they had a "pot pie" festival. Another day they made skewers with good-size shrimp. One day they had huge tubs of fresh black cherries that they must have gotten in one of the ports. I could go on, but the point is that on previous S-class cruises, the buffet always seemed to have something special and delicious. And the Mexican offerings and pizza were dependable. Not so on Millie.

 

One thing that stood out as being lacking on the Millie cruise were the buffet cheese offerings. At both lunches and dinners on previous S-class cruises, there was a nice assortment of interesting cheeses -- blocks of cheese where you could cut your own serving. On Millie, all I saw were a few ordinary types of cheese -- cheddar, Monterey jack, etc.--pre-sliced. We wondered of the cheese downgrade is a fleet-wide move!

There were big blocks of cheese on the Solstice on our 18 night Sydney to Honolulu cruise last month. And there were also theme nights in the Oceanview.

Just got off the Reflection. We loved the quality and spread of food in the Oceanview Cafe. Since this was a port intensive itinerary, we hardly ate any lunch on the ship. Dinners were evenly divided between the MDR and Buffet and we were never disappointed by the buffet. Infact we actually thought that the buffet had improved over our last 3 cruises on the Silhouette.

The Chinese/Indian dishes changed everyday, and there was a counter called chef's daily specials which was quite popular. Even though I'm Indian, I didn't each much of the Indian food (saw a lot of Brits enjoying it) but I heard that it was well made. Same for the Mexican food.

Maybe it's an S class vs M class thing (hopefully), I don't intend to sail on the M class ships unless the itinerary is amazing.

Sent from my iPhone using Forums

We have only eaten dinner at the oceanview buffet on Celebrity ships a few times, when we were late arriving from a tour.

When we did, there were almost no-one in the buffet and we had great service.

I was surprised by the options that we had, which included roast beef and great Indian food. Normally, for lunch, we eat a lot of salads and I have never been disappointed by the salad bar, except how slow some people are picking the exact tomato for their salad.

The pizza on Celebrity is not in the same ballpark as NY or Chicago style pizza, but everyone once in a while a slice with my salad is good. I agree, the Mexican food options are not that great.

I love the Eggs Benedict station for breakfast and miss that when we sometimes take an NCL cruise.

I have not noticed a change in the quality of food at the buffet since 2011 when we first cruised with X.

Actually on Silhuette in December we had only two types of eggs Benedict daily just like on NCL Gem in April. :)

We were on the Solstice in Alaska last month and thought the Oceanview dinner buffet was great! They always had pasta & stir fry stations at dinner but what we really liked was the grilled to order meat & fish. The options varied with different types of steak, fish, chicken & pork. My husband thought the grilled lamb chops he was served up there were much better than those he had in the MDR. One night they had a variety of fresh Alaskan fish that was awesome....best halibut I've ever had. We actually began eating up there more often than in the MDR just because everything was hot and fresh, whereas in the dining room we were often served lukewarm, overcooked entrees.

We just returned from the Millennium , south bound Alaska cruise. We were on the same cruise 4 years ago, and we're very disappointed with both the Main Dining-room and Buffett. What a change from last time!! I can't image it could get much worse. I agree with previous reviews, too much Chinese, Indian, and junk! The best part of each meal was dessert. Especially the pastries and cakes. We refuse to pay extra to eat in the specialty restaurants. If this is the direction Celebrity is going to take, we will have to jump ship! We were actually anxious to come home to good , healthy food again.

On the plus side, we had the best room steward ever!! We gave Hiras a 10 on the review.

Sent from my iPhone using Forums

Just did the Summit to Bermuda in May. The lunch buffet had very little variety and did not look particularly appetizing. We missed the variety they used to serve. Salad bar and pizza were very good. We enjoyed the fish & chips one day. Most days, we checked out the lunch buffet and ended up at the pool side grill and had their fabulous cheeseburgers and fries. We ate in the MDR every night and those meals were excellent.

We just did our first cruise on Celebrity on the Solstice and were so disappointed with the food. The Oceanview food was never hot even if it had just been put out and the scrambled eggs were runny.

The dining room wasn't great either. I felt like they should spend more time improving the food rather then trying to get everyone to buy the specialty packages.

Not sure if I will be using Celebrity again.