Breakaway- how is the food in the MDR for dinner?

[jetta8300]

We booked a cruise to Bermuda on the Breakaway very last minute, and I am in the process of making dinner reservations! I cannot seem to find much information whatsoever about dinner in the complimentary Taste, Savor, or Manhattan room. We will be eating here most nights if not all of them, most of the specialty restaurants do not have reservations left before 9pm. We are ok with this however.

 

It seems as though most people sailing Norwegian do not discuss or review the MDR dinners, only the specialty restaurants. Are the current menu's posted somewhere? Do all 3 restaurants serve the same menu? (Norwegians website would like you to think there are different menus for some reason when describing the restaurants.) Has anyone ever tried ordering the cheese plate on the dessert menu as an appetizer? (One of my fav things to do while cruising:). How would one compare the MDR food to Royal Caribbean or Carnival? Thanks for your opinions!

[Fido Chuckwagon]

We booked a cruise to Bermuda on the Breakaway very last minute, and I am in the process of making dinner reservations! I cannot seem to find much information whatsoever about dinner in the complimentary Taste, Savor, or Manhattan room. We will be eating here most nights if not all of them, most of the specialty restaurants do not have reservations left before 9pm. We are ok with this however.

 

It seems as though most people sailing Norwegian do not discuss or review the MDR dinners, only the specialty restaurants. Are the current menu's posted somewhere? Do all 3 restaurants serve the same menu? (Norwegians website would like you to think there are different menus for some reason when describing the restaurants.) Has anyone ever tried ordering the cheese plate on the dessert menu as an appetizer? (One of my fav things to do while cruising:). How would one compare the MDR food to Royal Caribbean or Carnival? Thanks for your opinions!

 

The menu for all three restaurants is the same for all three. There is a menu section that changes each night and several staples that are a constant. If you google beyondships norwegian breakaway menus you can find some examples. I'd say the quality is equivalent to average mass-produced catering hall wedding food, with some wide variation from dish to dish, there are some above average dishes, and some very below average. It can sometimes be difficult to get the food hot, and service can be spotty especially at peak times. I've generally found that the service is better in Savor/Taste then it is in the Manhattan room.

[SuiteTraveler]

You have to make a reservation for the Manhattan Room - definitely do that as there is a show with the dinner. Because of this, IMO, the waitstaff works harder to get things out in a timely manner.

 

The food in the MDR is your typical hotel banquet food. Good enough. We mostly eat in the specialty restaurants or in the The Haven restaurant as we are always in a The Haven Spa Suite or other Haven suite on NCL.

[Diane123boys]

We booked a cruise to Bermuda on the Breakaway very last minute, and I am in the process of making dinner reservations! I cannot seem to find much information whatsoever about dinner in the complimentary Taste, Savor, or Manhattan room. We will be eating here most nights if not all of them, most of the specialty restaurants do not have reservations left before 9pm. We are ok with this however.

 

It seems as though most people sailing Norwegian do not discuss or review the MDR dinners, only the specialty restaurants. Are the current menu's posted somewhere? Do all 3 restaurants serve the same menu? (Norwegians website would like you to think there are different menus for some reason when describing the restaurants.) Has anyone ever tried ordering the cheese plate on the dessert menu as an appetizer? (One of my fav things to do while cruising:). How would one compare the MDR food to Royal Caribbean or Carnival? Thanks for your opinions!

 

When you get on board go to Guest services (I think its on 6 in the atrium. if not its on 7) The reservation systems hold back alot of time slots for people to book on board for all of the restaurants - even the MDR unless you want to wing it and you are a small party. But unless you like to eat early like 5pm -6 pm then most of the time you want reservations , the Noodle Bar is no res, but gets really busy as the noight goes on and has limited seating. O'Sheehans you can go any time and that is a great place to have a late night snack. The Raw Bar and Sushi bar dont take reservations either but those are more for small meals - or appetizers.

[BirdTravels]

If you want prime time specialty dining, you need to book as soon as you embark. The easiest way is to use any of the touch screen kiosks in public areas to make reservations. You can also use your stateroom TV or iConcierge app on your phone.

 

The main dining room food is good. Much better than hotel banqueting. The ship has about 10 different menus that rotate.

[Queenzena]

Just off the BA this morning. Ate in Manhattan MDR three times. If I were to describe it in one word, that word would be "chaotic." All three nights we were presented with other passengers' food. No refill on water, no hospitality whatsoever and the noise level was worse than a college dining hall. Looks like staff were new, they were running around all over the place. We actually are at LeBistro last night even though we had maxed out our Specialty Dining Plan, and we paid ala carte rather than have another bad MDR experience.

 

 

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[BrandoMan13]

Just back this morning as well. I had a much different experience then the post above me. We ate there 4 times. We were part of a party of 10. Whether we came as 2 or 8 or all 10, we always received the correct meals, cooked as ordered. In fact all the proteins I had all week were always right on, chicken, seafood, beef, etc.

 

Drinks do take a while, and the staff is definitely overworked and forced to handle way too many tables at a time. This is where any issues may arise. We were lucky but a few others I met through the week had a few service issues even in cagneys, where again, we ate twice and had the best meals and service we had all week.

 

Noise level in the Manhattan varied depending on if there was live music at the time or how loud your neighbors were.

 

Bottom line, you can have great experiences or not so great. Hopefully yours are the great ones, and ncl starts to properly staff their restaurants.

[Fido Chuckwagon]

You have to make a reservation for the Manhattan Room - definitely do that as there is a show with the dinner. Because of this, IMO, the waitstaff works harder to get things out in a timely manner.

 

The food in the MDR is your typical hotel banquet food. Good enough. We mostly eat in the specialty restaurants or in the The Haven restaurant as we are always in a The Haven Spa Suite or other Haven suite on NCL.

 

You definitely do not need a reservation in the Manhattan Room. The only time you really would need this is if you have a large party.

[jetta8300]

Thanks everyone for your replies. After going on the website, it looks like most reservation times were taken up for the MDRs as well, I went ahead and made reservations at Savor every night (for some reason that was the only MDR that actually had available times left...maybe it's because we are a party of 2?)

 

The food is probably what I would expect like someone else said, typical mass produced banquet food which was what was on Carnival and RCI as well. Nothing we had was terrible, but we are foodies and so nothing was great either. But we enjoyed our meals. After searching all over the Internet, I was able to find about 2 days worth of menus, but that's all. It seems as though Norwegian does not have the same menus on all of their ships?