Dinner package questions

[Cruisegirl6]

Hello,

 

We always dine at the specialty restaurants nightly only we always have paid individual reservations, this next cruise we purchased the dining package....my question, I heard that RC assigns the first evening dinner, how do we find out which restaurant we are assigned in?

[Clarea]

Hello,

 

We always dine at the specialty restaurants nightly only we always have paid individual reservations, this next cruise we purchased the dining package....my question, I heard that RC assigns the first evening dinner, how do we find out which restaurant we are assigned in?

You will find out via letter in your stateroom. If you want to know sooner, go to any specialty restaurant right after you board.

[FreshOffTheBoat]

You can just go to a specialty restaurant after you board and pretty much pick what restaurant you want to eat at. If they picked one for you already they are more than happy to change it.

[wocheez]

We for the first time purchased a dining package and was wondering can you pre-reserve your restaurant date & time before the cruise or do you have to wait till you board??

[Cruisegirl6]

Thank you everybody!

 

With the dining package, your unable to make the arrangements until you board the ship.

[wocheez]

Thank you everybody!

 

With the dining package, your unable to make the arrangements until you board the ship.

 

Thank you!!:)

[AtlThunderDan]

Not to hijack your thread, but OP and others do you find that the dining plan is worth it? We will be on the Allure on 10/1 and are debating the ultimate or per night plan, or just sticking with the MDR.

 

We are long time cruisers and this is the first time in a mega-ship. We are always MDR folks and the food is usually very good. Thoughts, suggestions? Seeing ones like $50 for Chops is rather ridiculous to me, that's a bit pricey.

[dplusd]

Not to hijack your thread, but OP and others do you find that the dining plan is worth it? We will be on the Allure on 10/1 and are debating the ultimate or per night plan, or just sticking with the MDR.

 

We are long time cruisers and this is the first time in a mega-ship. We are always MDR folks and the food is usually very good. Thoughts, suggestions? Seeing ones like $50 for Chops is rather ridiculous to me, that's a bit pricey.

 

We enjoy the MDR and would not want to leave it completely. But, we do enjoy specialty restaurants 2 - 3 times on a week long cruise. Agree, I don't think the specialty restaurants are worth the "regular" price. But, lot's of discounts available between FNDR, BOGO, and the 3 and 5 night dining packages.

[AtlThunderDan]

Commenting on this, we did the 4 night for 100 and it was great. Actually wish we did 5 to include Sabor for lunch one day.

Honestly Johnny Rockets was better than Sabor in overall value and entertainment. The only specialty we didn't do was Giovanni Table. 150 Central Park was tops in our opinion.

 

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[Cruisegirl6]

I cancelled the dining package only to rethink things as my father in law put some sense into me....the dining package is only $24 a day so we rebooked the dining package....I may do Sabor for lunch one day which will enable me to try the MDR one night probably the formal night, but I think he is right, I will be a lot happier and get nicer meals and service with the dining package.

[AtlThunderDan]

You did the ultimate? I can see it. Personally, we did 3 MDR nights, but I miss the way that experience used to be before my time dining. We miss others at the table, knowing your waiter, etc. Not all wait staff in MTD do as good of a job. I did like being able to make a reservation for it though.

 

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[Cruisegirl6]

Yes the ultimate....On the Harmony back in May we dined at Chops the first night, as usual dining at Chops on other ships, we had a lot of misses and not so good food and cancelled our second evening there. We dined at Jamie's 2 different evenings, but found ourselves dining at 150 Central Park for 4 evenings, and we requested and had our same servers, it was very nice, in fact, the second to the last evening, the chef asked us if there was anything we wanted and we said lobster, needless to say we all had lobster the last evening.

 

The Oasis has Giovanni's I so much prefer that over Jamie's. I love the extra special attention dining at the specialty restaurants gives us.

[dadofjessie]

We for the first time purchased a dining package and was wondering can you pre-reserve your restaurant date & time before the cruise or do you have to wait till you board??

 

I just reserved and paid for the 4 night dining package on the Allure for our sailing and we were able to pick the time but not the restaurant. Customer service said that our time is pretty much what we will get for all 4 nights. We then just have to make sure that the restaurants are acceptable to us or we will have to make changes.

[Clarea]

I just reserved and paid for the 4 night dining package on the Allure for our sailing and we were able to pick the time but not the restaurant. Customer service said that our time is pretty much what we will get for all 4 nights. We then just have to make sure that the restaurants are acceptable to us or we will have to make changes.

My understanding was that the time you pciked only applied to dinner the first night.

[Cruisegirl6]

You choose the time range you want to have dinner but they choose the first night dinner for you....I only am going to Giovanni's twice, 150 three times, Chops I try on this ship once and want it for the first night so if I don't get Chops the first night (I have not been to a Chops on other ships that I can say I would go back for a second evening but want to see how it is on the Oasis) I will ask for it, this way, if I had an overall decent experience there I go back, if not, I won't go back.

 

Honestly, I always have paid individual prices for the specialty restaurants so that I am able to lock in my date and time, but from experience in doing so, I always happen to change times for dinner due to some reason and never had any problem in getting what we wanted even days into the cruise.

[Pmorton3360]

We did 4 night dining on Harmony. Went to Giovannis and made reservations for first and last night apon boarding. During the week made the other 2 reservations. No problem getting what we wanted.

 

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[sheezsmith]

We did 4 night dining on Harmony. Went to Giovannis and made reservations for first and last night apon boarding. During the week made the other 2 reservations. No problem getting what we wanted.

 

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Do you mean Jamie's on Harmony? How was it? I have heard very mixed reviews. Thanks!

[Pmorton3360]

Jamies was good. Wonderland was great. 150 was a little disappointing.

 

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[Cruisegirl6]

Sheezsmith- It is more an American/Italian restaurant, not your typical authentic Italian, we rate it similar to Carraba's or Olive Garden. We had three nights reservations here, after the second time we just couldn't go back and ended up eating the remaining 4 nights at 150 which was overall excellent each time.

Appetizers probably is Jaimie's Italian strongest part of the dinner....The green Olives were very good and the Cured Meat Plank is probably the best item on the entire menu. The Caprese salad was not the fresh large sliced mozzarella but small tiny balls of mozzarella it was ok....the Rainbow slaw just didn't belong on the menu at all and was on the Cured Meat Plank which we had to leave it belongs in a BBQ place....

There was no meatballs, sausage side which honestly you tell me of one good Italian restaurant that didn't have either of these?

My father in law was with us, so between the three of us eating here twice we pretty much tried most things on the menu.

 

Main Course- Penne Pomodoro over over aldente , even if it were cooked right not choose again

Chicken Cacciatore was more American Italian, just a grilled piece of chicken can't even call it cacciatore you can tell it wasn't cooked in a recipe for cacciatore such as with peppers, onions and such...it was a chicken breast disguised as cacciatore with some type of tomato sauce which wasn't very good to us. I had the Rib Eye Steak the second evening due to not liking the chicken cacciatore and my other half didn't like the penne...it was THE WORST STEAK I ever eaten...well, the waiter suggested to choose something else but there was nothing else I was interested in well, he sure was right I saw the steak full of fat took one piece chewy, hard and too charbroiled to a point it was burnt on the outside (I ordered it medium rare)....happened to be the gentleman next to our table also ordered it and did the very same thing took it back right away. My other half tried the Penne Carbonara....lemony and creamy but different, certainly not Italian like, more American style with a twist of Italian from the creamy parmesan sauce....my father in law had the lamb chops didn't really eat it, left it.

 

Dessert- Too disappointed and just wanted to get out both times that we didn't even have dessert.

 

I do not recommend it, and to be all honest, Giovanni's is nothing like Jaimie's....we love Giovanni's and probably our most favorite specialty restaurant next to 150 Central Park.