CARNIVAL & MASHED POTATOES Is it just me?

[ALWAYS CRUZIN]

😥 Why is it that only Carnival, on the buffet, they might have one evening only, offering mashed potatoes? I am a mashed potato lover. Last few cruises on the Royal line and the Celebrity line. Mashed potatoes on the buffet always, for lunch and dinner along with different kinds of rice and baked potatoes. I love them with turkey or chicken. Basically just about with any meat or poultry dish. No place for baked potatoes with turkey or rice for that matter. Now I understand that is me. I asked the head chef on Carnival why? The dumb answer that I got was. Not may people eat or even like mashed potatoes. Wow, that was a new one on me. I have no problem at all with baked potatoes and rice being offered. Lots of people love them. I think lots of people love mashed potatoes also. How about with awesome gravy on them or just good ol melted butter. Yum!

[Lottacruises]

They always have them available in the mdr. Maybe they mash them to order.

[ALWAYS CRUZIN]

4 minutes ago, Lottacruises said:

They always have them available in the mdr. Maybe they mash them to order.

You are correct. They are available in the MDR I need to order at least a double serving. They only give me one scoop if I do not ask. 

[Amadawn1]

We were on Holland a couple years ago over Thanksgiving, sailing out of Ft. Lauderdale.  We looked at the main dining room menu, and they were not even serving traditional Thanksgiving dinner as an option that day.  We decided to opt for the buffet.  They had no turkey carving there, either.  We got some deli sliced turkey and stuffing, and as I went down the line I asked for mashed potatoes.  The buffet worker told me they didn't have any.  Okay.  So I walked around to the other side of the buffet.  They had just closed that side and had just pulled down the semi see-through shades.  I spotted a different buffet worker, and asked him if there were any mashed potatoes?  He said, "Oh yes, ma'am!"  He went back to the kitchen and brought me a whole bowl of them.  Yum.  I thanked him from the bottom of my heart!  It's nice when someone will go out of their way when they don't have to.  I'm also guessing that since it was a little later, and they were closing one side of the buffet, they may have actually had turkey carving in the buffet earlier in the evening.

[Purvis1231]

Maybe the buffet cooks have not mastered how to make them. 

[UFMOM]

I love mashed potatoes too. As long as they are the real deal and not that reconstituted junk you get sometimes. Also do not like the whipped ones with so much liquid added to them that they are very thin tasting. I have yet to see mashed potatoes done well on a cruise unless they are in a specialty restaurant. 

 

 

Mary Ann

[Doggielover68]

1 hour ago, twodaywonder said:

😥 Why is it that only Carnival, on the buffet, they might have one evening only, offering mashed potatoes? I am a mashed potato lover. Last few cruises on the Royal line and the Celebrity line. Mashed potatoes on the buffet always, for lunch and dinner along with different kinds of rice and baked potatoes. I love them with turkey or chicken. Basically just about with any meat or poultry dish. No place for baked potatoes with turkey or rice for that matter. Now I understand that is me. I asked the head chef on Carnival why? The dumb answer that I got was. Not may people eat or even like mashed potatoes. Wow, that was a new one on me. I have no problem at all with baked potatoes and rice being offered. Lots of people love them. I think lots of people love mashed potatoes also. How about with awesome gravy on them or just good ol melted butter. Yum!

My guess is that the head chef had a point. Mashed potatoes are super easy and cheap to make and if people were eating enough of them, I'm sure they would have them more often. However, the 'holding time' of the potatoes versus the number of people eating them might leave them with loads of leftover mashed potatoes that have developed that icky dry crust on top. 

 

Anyway, even though people like mashed potatoes, I would venture to guess that with fries and baked potatoes available, more people choose those. We make mashed potatoes at home often but rarely eat them on the cruise. In the same way, I eat more baked potatoes and fries on the ship because I don't make those at home. 🤷‍♀️

[ALWAYS CRUZIN]

51 minutes ago, UFMOM said:

I love mashed potatoes too. As long as they are the real deal and not that reconstituted junk you get sometimes. Also do not like the whipped ones with so much liquid added to them that they are very thin tasting. I have yet to see mashed potatoes done well on a cruise unless they are in a specialty restaurant. 

 

 

Mary Ann

They certainly are different from ship to ship. The very best ones I ever had was in the beginning of the year on the Royal Caribbean Serenade of the Seas. The were awesome every day. So was the other food. 

[deadmoney]

Mashed potato lover here also.

And as you said, with gravy and butter.

yum!!!

[ALWAYS CRUZIN]

50 minutes ago, Doggielover68 said:

My guess is that the head chef had a point. Mashed potatoes are super easy and cheap to make and if people were eating enough of them, I'm sure they would have them more often. However, the 'holding time' of the potatoes versus the number of people eating them might leave them with loads of leftover mashed potatoes that have developed that icky dry crust on top. 

 

Anyway, even though people like mashed potatoes, I would venture to guess that with fries and baked potatoes available, more people choose those. We make mashed potatoes at home often but rarely eat them on the cruise. In the same way, I eat more baked potatoes and fries on the ship because I don't make those at home. 🤷‍♀️

Just an observance. Guess Carnival cruisers are totally different from Celebrity, Royal Caribbean and Princess cruisers. Just returned from the Celebrity Equinox with mashed potatoes always available in the buffet. Usually 3-4 pots of them on different tables. They go down  fast. Fresh pots fulls are constantly replacing the almost empty ones. I like getting the potatoes from the almost empty ones. They are the hottest. Never wet and never dry. Just right. Do not know how they do it. But I like it. As for getting them in the MDR. That is fine. If I want more it takes too long. I just like getting up and go get some more. As for fry's. With fish, burgers & some other meats. Not with turkey no baked potato. That goes well with a steak. That is me. However every is different.

[crooooze]

The steakhouse had those Yukon Gold Mashed Potatoes that were good enough to eat as a dessert. mmmmmmmmmmm

[Tiger0613]

My mom and I like mashed potatoes, but we hate mashed potatoes on Carnival.  They put onions in them.  This happens in the buffet and the MDR.  We hate onions.  Not everything should have onions in them.  The mashed potatoes should be plain with the option to add onions to them.

[Doggielover68]

1 hour ago, Tiger0613 said:

My mom and I like mashed potatoes, but we hate mashed potatoes on Carnival.  They put onions in them.  This happens in the buffet and the MDR.  We hate onions.  Not everything should have onions in them.  The mashed potatoes should be plain with the option to add onions to them.

Onions? I've never experienced that...garlic maybe but never onion.

[Lee Cruiser]

5 hours ago, twodaywonder said:

😥 Why is it that only Carnival, on the buffet, they might have one evening only, offering mashed potatoes? I am a mashed potato lover.

I agree, they need to have them available more, along with green beans.  Really, they need more vegetable options in general besides rice and baked potatoes.  They have baked potatoes every night and rice most nights.  But on our cruise in April they only had mashed potatoes and green beans one night.

[shof515]

32 minutes ago, Lee Cruiser said:

I agree, they need to have them available more, along with green beans.  Really, they need more vegetable options in general besides rice and baked potatoes.  They have baked potatoes every night and rice most nights.  But on our cruise in April they only had mashed potatoes and green beans one night.

 

i also noticed the same on my sunrise..every night they was a bake potato, one night only was mashed potato.

[Tiger0613]

3 hours ago, Doggielover68 said:

Onions? I've never experienced that...garlic maybe but never onion.

This happened on the Dream in Jan/Feb 2018 and on the Sunshine in Feb 2019.

[ALWAYS CRUZIN]

OK so mashed potatoes requirer more work to make than baked potatoes or rice. So what. Does not seam to bother the other cruise lines. As for drying out on the heat. On other cruise lines they use small pots, lot large trays, about 12 inches around so not a lot are in every pot. They empty quickly (No one eats many, right) and constantly replacing them with fresh. More hot vegetables for sure. Guess just cutting back. We are on the Magic this Halloween. I will see if someone will get me mashed from the MDRs kitchen. That would be great.

[ALWAYS CRUZIN]

Another thing about Carnival No email for customer service. Just a phone number and probably will not report what we say anyhow. All other cruise lines have an email address for customer service. Nothing like Celebrity. I return from a cruise and have a question or a complaint, I email them. The next day I get a call. It is taken car of immediately. That is how it should be. I could call my Diamond rep. but what good would that do? Probably laugh because it is about mashed potatoes. If no one will get me mashed potatoes, I will take a bowl and go down to the MDR and ask to have it filled up.

[ALWAYS CRUZIN]

Not that many years ago they did have mashed potatoes all the time. The food was also a lot better back then. Only a short time ago on certain ships, you could get sea food one deck up above the buffet. No longer. That is a BBQ and you now pay for fish and chips. On Celebrity we had fish fingers one evening, deep fried fish another, calamari  fish chowder, clam chowder but grilled fish every day. All I can get our of this is trying to keep there cost down to offer low cruise pricing. What else can it be?

[tattoos]

If you sail on the Magic and you like real butter on your mashed potatos, better pack your own.  No butter available anywhere on the Magic.  The only spread available is a butter substitute at the Lido buffet, MDR, and Steakhouse which Carnival refers to as "whipped butter" which bears absolutely no resemblance to real butter and tastes like whipped lard.  On our next cruise, we are bringing real, salty, calorie laden, butter on board and will bring a stick with us to the MDR when we eat there.  

 

Also, no granulated sugar packets available and no little wooden stirrers in the Lido buffet.  We will also be packing sugar packets on our next cruise.

[DallasGuy75219]

On 7/2/2019 at 3:55 PM, twodaywonder said:

😥 Why is it that only Carnival, on the buffet, they might have one evening only, offering mashed potatoes?

Have you considered that you may be in the minority and most cruisers prefer variety at the buffet rather than the same dishes every night?

[midcarolina]

That's the wonderful thing about choices....sounds like to me carnival may not be the cruise line for you based on your desire for mashed potatoes....

[ALWAYS CRUZIN]

14 hours ago, DallasGuy75219 said:

Have you considered that you may be in the minority and most cruisers prefer variety at the buffet rather than the same dishes every night?

Guess you do not read. I said. No problem with different types of rice and also baked potatoes. We need choices. With only one evening on Carnival offering them, the choices dwindle. I also said the opposite of what you are saying. If I was in the minority. Then why is it on other cruise line ships they are always refilling the mashed potatoes. Many times you need to wait in line to get them. 

[ray98]

Maybe everyone is not a mashed potato fanatic like you?  If you put them out for every meal during the week I would probably have one serving.

[ALWAYS CRUZIN]

51 minutes ago, midcarolina said:

That's the wonderful thing about choices....sounds like to me carnival may not be the cruise line for you based on your desire for mashed potatoes....

What choices are you referring to? All of 2? We are Diamond on Carnival with over 48 Carnival cruises. I only started this to see if there were any others that think the same way. No need to suggest we cruise with another cruise line.