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Dinner at O'Sheehans or Main Dining Room


IrishDutchess
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We’ve been on more than 12 Norwegian cruises in the last three years and have not had a meal in the MDRs that lasted more than 11/2 hours. In many cases, we found the service rushed and were finished in under an hour. The only time it was extremely slow was lunch on embarkation day. Maybe we’ve just been lucky. 

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We eat regularly in the MDR and when we don't share the time is usually about 45 minutes.  Sharing with 2 others seems to take it to a little over an hour.  We would NEVER share on a table of 8 as that certainly can take the time to a lot longer which would mess up attendance at the show.

 

As an aside we did take 2.5 hours on a share for 8 in Anytime dining on a cruise on Princess!!!   Never again!!!

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I only eat at MDR and never did it take more than 90 minutes. Most of the time, it was less. The waiter/waitress also often asked if we planned to go to the show so they knew if we needed to be out in a certain time.

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6 hours ago, IrishDutchess said:

It was stated that the length of dinnertime in the main dining rooms could be 2 - 2 1/2 hours. How does that compare to timing for dinner at O'Sheehans ?

 

I have never known MDR dining to take more than 90 minutes and that is if you go slow. The only time it will take over 90 minutes is if you have a large party, a two or four can often be out in an hour.

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6 hours ago, casofilia said:

We eat regularly in the MDR and when we don't share the time is usually about 45 minutes.  Sharing with 2 others seems to take it to a little over an hour.  We would NEVER share on a table of 8 as that certainly can take the time to a lot longer which would mess up attendance at the show.

 

As an aside we did take 2.5 hours on a share for 8 in Anytime dining on a cruise on Princess!!!   Never again!!!

 

At that rate stay seated for your next reservation- so much for the fast food concept !

 

I would think that the early dining reservations would be moved along for guests to attend shows or other

entertainment whereas the late evening service would be relaxed and not so rushed.

 

At least it is not like the other NON-FreeStyle cruise lines where the dining time is handled with military precision.

Enter - be seated - menu - order - drinks - be served - desert - and now get the heck out of dodge we got another

platoon to feed.

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17 hours ago, IrishDutchess said:

It was stated that the length of dinnertime in the main dining rooms could be 2 - 2 1/2 hours. How does that compare to timing for dinner at O'Sheehans ?

First we have never had dinner in the MDR take that long: over an hour? yes but not over 2 hours. That being said, in O'Sheehans it would be faster but having dinner (we did it once on our last cruise) isn't a very fun way to enjoy dinner. To us anyway, O'Sheehans is for lunch or a quick snack. We do eat breakfast there once in awhile. 

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Dinner in the MDR has never been longer than 90 minutes.  We were just on the Pearl and the MDR experience were very pleasant.  We were never rushed and usually were seared by a window.  Of course we were a party of 2.  As for O’Sheehans, we will never go back!  We were there on the rib night.  The service was awful and the portions were so small.  I did complain and the Maitr’d did follow up.  But MDR or specialty are the way to go.

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I always let our servers know if we need to be somewhere else and we have not had a problem getting out in 45-60 minutes.  We usually get to the dining room as soon as it opens.  We like to eat early and then enjoy the whole evening.  We know we can get a snack at O'Sheehan's or the Buffet.

 

Candi

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Our fast track, insider's tips for "rushing" thru the MDR in 1 hour or less.

#1 - skip dessert & coffee (that's usually a 10 to 15 minutes wait/pause)

#2 - inform your server/team you plan to fly out of there in xx minutes or less

#3 - order starters, soup & salads and ask that they be served combined or almost at once, don't do it one-at-a-time (so that the assistant can start getting the entree(s) picked up & ready (it's being held - anyway - mostly under the heat lamps in the gallery) to bring them up (depending on the ship & MDR location, they need to go up/down the escalators with a dozen covered plates, it's not fun nor easy ... trust me)

#4 - ordering drinks, bottles of wine, etc. will result in a slow down (anyone seen a wine steward or beverage runner lately in the MDR, it's mostly the server team doing it all ... taking care of & assigned to multiple tables on the chart)

#5 - smile, sit back & pass the bread and butter, check for any missing utensils, salt & pepper shakers, etc. to have it "ready" - in the rush, not uncommon for something to be missing these days when they "reset" the table for the next rounds of guests in-bound. 

#6 - enjoy 

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I would guess it depends on the size of your party. We are a party of 2 and have never been in the MDR for more than an hour. If there are 10 of you, that may be a different story.

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On 8/6/2019 at 10:02 AM, IrishDutchess said:

It was stated that the length of dinnertime in the main dining rooms could be 2 - 2 1/2 hours. How does that compare to timing for dinner at O'Sheehans ?

MDR meals take less than 90 minutes. More importantly, it is restaurant food vs. something which is intentionally designed to be bar food. 

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I have actually the opposite experience.  Dinner in the MDR has always been quick for me.  Usually around an hour.   When I have gone to O'Sheehans for dinner time, it has been slow and very discombobulated.   Although outside of dinner, for late night snacks, I have love O'Sheehans. 

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My fast track for the main dining room is to put in our apps, entree, and dessert order at the beginning and let the server know which show time you are planning to attend.  Never fails. Done in an hr and 15 min tops.

 

They won't bring all the food at once.  It will still be staggered like an appropriate meal.  There just won't be a long lag time between courses. 😉

 

Sometimes O'Sheehans takes a long time for lunch or dinner and late nite because there is a cosmic plan that everyone seems to go there at the exact same time.

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14 hours ago, LoraJ said:

I would guess it depends on the size of your party. We are a party of 2 and have never been in the MDR for more than an hour. If there are 10 of you, that may be a different story.

 

Totally agree!  Usually, we are with a party of 6+, so service is slow....many times we felt we could have sat down, went up to the buffet, brought it down and ate, before they even started to serve....

 

 

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35 minutes ago, 4774Papa said:

I love dining that is not rushed.  Why do people want to hurry when dining on a cruise ship?

totally agree. We aren't not doing shows as much as in days past, so normally our evening is dinner about 6:30 or 7:00, then we head to one of the bars where there is music, maybe see what is happening in the atrium or visit the casino for a very short time. I do understand the rush if you are trying to make a show and yes, there have been some good ideas here, but if the show is your goal go to dinner as soon as the MDR opens. 

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12 minutes ago, Mike_DeA said:

Maybe because not everyone is the same?

Sure, not everyone enjoys dining the way we do, but my question wasn't answered?   Why do people want to eat and go?  I probably is not that they need to make a show, since they could always plan to eat sooner.

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