Changes to main dining room menu

[PTC DAWG]

18 hours ago, roboref said:

Here is a menu link. 11 entrees (that is it)

Norwegian PRIMA Dining Menus · Prof. Cruise (profcruise.com)

 

I would get very tired of this menu as I really don't care (wouldn't pick) half of the dinner options. Especially if on a longer cruise!

I would try most everything on that menu..looks good to me.

[PC Skier]

FYI We just got off the Breakaway, the menu changed everyday.

[vince_g]

Booked the 12 night NYC to Galveston in May 2021, and the offer was still for 4 SD meals. With 2 additional specialty meals for sapphire latitudes, I think this dining room menu would do fine for 6 nights. Dinner at Indulge Food Hall would be fun too.

[TominNC]

Hope I can use my FCC next year before they roll this out fleet wide.

 

It would definitely push me towards another line.

[RichOZ]

I find this debate interesting, especially the "I won't sail NCL again" comments. I know it is annoying to feel pushed into paying more, but why not just accept it and look at the overall cost as I do?
A bit of background. We have only been on 3 cruises - 2 with Disney (out of USA) for 6 and 7 nights and a Royal Caribbean from Australia (home) over 9 nights.
The Disney cruises were great. Dinner rotated over 3 restaurants with largely changing menus, so you only went to each restaurant 2-3 times.  Buffets were also great.
We were told by our TA there was no need to book SD on RC.  We did for one night (NYE) and it was fantastic, but were bitterly disappointed in MD for the rest. The menu barely changed and the food was very average.  Even though they had another dining room at our sailing class we couldn't go there (I know the menu was the same but a change of decor would be nice.) We ended up eating at the buffet and one smaller free (included) restaurant that we found which was much nicer. 
The breakfast and lunch buffets were a was a bit disappointing too - no seafood at lunch and the same boring fruit at breakfast (would it break the bank to buy a few berries RC?)
So Disney food was much better BUT Disney was almost twice the price. We said we would never cruise again without factoring in SD for the majority of the trip as I feel dining is a huge part of a cruise.
Our next cruise (out of Miami) will be with NCL for 7 nights. Comes with 2 SD and now just debating how many more to pay for. Probably 5 SD all up for Mum and Dad and 4 for the kids. In the end, it will still be a thousands cheaper than the Disney cruise we were looking at as an alternative.

[styxfire]

The way to nip this dining-drought in the bud, and make sure it never expands beyond the Prima, is to specifically mention it in the post-cruise reviews that Norwegian asks you to fill out.

 

Norwegian has minced no words in explaining to investors how they plan to extract maximum money from cruisers while on board,... by up-charging for things that were formerly included.  But the main dining menu is a step too far.  

 

7 days is TOO MANY FOR THE SAME MENU.  It's honestly insulting to guests.  Yes I understand that there are NCL advocates posting here that tell us the solution is to do more specialty dining;  i.e. getting bored with the same choices is YOUR problem, and you can fix YOUR problem by paying extra for food.

 

People don't care to be reminded all-cruise-long that they're only getting a low-end experience unless they pay extra.  That's as big a turn-off as the limited choices are.  Until you speak up about it to the cruiseline itself, they'll continue to treat you like summer-camp mouths.  Seriously, who pays several thousand to go on a cruise where they give you pasta 7 days in a row, and you're supposed to be satisfied by choosing a different sauce each night?

 

It blows my mind that a few cruisers are actually invalidating the people who view this as a major dining downgrade.

Edited October 7, 2022 by styxfire

[RichOZ]

1 hour ago, styxfire said:

It blows my mind that a few cruisers are actually invalidating the people who view this as a major dining downgrade.

Good call styxfire. I was too dismissive of this as an issue, but that is because of my own perspective, which was that I am going in to my first NCL cruise (Norwegian Joy) with the expectation that MD would be disappointing and I would be paying for additional meals anyway.

The same menu for 7 days is unacceptable but so is only minor changes in the same dull restaurant for 9 days as I saw with Royal Caribbean (at least for the 3 or 4 nights we ate in MD the menu was barely changing).  

[debenson0723]

4 hours ago, styxfire said:

The way to nip this dining-drought in the bud, and make sure it never expands beyond the Prima, is to specifically mention it in the post-cruise reviews that Norwegian asks you to fill out.

 

Norwegian has minced no words in explaining to investors how they plan to extract maximum money from cruisers while on board,... by up-charging for things that were formerly included.  But the main dining menu is a step too far.  

 

7 days is TOO MANY FOR THE SAME MENU.  It's honestly insulting to guests.  Yes I understand that there are NCL advocates posting here that tell us the solution is to do more specialty dining;  i.e. getting bored with the same choices is YOUR problem, and you can fix YOUR problem by paying extra for food.

 

People don't care to be reminded all-cruise-long that they're only getting a low-end experience unless they pay extra.  That's as big a turn-off as the limited choices are.  Until you speak up about it to the cruiseline itself, they'll continue to treat you like summer-camp mouths.  Seriously, who pays several thousand to go on a cruise where they give you pasta 7 days in a row, and you're supposed to be satisfied by choosing a different sauce each night?

 

It blows my mind that a few cruisers are actually invalidating the people who view this as a major dining downgrade.

Since you have not been on the Prima yet, let me give you a little perspective. There was quite a bit more than 'pasta 7 days in a row' on the MDR menu.  In fact I never ate the pasta there once. I also did not eat in the MDR every night because I had my 2 platinum dining vouchers and 3 FAS specialty dinners (so 5 out of the 12 nights were included in Specialty restaurants).  And to be completely transparent, I was invited to dine in the Haven restaurant one evening, which also has the same menu every night on ALL of their ships, and the prices for those rooms are much higher than what I paid for my cabin. I don't read too many complaints from those in the Haven about their dining experience. Lastly we ate in port one evening on our overnight in Reykjavik.

So that left me with 5 nights in the MDR...but there are also other complimentary options on the ship. The Indulge Food Hall was great for lunch and dinner and was packed every day and night. And then one night we wanted to watch NFL football so ate in the Local. And some people like to eat dinner in the buffet...I am not one of them but that is another option.

No one forces you to eat in the MDR every night. I did not feel insulted or felt like I had to pay extra for a good dinner.  In reality I think we ate there 3 nights and never repeated an entree or appetizer or dessert. I actually liked this concept because I knew I would not miss my favorite entree or dessert because we had plans to eat somewhere else the night those items were being served. The food quality was outstanding in all of the venues and certainly much better than an RCL cruise I took in May where the MDR was basically the same with a few extra items added each night (and none of those were to my taste). I paid extra to eat in a Specialty restaurant on RCL and, ironically, had pasta (which was very good).

 As for your statement about NCL extracting as much money as possible from passengers (I am a shareholder also so very aware of this mindset), I am by far not NCLs target audience...I walked off the ship with a balance of less than $100. I even had $20 remaining in non-refundable OBC, which I used up in the casino on the last night and won $140.

Most of your posts seem to attack NCL so I don't think this is the cruise line for you (and to be honest, I am not sure if you have sailed on NCL at all).  Whatever line you chose to sail, I hope you have an acceptable and enjoyable time.

 

[PATRLR]

7 hours ago, styxfire said:

The way to nip this dining-drought in the bud, and make sure it never expands beyond the Prima, is to specifically mention it in the post-cruise reviews that Norwegian asks you to fill out.

 

Norwegian has minced no words in explaining to investors how they plan to extract maximum money from cruisers while on board,... by up-charging for things that were formerly included.  But the main dining menu is a step too far.  

 

7 days is TOO MANY FOR THE SAME MENU.  It's honestly insulting to guests.  Yes I understand that there are NCL advocates posting here that tell us the solution is to do more specialty dining;  i.e. getting bored with the same choices is YOUR problem, and you can fix YOUR problem by paying extra for food.

 

People don't care to be reminded all-cruise-long that they're only getting a low-end experience unless they pay extra.  That's as big a turn-off as the limited choices are.  Until you speak up about it to the cruiseline itself, they'll continue to treat you like summer-camp mouths.  Seriously, who pays several thousand to go on a cruise where they give you pasta 7 days in a row, and you're supposed to be satisfied by choosing a different sauce each night?

 

It blows my mind that a few cruisers are actually invalidating the people who view this as a major dining downgrade.

Very well said.  

[PATRLR]

1 hour ago, debenson0723 said:

I did not feel insulted or felt like I had to pay extra for a good dinner. 

But you (or someone you know) DID pay extra for a good dinner - three by way of FAS (which you did pay for via increased cruise fare over SailAway fares), one by way of someone who paid for Haven and one in port.  Good for you that you found ways around the fixed menu for 12 nights.   Good for you that you don't care about spending more money.  But one shouldn't have to do those things to avoid monotony.  And by your own experience, one has to pay extra to do it.

 

1 hour ago, debenson0723 said:

In reality I think we ate there 3 nights and never repeated an entree or appetizer or dessert

You ate there 3 times in 12 nights and you are dismissing those who are not happy about the same menu all week?  Really?

 

2 hours ago, debenson0723 said:

Most of your posts seem to attack NCL so I don't think this is the cruise line for you (and to be honest, I am not sure if you have sailed on NCL at all).  Whatever line you chose to sail, I hope you have an acceptable and enjoyable time.

 

@styxfire's post was far from "attacking" NCL.  It was very reasonable objective criticism of this change and the line in general.  If you feel it was attacking NCL, perhaps you are too caught up in NCL to think about them in an objective manner.  

[RTHall]

On 10/6/2022 at 9:05 PM, RichOZ said:

Our next cruise (out of Miami) will be with NCL for 7 nights. Comes with 2 SD and now just debating how many more to pay for. Probably 5 SD all up for Mum and Dad and 4 for the kids. In the end, it will still be a thousands cheaper than the Disney cruise we were looking at as an alternative.

We just disembarked from the NCL Breakaway yesterday.  Our experience with the food was awful.  I lost 5 lbs over the course of the week because I struggled to find anything that was worth finishing.  We ate in the main dining rooms and the buffet along with a couple specialty dinners.  I talked to other passengers who agreed with my assessment.  Poor quality steaks in Cagneys, sushi was bulked up with too much rice, etc.  

 

I think my wife said it best…when you combine the demographics of the guests with the quality of the food, it felt like we were on a floating nursing home.  Chocolate silk pie with the texture of jello, icy ice cream, mushy shrimp, rubbery fried chicken, every bread product was dry and stale.  I could go on all day.  We found the quality of the main dining room to be only slightly better than the buffet.  

 

I know its difficult to cook 15,000 meals a day, but if I were the head chef, I’d be ashamed to sign off on any of the food I ate.  Before this trip I didn’t think I was a food snob, but maybe I am.

 

The plus side was that the poor quality food pushed us to eat on shore as much as possible and we had some great meals on shore, my favorite being in Bar Harbor.

 

This was our first cruise on NCL and needless to say we won’t be cruising on NCL again.

[TominNC]

On 10/7/2022 at 3:47 AM, debenson0723 said:

Since you have not been on the Prima yet, let me give you a little perspective. There was quite a bit more than 'pasta 7 days in a row' on the MDR menu.  In fact I never ate the pasta there once. I also did not eat in the MDR every night because I had my 2 platinum dining vouchers and 3 FAS specialty dinners (so 5 out of the 12 nights were included in Specialty restaurants).  And to be completely transparent, I was invited to dine in the Haven restaurant one evening, which also has the same menu every night on ALL of their ships, and the prices for those rooms are much higher than what I paid for my cabin. I don't read too many complaints from those in the Haven about their dining experience. Lastly we ate in port one evening on our overnight in Reykjavik.

So that left me with 5 nights in the MDR...but there are also other complimentary options on the ship. The Indulge Food Hall was great for lunch and dinner and was packed every day and night. And then one night we wanted to watch NFL football so ate in the Local. And some people like to eat dinner in the buffet...I am not one of them but that is another option.

No one forces you to eat in the MDR every night. I did not feel insulted or felt like I had to pay extra for a good dinner.  In reality I think we ate there 3 nights and never repeated an entree or appetizer or dessert. I actually liked this concept because I knew I would not miss my favorite entree or dessert because we had plans to eat somewhere else the night those items were being served. The food quality was outstanding in all of the venues and certainly much better than an RCL cruise I took in May where the MDR was basically the same with a few extra items added each night (and none of those were to my taste). I paid extra to eat in a Specialty restaurant on RCL and, ironically, had pasta (which was very good).

 As for your statement about NCL extracting as much money as possible from passengers (I am a shareholder also so very aware of this mindset), I am by far not NCLs target audience...I walked off the ship with a balance of less than $100. I even had $20 remaining in non-refundable OBC, which I used up in the casino on the last night and won $140.

Most of your posts seem to attack NCL so I don't think this is the cruise line for you (and to be honest, I am not sure if you have sailed on NCL at all).  Whatever line you chose to sail, I hope you have an acceptable and enjoyable time.

 

But that's the difference.  And it usually is the "platinum and above" cruisers who explain how it isn't so bad.  Yes, we know, you get extra SD so it's NOT and issue.  People don't like to be told "go eat at the buffet" as an option.

[PATRLR]

19 hours ago, RTHall said:

I know its difficult to cook 15,000 meals a day,

No, it is not difficult to cook high quality meals in the volume needed for modern cruise ships.  NCL (and all the other mass market lines) have made the decision to lower meal quality. They could do much better if they wanted.

 

19 hours ago, RTHall said:

This was our first cruise on NCL and needless to say we won’t be cruising on NCL again.

That's what you need to do, though my experience is that all of the mass market lines have similar low quality food. 

Edited October 11, 2022 by PATRLR

[RichOZ]

On 10/11/2022 at 1:05 AM, RTHall said:

when you combine the demographics of the guests with the quality of the food, it felt like we were on a floating nursing home.

This is disappointing to say the least. 

Do you think a lot of it has to do with the COVID interruption? Have all the decent chefs found somewhere else to work, leaving the cruise industry to start again? (If so, hopefully things will pick up in the next 6 months before our cruise.)

Certainly in Australia after all our lockdowns, now things are back to normal,  the hospitality industry is struggling to find staff. People have found other lines of work. 

[Karaboudjan]

50 minutes ago, RichOZ said:

This is disappointing to say the least. 

Do you think a lot of it has to do with the COVID interruption? Have all the decent chefs found somewhere else to work, leaving the cruise industry to start again? (If so, hopefully things will pick up in the next 6 months before our cruise.)

Certainly in Australia after all our lockdowns, now things are back to normal,  the hospitality industry is struggling to find staff. People have found other lines of work. 

 

I think you should not form an opinion of NCL based on what you read in this thread.  Too many people with an axe to grind about the menu changes.  Read some other threads and you'll find many people who have enjoyed excellent food even after the restart.  I am one of them.

[RTHall]

11 hours ago, Karaboudjan said:

 

I think you should not form an opinion of NCL based on what you read in this thread.  Too many people with an axe to grind about the menu changes.  Read some other threads and you'll find many people who have enjoyed excellent food even after the restart.  I am one of them.

I have no axe to grind. This was my first cruise in 10 years and I came in to it expecting decent food in the dining rooms. I wasn’t expecting gourmet food. What I was served was the quality I’d expect from Golden Corral. Their slogan of “No one does dining like Norwegian” is a joke. I’ve been served better food when visiting my grandmother at a literal nursing home. Hopefully the signature dining locations are better. The food was bad enough that I wouldn’t risk taking another cruise with Norwegian. 

[RTHall]

12 hours ago, RichOZ said:

This is disappointing to say the least. 

Do you think a lot of it has to do with the COVID interruption? Have all the decent chefs found somewhere else to work, leaving the cruise industry to start again? (If so, hopefully things will pick up in the next 6 months before our cruise.)

Certainly in Australia after all our lockdowns, now things are back to normal,  the hospitality industry is struggling to find staff. People have found other lines of work. 

I have to assume it’s due to COVID related cuts. They wouldn’t have been able to run a cruise line for decades with food this bad. There would be no second time cruisers. 

[Nikonguy1961]

On 9/20/2022 at 3:17 PM, PC Skier said:

FYI We just got off the Breakaway, the menu changed everyday.

Thanks for this. My girlfriend and I aare sailing on Breakaway in Dec 2023 and this is great to hear.

[ziggyuk]

38 minutes ago, Nikonguy1961 said:

Thanks for this. My girlfriend and I aare sailing on Breakaway in Dec 2023 and this is great to hear.

 

I would be very surprised if this idea was not fleetwide by December 2023.

[PATRLR]

41 minutes ago, RTHall said:

I have to assume it’s due to COVID related cuts. They wouldn’t have been able to run a cruise line for decades with food this bad. There would be no second time cruisers. 

Has nothing to do with Covid.  ALL of the mass market lines have lowered food quality and that long predates Covid.  Your Golden Corral reference isn't far off, IMO.  My opinion is they are more like Applebees or other national chains and quite frankly Applebees fits a large segement of NCLs demographic so not surprised that so many think it's good food.  

And I have no axe to grind either.  I've got one NCL cruise booked for November and we're actively discussing another for next spring.  I know the food quality is low and I set my expectations accordingly. 

[Karaboudjan]

39 minutes ago, RTHall said:

I have no axe to grind. This was my first cruise in 10 years and I came in to it expecting decent food in the dining rooms. I wasn’t expecting gourmet food. What I was served was the quality I’d expect from Golden Corral. Their slogan of “No one does dining like Norwegian” is a joke. I’ve been served better food when visiting my grandmother at a literal nursing home. Hopefully the signature dining locations are better. The food was bad enough that I wouldn’t risk taking another cruise with Norwegian. 

 

That may be.  I was not on your cruise.  My take, though, is that this thread is encouraging people to talk about their bad experiences more than their good ones.  I was just advising someone not to take this as a 'how is NCL food' thread since I do not believe it represents the overall customer experience.

[newbe dave]

I am very confused on this thread. If you don't like the food on an NCL cruise, why would you book an NCL cruise? And if you are not a fan of NCL, why spend your valuable time trolling an NCL blog to spread your hate for NCL. Is there some internal benefit you get from publicly bashing something? Maybe I am missing out on the true enjoyment of these types of forums. 

 

For myself, I have never gone hungry on a cruise (NCL or other). The food is fine. Is it 5 star, no. But I think it is good value for the price I pay. Because of that, I have booked additional NCL cruises. If my opinion of the food changes, I may choose to spend my limited travel dollars elsewhere. But I do not expect to also spend my limited time explaining to the world every thought I have about NCL. Maybe I am missing something. 

[cruiseny4life]

5 minutes ago, Karaboudjan said:

 

That may be.  I was not on your cruise.  My take, though, is that this thread is encouraging people to talk about their bad experiences more than their good ones.  I was just advising someone not to take this as a 'how is NCL food' thread since I do not believe it represents the overall customer experience.

I agree with you about people discussing how terrible the food is on the new non-rotational menu that they haven't even tried. It seems a few have been on Prima and I've seen good comments on the food. I haven't read a comment yet about someone being bored with the menu (totally possible I missed them).

 

I will say @PATRLR and @RTHall are correct about the buffet being of Golden Corral quality. After my first cruise on NCL in April I was run through the ringer for calling the food worst than "pig slop." A lot of commenters told me to try it again and to try the specialties. Well, I did and my vedict is that I stand by my statement in April. I tried the buffet three times (lunch, Mexican night, and Asian night). Not one time was the food decent for my consumption. I wanted to try varied menus so that's why I attempted the food a few times. It was worse than Golden Corral.

 

My Mexican night plate - 90% of it went to the garbage (even the tacos):

 

 

Asian Night plate (all, but two or three bites went to the garbage):

 

 

Now, on to the positive! I went to the main dining room twice and had very good meals. I waited all week for Chicken Cordon Bleu and the opportunity finally came! Of course I had already eaten dinner, so I hoped I wouldn't be too stuffed. I was not as pleased as I hoped to be. They cut the chicken cordon bleu in half. The enjoyment of Chicken Cordon Bleu is having all that scrumptious sauce leak out after the first cut! The taste was ok. Not amazing, but it was better than a fresh from your grocer's freezer option. I was afraid of being overly stuffed (which my meal was not overly stuffed with swiss and ham), but the portions were so small that I was not, even after having first dinner earlier in the evening. The potato salad served with it was gross.

 

I also tried chicken parm in the main dining room. It was alright. The chicken pho I paired it with was very disappointing. It was not pho at all. The chicken parm was not tender enough and the breading wasn't well seasoned. The noodles were a bit over cooked for my liking and fake parmesan wasn't appreciated. 

 

 

 

One stand out - I don't remember which night - were the tiny tostados. I should have ordered three or four portions, because they were scrumptious!

 

 

This lobster ravioli was alright. The lobster sauce was too "fishy." I am not a lobster connoisseur, so I can't really say if it tasted right or not. I know it did not taste anything like the lobster tails I ate in the Haven. 

 

 

I said it was positive though. Yes! It was positive in that I could live of main dining room meals for a week if need be. Before my September cruise I wasn't sure as I never went to the main dining room in April. I am truly hoping that the Prima non-rotational menu works out, so that the food quality is raised. It could work! It does in the Haven, although I know the quality of the main dining room ingredients won't be quite as good as the Haven ingredients. 

 

[bookbabe]

We’ve done numerous NCL cruises, both pre- and post-lockdown.  We generally like the food, including that at the buffet.  We’ve sailed in the Haven a few times, and while the food is okay, the same menu every day is not something we are fans of.  Even the best food gets boring (for us) when it doesn’t change from cruise to cruise.  I’m really hoping the Prima MDR menu experiment is a failed one and this doesn’t roll out fleetwide.

 

And, as someone who doesn’t mind Golden Corral food, especially since I am a “try a tiny bit of everything” buffet fan, I will happily take that food over the fancy “Foam and Swirls” dishes that some people seem to feel is the only option for Fine Dining.  There’s nothing DH and I dislike more than menus where it seems like the chef is a failed artist and wants presentation to triumph over taste.  I’ve never had pig slop on an NCL cruise (or at Golden Corral for that matter) and even if a particular dish wasn’t to our taste, we’ve rarely had badly cooked or poor quality food.  YMMV, I guess.  Good thing there are lots of different cruise lines out there, with all types of dining styles and food options.

[RTHall]

9 hours ago, newbe dave said:

I am very confused on this thread. If you don't like the food on an NCL cruise, why would you book an NCL cruise? And if you are not a fan of NCL, why spend your valuable time trolling an NCL blog to spread your hate for NCL. Is there some internal benefit you get from publicly bashing something? Maybe I am missing out on the true enjoyment of these types of forums. 

 

For myself, I have never gone hungry on a cruise (NCL or other). The food is fine. Is it 5 star, no. But I think it is good value for the price I pay. Because of that, I have booked additional NCL cruises. If my opinion of the food changes, I may choose to spend my limited travel dollars elsewhere. But I do not expect to also spend my limited time explaining to the world every thought I have about NCL. Maybe I am missing something. 

Had I known how bad the food was I wouldn’t have booked. Knowing now how bad the food is I won’t be booking again. I was clearly misled by the slogan “nobody does dining like Norwegian”. I took that to mean they did it well….my mistake lol