Dining in The Restaurant at lunch

[adolfo2]

21 hours ago, saminina said:

Only ordered after the hotel manager lightly bugged me to do a specially prepared dinner.   And no, it was not offered in response to a complaint about food.

I remember Luca encouraging us to do a special dinner.

We declined, and told him that with all this delicious food why would we add extra work to the Chef & Staff for something special? ... He was speechless 😉

[hoosier74]

20 hours ago, brittany12 said:

 Ports all look pretty crappy, like Belize, best from the rear view mirror,  but who cares. 

The reef at Belize and the Blue Hole are spectacular.  The Mayan ruins at Laminai are also spectacular.   Ambergris Cay is a wonderful resort destination.  Belize City is not 

[nancygp]

Currently on the quest, at sea with a 2pm arrival in Halifax.  The Restaurant WILL BE OPEN for lunch today…pleasantly surprised.

 

Nancy 

[saminina]

The off menu ordering is not normally a burden in a well staffed ship's kitchen.  They do plenty of that for dietary needs.   On Seabourn, the Seabourn pre HAL takeover of the kitchen, not unusual for the top chef to ask if he could prepare something special.  It breaks the the routine for which they were happy.

It just wasn't our thing to do.  Maybe we missed something.....just add to list of missed things.  Like why didn't we order that bottle of wine that is now sold out?

 

I'm happy for those that enjoy the special meals while they are still available.  I'm happy for people that enjoy trivia, while I drink wine in MDR.

 

Edited October 20, 2022 by saminina

[calm down dear]

So far on Encore since 16/10 the restaurant has been closed at breakfast and lunch. I think this is a great shame, whilst patio is an alternative at breakfast it is too cold. However the sushi restaurant is sometimes open at lunch which is a far less frantic environment to the colannade. I don’t have a 100% aversion to buffet but given what we are paying there ought to be choice, as others note ambiance is important as well as food.

[highplanesdrifters]

4 hours ago, saminina said:

I'm happy for people that enjoy trivia, while I drink wine in MDR.

Turns out  you can drink wine and enjoy trivia.  Results may vary.😃

[Catlover54]

2 hours ago, highplanesdrifters said:

Turns out  you can drink wine and enjoy trivia.  Results may vary.😃

 

7 hours ago, nancygp said:

Currently on the quest, at sea with a 2pm arrival in Halifax.  The Restaurant WILL BE OPEN for lunch today…pleasantly surprised.

 

Nancy 

 

This is good.  Maybe it was considered a "sea day" because you had not yet arrived.

 

Did you go?

If so (or perhaps even if not), could you post (or just verbally describe) the Restaurant lunch menu (other than the always available options)?  It was not open on any day on my recent Quest journey, (other than a galley buffet lunch) so I haven't had an opportunity to see a lunch menu on Quest since pre-Covid.

[JPH814]

On 10/15/2022 at 12:53 PM, Vineyard View said:

I do not disagree with this at all. We are not buffet fans - although I will say that Viking has taken it to a different level than most we have sailed on. This being our first SB cruise, and this being a “luxury” line, I would not expect to find these types of concerns. I would think that having the dining room open on sea days would be automatic. In this thread, and several other, I notice quite a bit of unrest amongst SB fans with a lot reduction of service changes that have been implemented. Add to that, the financial concerns - I am sincerely beginning to wonder if my paid in full luxury cruise is such a wise decision. I should be getting excited about our first post-Covid cruise on SB, not increasingly worried. I know cruise lines in general have really struggled, and it’s not a bed of roses everywhere, but there seems to be a high level of dissatisfaction and concerns on the SB threads in comparison to a couple other lines we have sailed on or are considering. 

I am aboard the Quest now.  As per my signature I have a pretty broad set of experiences.  I have to disagree.  
 

“ quite a bit of unrest”. Not really. An occasional hiccup but wonderful staff, exceptional food and beet personalized service 

 

“ high level of dissatisfaction “. Check out the posts and you may find many stem from a very few people.  And the positives far outnumber the negatives

 

dining room? Had breakfast one day ( not a sea day). And lunch was open yesterday ( sea day? Pulled into port at 1:30) 

Edited October 21, 2022 by JPH814

[jondfk]

Thanks all for your comments and especially to those who are posting current experiences.  We are booked on two Seaborne sailings in 2023, Ovation in June and Odyssey in August, our first.

 

We sailed Oceania thrice this year, at a per diem about 1/3 less than Seaborne, even still, the main dining room was open daily for breakfast and sea days for lunch.  DW does not under any circumstances do the buffet, when this is the only option, I become her waiter, which is fine on calm port days but undesirable on busy sea days.  We are certainly hoping the dining room will be an option at least on sea days.

 

We are eagerly looking forward to sailing Seaborne but will say honestly that daily buffets for 2 out of 3 meals, at the prices charged will not make us loyal customers.  
 

[adolfo2]

20 hours ago, calm down dear said:

So far on Encore since 16/10 the restaurant has been closed at breakfast and lunch. I think this is a great shame, whilst patio is an alternative at breakfast it is too cold. However the sushi restaurant is sometimes open at lunch which is a far less frantic environment to the colannade. I don’t have a 100% aversion to buffet but given what we are paying there ought to be choice, as others note ambiance is important as well as food.

I agree 100%

 

While I'm sure that the "Buffet" experience is a step above Old Country Buffet or Golden Corral (being facetious of course) the fact remains, that in our case (14-day cruise w/o any sea days) we're never going to experience an MDR breakfast or lunch (except for maybe Galley lunch?). This is hardly the mark of a very-expensive, five or six star LUXURY cruise line 😕

 

[adolfo2]

3 hours ago, jondfk said:

Thanks all for your comments and especially to those who are posting current experiences.  We are booked on two Seaborne sailings in 2023, Ovation in June and Odyssey in August, our first.

 

We sailed Oceania thrice this year, at a per diem about 1/3 less than Seaborne, even still, the main dining room was open daily for breakfast and sea days for lunch.  DW does not under any circumstances do the buffet, when this is the only option, I become her waiter, which is fine on calm port days but undesirable on busy sea days.  We are certainly hoping the dining room will be an option at least on sea days.

 

We are eagerly looking forward to sailing Seaborne but will say honestly that daily buffets for 2 out of 3 meals, at the prices charged will not make us loyal customers.  
 

Very DISAPPOINTING 😞 

A happy medium would be a few MDR breakfast & lunch "sprinkled" about on those days when Seabourns own historical data indicates many passengers remain onboard.

[Mr Luxury]

46 minutes ago, adolfo2 said:

Very DISAPPOINTING 😞 

A happy medium would be a few MDR breakfast & lunch "sprinkled" about on those days when Seabourns own historical data indicates many passengers remain onboard.

It's a small ship and very few stay on board.

Larger ships have to open dining venues as they need the space because there are too many guests to seat in one or two venues.

[Vineyard View]

5 hours ago, JPH814 said:

I am aboard the Quest now.  As per my signature I have a pretty broad set of experiences.  I have to disagree.  
 

“ quite a bit of unrest”. Not really. An occasional hiccup but wonderful staff, exceptional food and beet personalized service 

 

“ high level of dissatisfaction “. Check out the posts and you may find many stem from a very few people.  And the positives far outnumber the negatives

 

dining room? Had breakfast one day ( not a sea day). And lunch was open yesterday ( sea day? Pulled into port at 1:30) 

My comments were made based on multiple recent threads regarding Quest, not just this one regarding lunch. I stand by what I concluded, specifically regarding Quest, from reading these several threads. There have been a lot of misses, not just hiccups, that should not occur on a Five Star luxury ship. 
 

That said, I am really happy that your current experience on Quest is positive.  I sincerely hope that those reports start becoming the norm. We are scheduled on her next year. 

[calm down dear]

My solution, if it is staffing that is the issue, is close the patio every now and then. Everything on patio eg burger, is available in colonnade and if you want to eat said burger outside in the cold there are plenty of outdoor tables in colonnade or you could get room service to deckchair.

The other idea is why not gauge demand a la Keller night by putting on a say themed lunch in restaurant?

To me only having a frantic buffet or windswept patio is not luxury in 14 days.

[CalmSea]

I have to put in a few words of defense for lunch on the patio. It is our lunch location of choice on port days. It was opened until 3:30 p.m. We often came back from an excursion, or a walk around the port around 3 and went to the patio. Our usual order was fish of the day, a soup (if it was still available), and a beer. Their fish dishes changed every day, and were usually very good and better than the salmon from the Colonade. Since the ship was not moving, the wind was usually not a problem. 

[florisdekort]

4 hours ago, Mr Luxury said:

It's a small ship and very few stay on board.

Larger ships have to open dining venues as they need the space because there are too many guests to seat in one or two venues.

Exactly 👍🏻

[Catlover54]

56 minutes ago, CalmSea said:

I have to put in a few words of defense for lunch on the patio. It is our lunch location of choice on port days. It was opened until 3:30 p.m. We often came back from an excursion, or a walk around the port around 3 and went to the patio. Our usual order was fish of the day, a soup (if it was still available), and a beer. Their fish dishes changed every day, and were usually very good and better than the salmon from the Colonade. Since the ship was not moving, the wind was usually not a problem. 

 

I'm glad it worked for you, as it does for many.  Eating at 3 on the ship (instead of eating in port, which SB pax are indirectly encouraged to do) also increases the odds that service will be better.

 

On our recent Quest trip, because we felt the Colonnade food was mediocre (and stressful with the buffet) we ate on the patio at "lunchtime" a few times,  which means 12-1:30, rather than at 3 as we are not huge breakfast eaters and we get pretty hungry after walking around. DH also prefers  to have lunch many hours before our usually large dinner (I'm fine with grazing intermittently throughout the day if I have something to graze on, and adjusting my intake accordingly, but he likes a regular normally timed and normal sized lunch).  Our entree choices were hamburger, hot dog, pizza, and fish of the day. As you know there was also salad which staff would mix up for us with what we wanted (that was the best part). .   Our cumulative problems were:

1.  One day plain hamburgers had no taste, the next time the "Napa burger" intrinsically tasted  better (like real meat) but was room temperature.  All were repeatedly served on untoasted buns (the last set of buns were actually cold, like out of a cooler, probably just thawed). Hot dog was dessicated.  Both issues were in part likely related to late pickups by the waiter and staffing shortages precluding toasting of buns (which were toasted on Quest and Encore and Odyssey pre-Covid).

2.  Fries were soggy, or once just missing (an empty pointy container of paper was brought ), requiring flagging down the elusive waiter again.

3.  We repeatedly struggled to get drink refills, e.g., on simple diet coke.  The one slow-moving waiter would be busy on the other side of the deck chatting and smiling and dealing with cocktails for big groups (and then later refilling their cocktails/beers) never looking up at us.   This was a repeated event.

4.  We did not like the constant pounding pop music (we both have very good hearing, so noise does not automatically get muted).  Some people may like that thumping (we don't), or just not hear it, especially if they are loudly talking in a group and well-lubed.

 

We landed up preferring lunch in the quiet suite where even if the food came cold, we could at lest easily pull a coke out of the frdge  or (if possible, not always an option)  our favorite was to get around the issue by  just spending more money to eat in port.

 

Better staffing, or coming mid-afternoon at 3 and ordering  nice fish like you had instead of meat, would have likely solved our problems except for #4.  

 

It was good, however, to have the venue open until 3:30 -- people saving money who did not want to eat in port even when there were places to eat , could just go and plop down in their excursion gear, straight from reboarding, without having to clean up and get more presentable for a MDR lunch (like we did in the past, when MDR was open at lunch).  

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Catlover54]

31 minutes ago, florisdekort said:

Exactly 👍🏻

 

5 hours ago, Mr Luxury said:

It's a small ship and very few stay on board.

Larger ships have to open dining venues as they need the space because there are too many guests to seat in one or two venues.

 

SB ships have always been small (and last I looked, they are not getting smaller), and in popular ports, most pax would get off the ship (though many would try, and still try, to return for lunch, which they have already paid for and which is convenient and/or the only realistic option in some places when ports are visited off season and much is closed).

That is not new. What is new, is the staffing cuts. 

 

 

[CalmSea]

57 minutes ago, Catlover54 said:

...

Our cumulative problems were:

1.  One day plain hamburgers had no taste, the next time the "Napa burger" intrinsically tasted  better (like real meat) but was room temperature.  All were repeatedly served on untoasted buns (the last set of buns were actually cold, like out of a cooler, probably just thawed). Hot dog was dessicated.  Both issues were in part likely related to late pickups by the waiter and staffing shortages precluding toasting of buns (which were toasted on Quest and Encore and Odyssey pre-Covid).

2.  Fries were soggy, or once just missing (an empty pointy container of paper was brought ), requiring flagging down the elusive waiter again.

3.  We repeatedly struggled to get drink refills, e.g., on simple diet coke.  The one slow-moving waiter would be busy on the other side of the deck chatting and smiling and dealing with cocktails for big groups (and then later refilling their cocktails/beers) never looking up at us.   This was a repeated event.

4.  We did not like the constant pounding pop music (we both have very good hearing, so noise does not automatically get muted).  Some people may like that thumping (we don't), or just not hear it, especially if they are loudly talking in a group and well-lubed.

...

 

I know I am going off topics here, but I still would like to add a few comments regarding food during lunch on the patio.

I was on the Quest too, and after reading some of the remarks about patio lunch food, I decided to try their hot dog and didn't like it. We tried the french fries and liked it. You are correct that we probably got better service at 3. But, fish was probably also better at 3. Let me explain. Obviously, fish for lunch at the patio was frozen, but if it was cooked correctly, it would taste almost as good as fresh ones. It should not be defrosted but cooked directly frozen. At 3, it was very likely that they didn't have any defrosted fish left anymore. We found it a good sign when we had to wait some 20 minutes for our fish of the day. It was just about the right amount of time to cook a frozen fish through, so that it was warm and not overcook. Next time, you may want to try order fish at the patio at a late hour.

 

I promise not to go off-topic again.

[Catlover54]

28 minutes ago, CalmSea said:

 

I know I am going off topics here, but I still would like to add a few comments regarding food during lunch on the patio.

I was on the Quest too, and after reading some of the remarks about patio lunch food, I decided to try their hot dog and didn't like it. We tried the french fries and liked it. You are correct that we probably got better service at 3. But, fish was probably also better at 3. Let me explain. Obviously, fish for lunch at the patio was frozen, but if it was cooked correctly, it would taste almost as good as fresh ones. It should not be defrosted but cooked directly frozen. At 3, it was very likely that they didn't have any defrosted fish left anymore. We found it a good sign when we had to wait some 20 minutes for our fish of the day. It was just about the right amount of time to cook a frozen fish through, so that it was warm and not overcook. Next time, you may want to try order fish at the patio at a late hour.

 

I promise not to go off-topic again.

 

Excellent and creative suggestion about the patio fish timing!  

I continue to learn so much on CC (much of it from off or semi-off-topic :)).

 

[Mr Luxury]

10 hours ago, Catlover54 said:

 

 

SB ships have always been small (and last I looked, they are not getting smaller), and in popular ports, most pax would get off the ship (though many would try, and still try, to return for lunch, which they have already paid for and which is convenient and/or the only realistic option in some places when ports are visited off season and much is closed).

That is not new. What is new, is the staffing cuts. 

 

 

It's not staffing cuts it's actually staffing issues.

The hospitality industry at sea and on land has a real problem with getting staff especially after the pandemic as many in the industry left and got jobs in other sectors.

All cruise lines are actively recruiting and that is why you see service issues on every line as new staff are being trained.

It is easy to criticise and get upset because "we have paid a lot of money for this and we expect five star service" but we must be patient as we also see in land based restaurants,after all we are on vacation and life is good if we can afford the thousands of Dollars/Pounds to be lucky enough to travel.

[markham]

Mr L,

There you go again trying to be reasonable. You will get your reward in due course.

Happy and healthy sailing!

PS- I too dislike loud thumping music. Never understood the appeal for anyone older than 20.

[adolfo2]

14 hours ago, Catlover54 said:

It was good, however, to have the venue open until 3:30 -- people saving money who did not want to eat in port even when there were places to eat , could just go and plop down in their excursion gear, straight from reboarding, without having to clean up and get more presentable for a MDR lunch (like we did in the past, when MDR was open at lunch).  

I'm hesitant to eat in some of the places we're at due to food "sanitation" fears/issues as I don't relish getting sick/ill for a few days with GI issues.

 

I still remember the tricycle "Ceviche Cart" (not unlike an old-fashioned Good Humor one) in Columbia. Would have LOVED to partake of it BUT also terrified of the potential consequences 😲

[adolfo2]

19 hours ago, Mr Luxury said:

It's a small ship and very few stay on board.

Larger ships have to open dining venues as they need the space because there are too many guests to seat in one or two venues.

Then why isn't the MDR open for breakfast at least, on port-days, when there is still a captive audience of guests onboard?

It's rare for docking to occur before 8:00AM so a 6:30~8:00AM sit-down breakfast sounds ideal and would take lots of pressure off of the room service staff as well!

[adolfo2]

4 hours ago, Mr Luxury said:

It is easy to criticize and get upset because "we have paid a lot of money for this and we expect five star service" but we must be patient as we also see in land based restaurants, after all we are on vacation and life is good if we can afford the thousands of Dollars/Pounds to be lucky enough to travel.

Patience is one thing but I expect a certain level of "everything" based upon what was paid. Until this level is rendered, we should be receiving a letter of apology (Including an OBC) at embarkation when they know full well, in advance, that it can't be supplied.