Anyone enjoying the new menu selections?

[orville99]

14 minutes ago, pittnh said:

 

there is no such thing as Alfredo sauce in Italy

It was created in Rome in 1914 by chef Alfredo di Lelio and served at his restaurant, Alfredo's. Legend has it that in 1927, silent-film stars Mary Pickford and Douglas Fairbanks discovered this dish while honeymooning in Rome.

Edited March 28, 2023 by orville99

[orville99]

11 minutes ago, poocher said:

My lasagna sauce is also a little different than my regular home made.  

And a true Italian never eats lasagna the day it is baked😇

[lovesthebeach2]

18 minutes ago, orville99 said:

And a true Italian never eats lasagna the day it is baked😇

And also will eat it cold from the fridge the next day too…..we’ll, I do anyway 😇

[pittnh]

35 minutes ago, HappyTexan44 said:

 

It was created by a chef in Italy to tempt his pregnant wife to eat.  

 

 

maybe but having lived there for several years the only place I saw it on a menu were tourist traps in Firenze catered towards americans

Edited March 28, 2023 by pittnh

[orville99]

15 minutes ago, pittnh said:

 

maybe but having lived there for several years the only place I saw it on a menu were tourist traps in Firenze catered towards americans

Irrelevant to the statement you made. I have never had Cincinnati chili, but I trust that it somehow began its existence in Cincinnati. Just as Caesar salad started in Mexico, but most think it is somehow Italian, BTW, Firenze is closer to Florence than it is to Rome, and Florence has its own unique white sauces that you won't find elsewhere in Italy.

Edited March 28, 2023 by orville99

[Tatka]

I thought Firenze was Florence 🙂 

[pittnh]

30 minutes ago, orville99 said:

Irrelevant to the statement you made. I have never had Cincinnati chili, but I trust that it somehow began its existence in Cincinnati. Just as Caesar salad started in Mexico, but most think it is somehow Italian, BTW, Firenze is closer to Florence than it is to Rome, and Florence has its own unique white sauces that you won't find elsewhere in Italy.

 

not true.  I said there is no sauce or item on a menu called Alfredo in present day Italy.  Maybe in some form there was an Alfredo who created it long ago but if you order it today in Italy you might as well get a side of Hamburger with it since it will be in the most touristic of spots and caters to the americans.  

[pittnh]

28 minutes ago, Tatka said:

I thought Firenze was Florence 🙂 

 

it most definitely is, I take it as some type of typo from Orville in their post

[pcur]

3 hours ago, orville99 said:

And a true Italian never eats lasagna the day it is baked😇

Agree.  It sits in the fridge overnight so the flavors can blend, the sauce get absorbed a little in the noodles, and the cheese settle. Serving within 24 hours of cooking is my mark.

[pcur]

3 hours ago, poocher said:

My lasagna sauce is also a little different than my regular home made.  That’s too thick.  My lasagna needs a looser, thinner sauce.  I rarely eat Italian at a restaurant of any kind as it doesn’t live up to my family’s cooking.  But the small nonno & nonna shops are usually the best.  When visiting my daughter, we always stop at a little place in a strip mall in Altamonte Springs.  You’d never know it was there and the food is fabulous.

I'm picky about lasagna, too.  I find that most restaurants are stingy with the sauce.  I am not.

[baldilocks]

I do not know about everyone else, but I can remember back in the USMC the old 'C' rats. I'm not going to complain about the food on the ship unless it is just awful. 

[lovesthebeach2]

11 hours ago, Tatka said:

I thought Firenze was Florence 🙂 

So do I.

[poocher]

This is what we call making sauce (it’s a 20 qt pot)

 

[HappyTexan44]

1 hour ago, poocher said:

This is what we call making sauce (it’s a 20 qt pot)

 

Somewhere I have a coffee table book on "Italian Cooking."   Many of the recipes just start with "red sauce", which of course everyone just has in their fridge.  

[Batch5]

On 3/15/2023 at 2:47 PM, CanadaRob said:

Got off Oasis, 2weeks agp, ate in the MDR every night except last one, food was as good as my previous October Odyssey sailing. The deal for us is is we both can’t see something we want we don’t go, hence the last night, wife didn’t see anything that she would want, I felt pretty similar.  Had salmon a couple of times, pasta(I don’t eat pasta at home).  Generally food was good, our service was not, so I can’t blame a lukewarm entree on the kitchen when we waited 20-30minutes for them sometimes.

 

Too funny CanadaRob, this is my wife and me exactly!  We also did not go the last night on this past Anthem cruise for the same reason.   We look at it this way we are not cooking or cleaning up so in and of itself makes everything more appealing.  We also do not set the bar that high and try new things that we normally would not get at home in a restaurant (e.g. lamb shank gave it a shot), you are on a cruise you will go hungry.

Chris

[Sigyn]

This food is terrible, and the portions are so small!

[coordinator23]

I am not looking forward to my upcoming Alaska cruise. The quality of the food on VOS earlier this year was poor. I am hoping to get some decent meals in port. I’ve never had a prime rib before that I could not eat. I had difficulty cutting into it - using a steak knife!  After two very chewy bites, I gave up.The turkey dinner tasted like a Banquet tv dinner and the turkey was obviously pre-prepared. The dark meat was a pressed medallion and the white meat resembled thin strips of bacon - two of them about 3/4” wide and 3” long. If the food is the same quality on BOS, this will be my last RCCL cruise.  The next one will be Celebrity or Princess.

while I’m on a tear, one pat of butter per person - really?  Two preassigned rolls (same nightly) and two extremely thin sliced pieces of French bread ( there were two of us)?

You pay “extra” for an owners suite an get one bar of soap to move around the bathroom when you shower or use the separate tub or the double sinks (stateroom attendant got us another bar of soap when we asked halfway through the cruise).

Before I end the rant - I am D+ and have been fairly loyal. Will pick up third glass block in June. This is not the Royal Cruise Line I have been loyal to all these years.  I should not have to retreat to Chops to get an edible meal.

[poocher]

Was there not the liquid shampoo/conditioner/body wash dispensers in both the tub and shower areas?

[DebJ14]

On 3/19/2023 at 2:31 AM, perfect match said:

This is totally unacceptable! Sometimes I feel like people think I’m just being difficult because I question everything related to my food allergies. I’m not. I’m just trying to stay safe and healthy. I’m sure that me having an allergic reaction in the middle of the MDR would create a far greater disturbance than my questions ever will.  Unfortunately I’ve found out the hard way that it is in my best interest to be sure I know exactly what is on my plate and how it is prepared before I eat it. So far I’ve never had a problem on a cruise ship and I hope I never do.

I agree it is totally unacceptable.  I have celiac disease and I am highly allergic to dairy, beef and yeast.  Sadly, I have been glutened on 2 Carnival ships and on one Royal Caribbean ship. When it happens, I get the privilege of spending the night in the bathroom and feel awful for days after.  In every case, I have missed ports and the cruise lines have refused to refund shore excursions. In once case I had a devil of a time convincing the medical center that I did not have noro because getting glutened causes the same symptoms.

In the past they have always tried to be very accommodating.  On my last RCI cruise in Feb. 2023 the word I heard all the time was NO.  No GF pasta, no changes to any entree to make it gluten free, even when pre-ordering, no desserts that did not also contain dairy, and weirdly no Caesar salad, even without croutons.The only GF salad dressing was oil and vinegar.   I know the poor waiter felt bad when he had to deliver the NO, NO, NO.  Removing the GF designation from the menus makes the job much harder for the waiters as they have to continually ask the chef.  

I have until April 4 to pay a non refundable deposit (suite booking) or cancel in favor of another cruise line that I can count on to deliver meals that I can eat.  Frankly, I was shocked after having had 9 great gluten free cruises on Royal to see things change so drastically.

[rimmit]

10 hours ago, DebJ14 said:

I agree it is totally unacceptable.  I have celiac disease and I am highly allergic to dairy, beef and yeast.  Sadly, I have been glutened on 2 Carnival ships and on one Royal Caribbean ship. When it happens, I get the privilege of spending the night in the bathroom and feel awful for days after.  In every case, I have missed ports and the cruise lines have refused to refund shore excursions. In once case I had a devil of a time convincing the medical center that I did not have noro because getting glutened causes the same symptoms.

In the past they have always tried to be very accommodating.  On my last RCI cruise in Feb. 2023 the word I heard all the time was NO.  No GF pasta, no changes to any entree to make it gluten free, even when pre-ordering, no desserts that did not also contain dairy, and weirdly no Caesar salad, even without croutons.The only GF salad dressing was oil and vinegar.   I know the poor waiter felt bad when he had to deliver the NO, NO, NO.  Removing the GF designation from the menus makes the job much harder for the waiters as they have to continually ask the chef.  

I have until April 4 to pay a non refundable deposit (suite booking) or cancel in favor of another cruise line that I can count on to deliver meals that I can eat.  Frankly, I was shocked after having had 9 great gluten free cruises on Royal to see things change so drastically.

I am not GF but our tablemate on our recent cruise was.  I will say the waiters were very difficult.  In the past they have been very accomodating, but this most recent time, they had no clue what was gluten free.  What they could do to make it Gluten free and really minimal accomodations whatsoever.  It was very frustrating for them.  There was also another at our table that was Vegan and that was just as challenging.
 

Quite a contrast to previous cruises and when you go to Disney World, where you are asked 50 times if you have any dietary restrictions when you go to one of their restaurants.

Edited March 31, 2023 by rimmit

[HalifaxYorksCruiser]

Oh dear - terrible review of the MDR new menus.

 

 

[nelblu]

On 3/28/2023 at 9:41 PM, pcur said:

Agree.  It sits in the fridge overnight so the flavors can blend, the sauce get absorbed a little in the noodles, and the cheese settle. Serving within 24 hours of cooking is my mark.

Don’t know about you but we eat it hot out of the oven. All of the flavors are bubbling up.   Do you eat baked macaroni the next day also 😜

[poocher]

14 minutes ago, nelblu said:

Don’t know about you but we eat it hot out of the oven. All of the flavors are bubbling up.   Do you eat baked macaroni the next day also 😜

Gotta agree with pcur, many casserole type dishes taste better the next day.

[BennyandBo]

2 hours ago, HalifaxYorksCruiser said:

Oh dear - terrible review of the MDR new menus.

 

 

Starts off kinda OK, but by the end it's brutal. Royal has got to up there game. And soon. This is Carnival 2003 all over again. The bad food rep will stick for a long long time.

[TravelBluebird]

4 hours ago, BennyandBo said:

Starts off kinda OK, but by the end it's brutal. Royal has got to up there game. And soon. This is Carnival 2003 all over again. The bad food rep will stick for a long long time

 

Yikes. As someone planning to go on my first Royal cruise this has me worried. At bare minimum, I expect warm food, hot preferred, and certainly not some of the ice cold food they were served in the MDR.