Dinner dining question

live4christp1

DIS Veteran
Joined
Jan 18, 2005
In the main dining rooms for dinner do the servers wait for a certain amount of time to bring out the next course. We are pretty quick eaters and I cannot image having to spend an hour and a half + in the dining room. The only place I could see that this would be necessary is in Animator's Palate as the room changes with each course.

As we finish each course will they go ahead and bring the next?
 
Tell your servers that you'd like your courses served as soon as you finish each one. In Animator's, the show isn't really coordinated with the courses other than that dessert is typically after the "show" part.

Also, if your serving team is slow, let the head server know....he can either speed them up or move you.
 
Tell your servers that you'd like your courses served as soon as you finish each one. In Animator's, the show isn't really coordinated with the courses other than that dessert is typically after the "show" part.

Also, if your serving team is slow, let the head server know....he can either speed them up or move you.


Thank you. DH is military and if you know anything about how they eat at chow.......they don't waste any time.......:rotfl: . Now it takes me a little longer bur not an hour and a half.......:faint:
 
I was going to post about this at some point as well... I have been peeking around the DIS boards and get the impression (from readng trip reports) that the dining room dinners can take an hour and a half to two hours. While I am a relatively slow eater, I just can't imagine sitting still in a dining room for that length of time while I am on the DISNEY CRUISE!! I imagine that I will be way too excited and anxious to get back out there & experience all of the fun & intriguing things listed in the Navs. Is there a polite way to let your servers know that you want to keep your meal to an hour or less (if possible), and would doing so be considered rude behavior towards your tablemates if they did not also wish to do so?

We have the late dinner seating (which is crazy late in my opinion!!) and I want to get up & outta there in order to have some time for activities and not feel like I am going straight from dinner to bed.
 


There will be a short break in between courses but the dinner in AP the night of the show cannot be shortened at all. The service is timed to the music and all the servers must be on time for that.
 
Actually I have never sat long in between courses, except for dessert and that is because the dessert menu comes out as you are finishing up dinner. They do wait to bring out the menus after everyone is finishing. Sometimes being the last one to finish, some of my table mates are waiting for me to finish in order to order dessert. The food by no means is "ready" in the back. They do make it to order, so you will wait a little longer than what you would in a Perkins. If you want this then you have to hit Goofy's. So my bottle line is; it is not the servers, it is the food prep, organization, presentation that takes a bit more time. You have to wait for the art to be done to the plate. So it truly is no longer than a gourmet restaurant. The biggest waits are waiting for all of your tablemates to arrive, the arrival of your food and the wait for dessert. Any 5 star dining takes longer than your "Applebees" type restaurant. So just to let you know, it will take the average length of time. The only time you are sitting at the table twirling your thumbs is waiting for table mates and for dinner to start.

The "show" that people talk about really is not a "show" so the time in AP should be the same as in all of the other Restaurants. I guess it may take a wee bit longer in AP because we do have to add 3 minutes for the servers to change vest :lmao: .
 
Thank you. DH is military and if you know anything about how they eat at chow.......they don't waste any time.......:rotfl: . Now it takes me a little longer bur not an hour and a half.......:faint:

My DH is military as well. I can take 2 bites of something and by the time I am finished chewing he is done his entire meal. It drives me insane!!:lmao:
 


I was going to post about this at some point as well... I have been peeking around the DIS boards and get the impression (from readng trip reports) that the dining room dinners can take an hour and a half to two hours. While I am a relatively slow eater, I just can't imagine sitting still in a dining room for that length of time while I am on the DISNEY CRUISE!! I imagine that I will be way too excited and anxious to get back out there & experience all of the fun & intriguing things listed in the Navs. Is there a polite way to let your servers know that you want to keep your meal to an hour or less (if possible), and would doing so be considered rude behavior towards your tablemates if they did not also wish to do so?

We have the late dinner seating (which is crazy late in my opinion!!) and I want to get up & outta there in order to have some time for activities and not feel like I am going straight from dinner to bed.

Just remember for a lot of us West Coasters, for our body clocks late seating is crazy early for us. 8:30 is 5:30 for us. Our kids did things like soccer and Little League after school so normaly dinner at home was rarely before 7 or 7:30 pm.
And as cruisers going back 29 years, we expect dinner to last a while...our late seating dinner on Disney usually lasted 2 hours. But that's because we consider dinner to be one of the activites we love on the ship.
That's what's wonderful about most cruises, including Disney. You can eat late, you can eat early, you can ask servers to speed up your service, your can get a quick meal at Plutos or Pinnochios or Goofy's, or even in your room and on 7 days you can eat at Topsiders for a quicker meal.
 
We've only cruised once so far, but if I had to pick one negative thing out of our cruising experience, it would be the time it took to eat dinner in the dining rooms. We are foodies, so for us eating in the dining rooms is one of the highlights of the cruise, and eating dinner at Topsiders is not an option. On our cruise, our server would wait until all of his tables had finished one course to bring the next one. Dinners took close to 2 hours every night! On the 2nd night we asked if he could serve us at a faster pace. He said he would, but he continued with his bizarre system, so when one of his tables was late, we all had to wait to order our food! Needless to say that our dining times remained at 2 hours. Since this was a short cruise, I didn't have time to complain again. While this didn't ruin our cruising experience, it certainly put a dent on it. We hope that this is not the norm and that we get better servers the next time around.

Do you have any advice about requesting a faster pace at dinner from your servers? (We'd be OK with 1 1/2 hours popcorn:: )
 
Also, part of the problem is that some diners come late. We are always on time. Its a weird habit of DH and myself. :lmao:

Anyway, they would seat us and we would sometimes be the only table in our server's section for a good 10 minutes. So they would bring out our soup or salad and our DD's child meal and then we would sit. One time they told us that our main courses wouldn't be out for an additional 45 minutes. :scared1: I laughed because I thought he was joking. He told me that they couldn't speed up the process just for us and that we were early. Umm, they don't open the dining room until the prescribed time. It was really weird. Then he told me that he would speak to the chef about speeding things up. :confused3
I was rather surprised. It seemed that our server didn't want us on the main course when others were just sitting down. But it really isn't our problem that people came 30 minutes late to dinner. Oh, and just so anyone isn't confused we were at a table by ourselves.

My DH has really bad arthritis and has problems sitting for extended periods of time without moving around. So many times he would leave after the main course and not stay for desert. He's diabetic anyway and doesn't eat desert. It really irked the server that DH didn't stay with us. Heck, if it doesn't bother me and DD it shouldn't bother him, and that's what I told him when he said something.:eek: From then on, the meal was served in regular intervals and we were rarely in the dining room for more than an hour.
 
Okay, I've put on my flame suit because I know that I am going to get flamed for this one.
But why should I have to wait to order my food and start my dinner because other tablemates (which would not be in my travelling party) cannot be on time to dinner? Let alone what if they choose not to show up at all that night? Our tablemates on our first cruise NEVER came to any of the sit down meals. We were told by the server and the head dining room server that we did in fact have tablemates. :confused3
My gripe is why does it have to take forever to eat because some people choose to lesuirely walk in with no regard to others who are being 'forced' to wait for them?!
I'm looking at changing our cruise date, but all of the early dinner seatings are gone. If I can't change it to an early seating (and I NEED this for medical reasons, the late seating is absolutely NOT AN OPTION) then we will order room service or eat at BBB. One night we plan to eat at Palo's too. And (donning flame suit again:rolleyes1 ) if I don't eat in the dining room at all, you can bet your britches I'm not tipping servers that I did not use. I know, that's a whole 'nother thread. :laughing:
I just wish that they would do more tables of 4 and even some of 2. I really don't enjoy eating w/ complete strangers. I know, I know, some can be really nice and it gives you a chance to meet other people. But what if you get stuck w/ the tablemates from H****??!! :scared1: I could see that putting a HUGE damper on my cruise experience. I guess I'm not good dinner company as I'd have no problem eating all alone. :rotfl2: I really just want the choices from the menu, but would have no problem eating in my cabin...quiet and peaceful. no little kids (or big ones:lmao: ) screaming, getting up from the tables, etc... ahhhhh .... ;)
 
No flames here.

I will say...for us, one of the downsides of the cruise is the length of time it takes for dinner. My kids were mentally DONE by the time we'd eaten the main course, so I think we maybe had dessert once during our entire 7-day Eastern. It was just waaaaay too long. The second day, the kids suggested leaving to get soft serve ice cream from deck 9, and the DH and I were on board with that. It got exhausting sitting for so darned long.

It's not that we're lightning-fast eaters, or that we didn't love our servers (they rocked) or enjoy the meals. It just seemed to take forever for food to come and we got bored out of our minds waiting. And waiting.

I'm kind of relieved to know we weren't the only ones!
 
We only had desert on 2 nights. Rest of the time was soft serve for DD and myself. And since my DD was eating a child's meal, she was done before our main course was even served. Just crazy.
 
DS went to the club a little more than half way through dinner just about every night. He had already finished their desert and was happy to go check in and start having fun with his friends there. That left DD to talk to the two other kids at the table and the adults to visit. We could stay longer than two hours if they let us since we sit with people we know before the cruise and enjoy catching up with each other on our activities that day.
 
I was going to post about this at some point as well... I have been peeking around the DIS boards and get the impression (from readng trip reports) that the dining room dinners can take an hour and a half to two hours. While I am a relatively slow eater, I just can't imagine sitting still in a dining room for that length of time while I am on the DISNEY CRUISE!!

Truth be told, NOBODY takes an hour to eat dinner. But you are missing the point. You have been tricked into thinking that dinner is a shove-it-down-your-throat-and-make-room-for-the-next-party affair by commercial restaurants that want you to order, eat, and make room for somebody else as fast as you can.
In the past in our country, and to this day in some countries, dinner is a long affair where you spend a little time eating and a lot of time relaxing and socializing.
If I want a nice dinner with my family, or a nice date with my wife, we go to a restaurant where we get a six course meal over 90 minutes so we have time to talk, don't have to rush ourselves, and can relax for a little bit.

Okay, I've put on my flame suit because I know that I am going to get flamed for this one.
But why should I have to wait to order my food and start my dinner because other tablemates (which would not be in my travelling party) cannot be on time to dinner? Let alone what if they choose not to show up at all that night? Our tablemates on our first cruise NEVER came to any of the sit down meals. We were told by the server and the head dining room server that we did in fact have tablemates. :confused3

I don't think you should have to wait at all. If you end up with tablemates who show up 20 minutes late and your server will not take your order until they are there, or will not deliver the main course until everybody's is ready, then tell - don't ask - the head server to move you to a table where you can get served promptly.
And if you do get the tablemates from hell, ask the head server to move you to a table with people who have appropriate social skills.
 
You have been tricked into thinking that dinner is a shove-it-down-your-throat-and-make-room-for-the-next-party affair by commercial restaurants that want you to order, eat, and make room for somebody else as fast as you can.
In the past in our country, and to this day in some countries, dinner is a long affair where you spend a little time eating and a lot of time relaxing and socializing..

While this is true to some extent, it's not my issue with the long dinner. I'm just not a heavy eater, and DEFINITELY not at dinner. I tend to eat my biggest meal at either breakfast or lunch and I don't eat out a lot. Maybe because I partially grew up in Europe, or maybe it's just me, but two hours is an awfully long time to be at dinner waiting for multiple courses (and watching the kids eat...then having them watch us eat.)

I'd rather socialize with my family and relax away from a dinner table. I don't want to stare at food for that long.

It's not that it's that bad--as I said before, my family thought the food and servers were wonderful, and we enjoyed the cruise enough to do it again very soon--but I do wish it was easier to eat that same, non-buffet food on my/my family's own schedule.

A trade-off, I guess!
 
Truth be told, NOBODY takes an hour to eat dinner. But you are missing the point. You have been tricked into thinking that dinner is a shove-it-down-your-throat-and-make-room-for-the-next-party affair by commercial restaurants that want you to order, eat, and make room for somebody else as fast as you can.
In the past in our country, and to this day in some countries, dinner is a long affair where you spend a little time eating and a lot of time relaxing and socializing.
If I want a nice dinner with my family, or a nice date with my wife, we go to a restaurant where we get a six course meal over 90 minutes so we have time to talk, don't have to rush ourselves, and can relax for a little bit.



I don't think you should have to wait at all. If you end up with tablemates who show up 20 minutes late and your server will not take your order until they are there, or will not deliver the main course until everybody's is ready, then tell - don't ask - the head server to move you to a table where you can get served promptly.
And if you do get the tablemates from hell, ask the head server to move you to a table with people who have appropriate social skills.


I agree, all good points. My family also looks at dinner as a social event. This is our one chance the whole day to sit together and find out how everyone's day was and what we plan for the evening or the next day. It is the one occasion that is mandatory for the kids. Now keep in mind, that the kids usually are served/finish a bit quicker or skip dessert to head to their respective clubs - but that is fine.

OP - keep in mind that you can also request ahead of time and again upon boarding to have your family not be seated with others. It cannot be guaranteed ahead of time, and depends on several factors out of your control, but it may be a good option for you if you do not want to wait for others.
 
Truth be told, NOBODY takes an hour to eat dinner. But you are missing the point. You have been tricked into thinking that dinner is a shove-it-down-your-throat-and-make-room-for-the-next-party affair by commercial restaurants that want you to order, eat, and make room for somebody else as fast as you can.
In the past in our country, and to this day in some countries, dinner is a long affair where you spend a little time eating and a lot of time relaxing and socializing.
If I want a nice dinner with my family, or a nice date with my wife, we go to a restaurant where we get a six course meal over 90 minutes so we have time to talk, don't have to rush ourselves, and can relax for a little bit.



I don't think you should have to wait at all. If you end up with tablemates who show up 20 minutes late and your server will not take your order until they are there, or will not deliver the main course until everybody's is ready, then tell - don't ask - the head server to move you to a table where you can get served promptly.
We did address the issue w/ the head server that our table mates were tardy the first night. Therefore, holding us up. Then they ended up being 'no shows' the whole cruise. It was very inconvenient. I think if I weren't going to dine in the dining room, I would check w/ guest services and find out who the appropriate party would be to direct that message/info to. I don't know maybe my expectations were too high, :confused3 but I felt we were inconvenienced at every dining room dinner because of the 'ghost' tablemates.

And if you do get the tablemates from hell, ask the head server to move you to a table with people who have appropriate social skills.
It's not about the social skills. It's the topics of conversation that I am not interesting in discussing w/ complete strangers. Mind you, we were on our cruise on election day. :scared1: Want to talk about contraversial issues? :rolleyes1 They seemed to be EVERYWHERE. But I think all and all, DH and I did a pretty good job of avoiding them. Shouldn't have had to put so much effort into though. Kinda leaves you strained and drained and you're on vacation. KWIM? ;)

While this is true to some extent, it's not my issue with the long dinner. I'm just not a heavy eater, and DEFINITELY not at dinner. I tend to eat my biggest meal at either breakfast or lunch and I don't eat out a lot. Maybe because I partially grew up in Europe, or maybe it's just me, but two hours is an awfully long time to be at dinner waiting for multiple courses (and watching the kids eat...then having them watch us eat.)

I'd rather socialize with my family and relax away from a dinner table. I don't want to stare at food for that long.

It's not that it's that bad--as I said before, my family thought the food and servers were wonderful, and we enjoyed the cruise enough to do it again very soon--but I do wish it was easier to eat that same, non-buffet food on my/my family's own schedule.

A trade-off, I guess!
:thumbsup2 My sentiments exactly!! ;)
 
I agree with it taking too long. Our servers never understand why we don't want to stay for desert. In most cases we are either too full or just want to be done being in the resturant at that point. And also by the time 9 something rolls around the last place I want to be is sitting in a diningroom finishing dinner. Sorry JMO....but I wish they had more options so many of us would'nt get stuck on late seating. We did however this past cruise go to topsiders and really enjoyed the laid back atmosphere and choices we had there. We'll deffinately make sure to use it more next time around. :)
 
I'm another one that feels dinner is so drawn out. I felt like we waited too long between courses. It's worse with late dining. Dinner basically felt like the end of my night. What a downer. I hated the full feeling before bed.

I would rather have spent a little more time enjoying the night life on the ship than to have sat there waiting for my meal. We ended up feeling too tired to visit the lounges.
 

GET A DISNEY VACATION QUOTE

Dreams Unlimited Travel is committed to providing you with the very best vacation planning experience possible. Our Vacation Planners are experts and will share their honest advice to help you have a magical vacation.

Let us help you with your next Disney Vacation!







Top