WHY did you not like the food on the cruise?

[lah3hh]

I wish they got a little bit more creative in their "lighter options"...they basically offer the same thing night after night. We have been on other cruise lines and they were extremely creative in regular, lighter options and vegetarian dishes. Disney not as good in this category. When we have been on the longer cruises these options are so basic and almost boring...come on offer some awesome things in that category as well.

I agree with some previous comments about the desserts. They look pretty but the taste does not make me want to eat it all.

Trust me I do not go on cruises to lose weight or be extremely fussy about eating all healthy but it is an area they can improve. I know they would have some good followers of lighter fare with a fling!!

Also PLEASE offer fresh popcorn made there in a machine for the movies!!! I know that is a little off topic but it's food!!!

 

[kiford]

Everyone's taste buds are different. I, for example, cannot understand people saying that the desserts are bland. I find them hideously overly sweet. Makes me nauseous even trying a few bites (this does NOT apply to the chocolate soufflé in Palo's - that I love). I rarely eat sweet foods so most desserts taste highly sugary to me. Same with salt; even small amounts of salt in food comes across to me as distastefully salty yet I can see some people adding tons more to the same dish that I eat and enjoy it. I cannot stand hot and spicy foods. I like flavourful but too much overwhelms me. I've read about people who think that the burgers from on deck are great - I think they're gross. I like the pool deck tacos (surprisingly) and the pizza is not bad.

I'm used to eating everything from McDonald's to chain restaurants to local mid-range non-chain restaurants to high-end restaurants and a variety of different cuisines. So I find the DCL food to be reasonably good - not McDonald's, not high-end (except for Remy's). I've never had a cold or lukewarm meal on DCL although I've had the occasional overcooked meat. I've had some I really liked, some I didn't, and some OK. Personally, I prefer their appetizers over the entrees because I prefer smaller portions of a wide variety of foods over a large plate of one thing. I like the variety of ingredients that they serve. My dad wants a slab of meat and a pile of potatoes and some overcooked (in my opinion) vegetables - none of those "weeds" (salad greens), weird vegetables (eggplant, zucchini) or foreign foods (pasta), thank you . I hate the foods he eats and he hates what I eat (makes the holidays very interesting).

Food preferences and taste are so very individual that you can't expect them to cater to that individuality. So you have to take what other people say about the food with a grain of salt (no pun intended) and make your own decisions. Cold, overcooked, greasy, mushy or undercooked is a legitimate complaint in my opinion; personal taste is not.

 

[moomy-san]

I agree with the desserts being over sweet and lacking flavor. There's one or 2 that aren't horrible.
There are a few things I look forward to on the menus, the rest I tolerate. The best cruise we ever had though was the time the dining room manager (whatever his title actually is?) found out that I couldn't eat the Parrot Cay menu and the Pirate Night menu because I'm allergic to many spices. He was from Italy and had actually managed Palo for years, so he told the kitchen staff exactly what to make for us every single night- they were all divine! We didn't have a clue what was coming but he made delicious choices for us. Best DCL food ever.
We have also started customizing the room service foods. They are very willing to change them for you if you ask.
And the Caesar salad in the MDR is the best. Already looking forward to it!!

 

[nananeliz]

I'm wondering if people who haven't been thrilled about the food on the cruise can explain why. To me, 1 bad meal for an overcooked steak or piece of fish is different than saying as a whole you didn't like the food.
I have 2 theories and am wondering if either (or both) may be somewhat true.
1) People who don't like the food prefer basic, simply stuff, may be a little picky, or just think it's too fancy/fussy/weird...
OR
2) People who don't like the food are used to eating out somewhat often at restaurants that cost $65+ for a couple and think Disney just can't quite hit that standard in the MDRs...
What do think?

Chiming in, having taken our first cruise this past summer. By way of background, we are not picky eaters, and do not frequent expensive restaurants, but we do like ethnic cuisine.

My husband and I didn't have overly high expectations of the food, given the large volume of folks that the kitchens must prepare dishes for and serve every night. I'd have to say that what we experienced was about on par with what we expected: the food was completely edible, but nothing too exciting. It was often beautifully presented, very nice to look at, but extremely bland from a taste perspective. But we did have excellent service, and we never had an inedible meal, so I didn't feel dissatisfied with that aspect of the cruise.

Some specific positives and negatives about the food:

Positives:
Taste of Alaska menu -- my husband raved about the Elk Tenderloin entree, and we enjoyed the fresh and local ingredients
Til We Meet Again menu -- the roasted red snapper entree was very good and we enjoyed the Baked Alaska dessert
French toast @ Parrot Cay -- my daughter's favorite breakfast entree
Palo brunch -- it was all good. Worth the extra cost.

Negatives:
As another poster mentioned, I'd loved to have seen a wider variety of "lighter note" offerings. There was typically an entree salad, which did change each night, but then the same set of other entrees (salmon, chicken, steak) with rice or potato and steamed veggies. After a few days on the ship I was craving something a bit lighter.
Similarly -- not much variety in the kids menu. We would sometimes order an entree from the regular menu for my daughter, but the portion sizes were large and I hated to waste the food.

I will add one more thing: I do appreciate very much how accommodating Disney is for guests with food allergies. Mine is not complex -- a shellfish allergy -- but DCL has a very good process for ensuring that the dishes are ordered, cooked, checked, and delivered so that there is no risk of cross-contamination.

 

[Conservative Hippie]

Food preferences and taste are so very individual that you can't expect them to cater to that individuality. So you have to take what other people say about the food with a grain of salt (no pun intended) and make your own decisions. Cold, overcooked, greasy, mushy or undercooked is a legitimate complaint in my opinion; personal taste is not.

Even some of that is subjective. DH thinks I overcook pasta and it is too mushy. I think he undercooks it and it is too crunchy (same with rice). He also prefers his food what I think is too cold (like room temperature) and I like mine piping hot.

Sent from me.

 

[mrsclark]

We never complained about the food on the ship because we had realistic expectations. I would say that the food is mediocre but we didn't care! We loved our servers. I hate to dress up and we did for the main dining room but to me the dressing up was not appropriate for the food being served.

Let me add some background on us. We are a family of 5 and middle income. We can't and don't eat at fancy restaurants. My wife is a meat and potatoes, hates seafood, and not adventurous. The head server was awesome and got her steak most of the time we ate in the MDR. I am adventurous but the food I tried was just average.

We live in Austin, TX which is known to support local owned restaurants. They thrive here. We are spoiled. We don't eat at chains like Applebees, Chilis, etc... Texas Roadhouse is a stretch for us. If we want Mexican we have local places, if we want burgers we have local places, etc...

The key to awesome food here in Austin is fresh fresh fresh. A lot of the places we eat at brag about not having freezers on the premises. (Except for ice makers of course). They buy their food fresh and cook it pronto. You can tell it is awesome. The place we love by our house (Jack Allen's Kitchen) is amazing and even the veggies are farm to market. The food is awesome and it helps so much with flavor when you aren't eating frozen food. Someone not adventurous like my wife gets an awesome dish every time just because the food hasn't been mutilated before it was brought to the table. It takes little spice to make fresh food taste good.

In Austin we can have food like this for a family of 5 for less than 40 dollars. It is hard to compare to a cruise ship. Like I said we are spoiled. We have a hard time visiting other places like where my parents live because the food is all chains and preprocessed. We just set our expectations and live with it. This is cruise food. It isn't fresh, it is frozen and cooked later. Nothing you can do on a vessel that size to get like we can in a restaurant at home. We set our expectations and enjoy our time even though the food isn't the best.

One other thing I noticed is the cheesecake is poor in the MDR. It doesn't have a rich consistency like a home made cheesecake. It is to much like a jello cheesecake. All of them taste the same but have a different topping on them like lemon, strawberry, mango, whatever. I LOVE cheesecake and I was the most disappointed by the cheesecake served on the ship.

With all that said we love the Disney cruise. I can understand why people don't like the food. Especially if you have access to fresh local food restaurants. No they don't have to cost $65 a person. In fact ALL of the restaurants we eat at in Austin are cheaper than the chains. I just don't understand how people eat at chains here. I swear they are open for business because of the tourists that don't realize that in order to truly experience Austin you have to eat at the local restaurants.

I agree - the two main reasons we didn't like the food were 1) it was obviously frozen instead of fresh and 2) for the meat dishes, I would say the quality of the cuts/meat was average to average minus. I think the problem for us it was presented in such a fancy way with two waiters, white tablecloths, etc., but the quality of food in our opinion did not match that level of formality/service. Instead it seemed like they were trying to dress up ok food to make it seem like you were getting a lot of the money by making it fancy.

I also agree that it was about the quality you would expect at a banquet hall or hotel ballroom for a wedding, which is fine for a one night event like a wedding, but when I have paid a fair amount to be on the ship and you are there for several nights in a row that can get old.

The exception, of course, was Palo. All the food tasted very fresh and well-prepared.

As background, we eat at locally owned restaurants where the food is still made on site (rather than bing frozen and reheated) and a lot of times made with the owners' family recipes - none of them are what I call fancy, but they use high quality ingredients and prepare the food well. Or we cook at home and when we do cook at home, we like to use high quality ingredients and make a lot from scratch. And, yes, we have eaten at Applebee's several times - we used to live in a smaller town where the only restaurant open later on a Sunday night was Applebee's. FIL would sometimes visit us on Sundays and want to go out to eat so that's where we would go. Some of the dishes on DCL were on par with Applebee's in my mind and some were better. If the food on DCL MDR were served in an Applebee's setting then it would make more "sense" in my mind, but when they go out of their way to make the dining rooms fancy, have two servers per table, and make the dishes sound really gourmet, then what you get doesn't live up to the hype so to speak.

 

[tink2007]

My husband and I got off our first DCL cruise (Dream) last week. My husband loves food .... all food. That being said, he loved everything he ate and he ate it all.
I, on the other hand was not impressed with anything. I certainly didn't starve but there wasn't anything that I would say was so good that I wanted more of it. I love cheesecake and all the cheesecake I tried looked so pretty and delicious. No joke, they all tasted the same.
From the mango cheesecake to the key lime cheesecake. So disappointing.
I feel like I'm betraying Mickey by talking bad about his food so let me just finish by saying, I don't care if he served PBJ 3 times a day. We will never go on another cruise line but Disney. We loved the Dream, our waitstaff and the whole atmosphere. Who cares about food??? I can eat when I get home!!

 

[Alexle2007]

Coming from MD, the crab cake appetizer could really use some improvement. Crab cakes are supposed have Old Bay or some sort of crab seasoning and they should NOT have onion (and I think it was green pepper) in them. That was definitely the worst thing that I had to eat the entire cruise.

 

[jdb in AZ]

Would it hurt DCL to use higher-quality bacon? It's mostly grease and fat and very little substance.

The hash-brown potatoes taste like the freezer.

DCL needs to hire a decent pastry chef instead of relying on frozen/defrosted Krispy Kreme donuts.

I watched the head chef grilling steaks for a barbeque on the deck of the Wonder. He just stood there while the meat caught fire. Did he really think the passengers wanted to eat burnt offerings?

As has been mentioned several times, the desserts are just blech.

 

[MillauFr]

I found the food to be bland, overcooked, and over salted. Disney should revise their marketing and be honest with people. It is not fine dining. The food is comparable to an average mass market chain restaurant. We did love our servers. They were great and my son still talks about "Hans" over a year after our cruise.

 

[mecllap]

Coming from MD, the crab cake appetizer could really use some improvement. Crab cakes are supposed have Old Bay or some sort of crab seasoning and they should NOT have onion (and I think it was green pepper) in them. That was definitely the worst thing that I had to eat the entire cruise.

thanks for the warning -- I love crab cakes, but not with onion ( could maybe take the green peppers, maybe).

Guess I should have requested Low Salt -- but didn't want them limiting my choices (have heard that can be a problem if you request a special diet).

 

[Liltx]

My parents have sailed on many mass market lines and agree that Disney has the worst food, RCCL the best, and carnival and princess in the middle. They said they enjoyed some of the fish dishes but that the beef dishes were horrible. They also said the buffet selections were very limited and just not good. They did not eat at Palos. They are not picky eaters and are usually very happy in the MDR.
I think we will stick to the fish and have cookies in the room later. We plan to go to Palos for dinner and brunch. On RCCL we don't go to the specialty rest. anymore because we really enjoy the MDR food. I wonder if they didn't do the rotational dining if the food would be better? With each rest. serving something different I wonder if that spreads them too thin on staff?

 

[SteamboatWillie1021]

Coming from MD, the crab cake appetizer could really use some improvement. Crab cakes are supposed have Old Bay or some sort of crab seasoning and they should NOT have onion (and I think it was green pepper) in them. That was definitely the worst thing that I had to eat the entire cruise.

Had this last week and took two bites..very fishy tasting. Disappointed overall with the food. The turkey had a microwaved taste to it. Pancakes and waffles gritty and tasteless, pasta all overcooked.

A few good things: lobster (surprisingly good and cooked nicely, potato leek soup, black bean cakes.

 

[moomy-san]

My parents have sailed on many mass market lines and agree that Disney has the worst food, RCCL the best, and carnival and princess in the middle. They said they enjoyed some of the fish dishes but that the beef dishes were horrible. They also said the buffet selections were very limited and just not good. They did not eat at Palos. They are not picky eaters and are usually very happy in the MDR.
I think we will stick to the fish and have cookies in the room later. We plan to go to Palos for dinner and brunch. On RCCL we don't go to the specialty rest. anymore because we really enjoy the MDR food. I wonder if they didn't do the rotational dining if the food would be better? With each rest. serving something different I wonder if that spreads them too thin on staff?

To me, it seems rotational dining does the exact opposite. The kitchens are smaller because they serve less people- and the kitchen is only serving food for that restaurant each night. In theory the food should be better than other lines feeding more people in one MDR!!

 

[gumbypee]

Just wanted to pipe in that I always found yummy food on magic ( Mac m cheese best in my life) but struggled on celebrity-I actually lost weight in that cruise!!

 

[gumbypee]

And also, food is very very subjective. I just saw someone said they enjoyed celebrity food but I went hungry alot. * shrug*

 

[SteamboatWillie1021]

I also have enjoyed the food in the past. Our server said this was the second week of the new menus...to me, they were worse, not better. We are not picky eaters at all but prefer fresh food to frozen type or bland meals which I found to be the case this week on the Fantasy.

 

[DisneyMomJen]

DCL needs to hire a decent pastry chef instead of relying on frozen/defrosted Krispy Kreme donuts.

I laughed at this since the Krispy Kremes are one thing I LOVE on the Disney ships! We do not get them in NJ.

 

[slzer0]

I laughed at this since the Krispy Kremes are one thing I LOVE on the Disney ships! We do not get them in NJ.

OMG. Where on the ship? YAY

 

[slzer0]

I also have enjoyed the food in the past. Our server said this was the second week of the new menus...to me, they were worse, not better. We are not picky eaters at all but prefer fresh food to frozen type or bland meals which I found to be the case this week on the Fantasy.

Are new menus posted anywhere yet?