Food choices on ABD trips

[GirlfromTN]

I saw some complaints about the ABD food offerings on another threat. Now I am concerned about the food! I am going on Backstage Magic on 6/2/09 and may book one of the other trips for 2010 (possibly Spain, Ireland, Italy, or Australia).

Can anyone tell me what the problems with the food choices are? Is the food too kid-friendly, or too American-friendly, etc?

Is the food bad on all the trips or just ones in Europe? I saw that on the ABD trips to Paris, the tour includes meals in the Eiffel Tower restaurant (which I've heard is pretty good) and Laduree (which I have been to myself for tea and dessert and thought it was wonderful). Are the menu choices just bad at these locations??

Are the meals bad in both restaurants and hotels?
Any info is much appreciated!!!

 

[redzinner]

This is a very subjective topic. You are going to get varied responses.
For us the included dinner meals were not to our liking in Italy.
All the breakfast buffets were great, even Tuscany. The luncheons were fine: Tuscany great, Rome good pizza. The dinners were not to our liking. In our experience, the places we dined with the group could not prepare beef.
All the hotels give you a choice in entree but we felt they were bland and not very Italian.
I don't know where you are touring with AbD but don't go for the food, go for the sheer enjoyment of the experience.

 

[Happy99]

On our soutwest adventure the breakfast food was fine, just regular breakfast food, except for our stay at the hotel at the Grand Canyon. I know they now changed the hotel so that may be better now. Our first welcome dinner was very nice. Our last dinner was very good. We had one meal at the hotel at the Grand Canyon that was just fair. What I found is that most of the meals were buffet and buffet food is just ok

In Europe the food was very americanized which doesn't work well when not in the U.S. I think they would have more success in Europe if they did offer more traditional food for that country. I mean how can you mess up food in Italy.

 

[Pakey]

I saw some complaints about the ABD food offerings on another threat. Now I am concerned about the food! I am going on Backstage Magic on 6/2/09 and may book one of the other trips for 2010 (possibly Spain, Ireland, Italy, or Australia).

Can anyone tell me what the problems with the food choices are? Is the food too kid-friendly, or too American-friendly, etc?

Is the food bad on all the trips or just ones in Europe? I saw that on the ABD trips to Paris, the tour includes meals in the Eiffel Tower restaurant (which I've heard is pretty good) and Laduree (which I have been to myself for tea and dessert and thought it was wonderful). Are the menu choices just bad at these locations??

Are the meals bad in both restaurants and hotels?
Any info is much appreciated!!!

I'm the person who complained about the food on my London Paris trip on the other thread and I'm going to specifically answer the questions you have about the eiffel tower and Laduree meals.

The Eiffel Tower meal was the absolute worst meal of the trip. There is more than one restaurant at the Eiffel Tower and the one we dined at is not the top one. I'm trying to remember if we had a choice of entrees; if we did, it was only 2 (that's the max we always had from which to choose). My husband and I both had the chicken. It was terrible. We sat cramped (so cramped in that you could not get out of your chair without everyone on your side of the table also getting up) at long tables, we shared carafs of drinks that were too small for the number of people so I remember being very thirsty as once the caraf was empty, it was not refilled. It came with dessert but everyone got the same dessert, it came in a small plastic cup, some pudding thing, I could not eat it.

Laduree is where we had the choice of sea bass or chicken. Again, we were seated in a back room, very crowded. Our group of 44 was seated at 3 tables so the back of my chair was hitting the back of the chair of the person at the table behind me,it was that crowded. The green salad, everyone got the same, was good. I had the sea bass and it was the worst sea bass I'd ever had. Very very fishy. I've eaten a lot of sea bass as it's one of my favorites and this did not taste fresh. And it was grilled with no sauces or anything, very plain. The dessert tray came out and they were absolutely beautiful but it came on one tray for the entire table and when it was set down, of course the more aggressive people chose first. Neither my husband nor I are outspoken so neither of us ended up with something we would have chose.

The best included meal of this trip was the high tea at Harrods. Although we had high tea on our own somewhere else that was better, it was still good and a beautiful location.

I'm going to state again that we are not picky eaters, very adventurous. I did not hate hate hate this food but it was disappointing. Also, if you don't like fish, you are going to eat lots of chicken.

 

[GirlfromTN]

Thanks for the responses. Sorry to hear that the included meals aren't so good
I wonder why ABD can't find better options for dining........
How about Spain or Ireland? Any opinions on the food on those trips?
My DF and I are big foodies. We cook all the time at home and love going to nice restaurants. I understand that the main point of the ABD trips is not the food, but for the high price, it seems like at least they should offer some good quality options, with choices that reflect the local cuisine.