Menu rotation

[mra9955]

Hello. I've read on this forum for some time various discussions about Celebrity's food. My family and I (we're 30, our children who cruise with us are 3 and 2) and so far taken two Celebrity cruises: January 2011 on Summit in Eastern Caribbean and Sept 2010 on Summit Canada/NE (we got caught in that hurricane and were all very sick, but that's another story for another day).

 

We're taking our third Celebrity cruise this Thursday, a 10 day on Millennium out of San Juan. Needless to say, after the very cold winter we've had here in the mid Atlantic, we can't wait for warm weather.

 

Anyway, on the two previous Celebrity cruises we noticed the menus were exactly the same (both cruises were 7 days) and honestly we loved some of the items and found others to be weak. It was disappointing to have the exact same menu in the Caribbean and in New England. Further, what was interesting is that Celebrity seemed to have some awesome items all on the menu one day and then the next would be not so awesome selections....the best entrees seemed to be clustered on certain days instead of spread out throughout the cruise.

 

Does anyone know know or wish to opine if Celebrity will have a different set of menus for a 10 day cruise? I'm hopeful that it's not the exact same menus that we've already experienced. And given our limited cruising experience, is this typical to group the best entrees on the same days? Yeah, I know food is subjective. But upscale food is a nice part of cruising becauser when at home we cater to our little kids' food tastes, which inevitably top out at Mac and Cheese.

 

Thanks.

[Lsimon]

The odds are that 7 of the 10 menus will be the same, or very similar to the menus on your 7 day cruises and in a similar order. Order will be especially the case for the first night and the formal nights of the cruises. We've found this is pretty common.

[Alsmez]

Lsimon hit the nail on the head. For a 10-day cruise, they'll likely just add three new menus to the seven you've already seen. As for order, that is more of a crap shoot, although the formal night menus are always the same. Apparently the first night menu is usually the same for all cruises, although on our recent 11-nighter we had the menu typically served the first night on the third night instead.

[MrNobdy]

Actually, they have a 14 day menu cycle. They start at Day One on each cruise and you can go 14 days without repeating. As you said, some weak, some great! I believe that they have a thread/Sticky here with pictures of all the menus.

[LionCat]

Here the thread about menu.

http://boards.cruisecritic.com/showthread.php?t=1247134

 

and here is where you can download menu for 12 nights cruise.

http://boards.cruisecritic.com/showthread.php?t=1294083

[dexter99]

i don't think they are purposefully clustering their 'best' entrees to certain days. On any given day, there is a wide variety of items, and it just happens that some days you like them all, some you don't. Probably a good chance that what you consider a good day others wouldn't like.

[Lsimon]

i don't think they are purposefully clustering their 'best' entrees to certain days. On any given day, there is a wide variety of items, and it just happens that some days you like them all, some you don't. Probably a good chance that what you consider a good day others wouldn't like.

 

I'm not so sure about that. The contrast between a variety of great entrees some nights and nothing appealing on others is just too big a coincidence and I've seen it in different variations of the menus over the years. I'm guessing it has to do with food costs and that by clustering the expensive items on some nights they can consume less of them then if they always had a couple of the more popular items on the menu every night. I've never exactly walked away hungry but some nights are way more appetizing than others.

[We're The Groupnors]

I've personally never had a problem finding something I'd like to order on any night of a cruise. Then again, as long as I don't have to cook it or clean up afterward I'm a lot more complacent!

[Alsmez]

Actually, they have a 14 day menu cycle. They start at Day One on each cruise and you can go 14 days without repeating. As you said, some weak, some great! I believe that they have a thread/Sticky here with pictures of all the menus.

 

Yes they have a 14-day menu cycle, but they only use it on longer cruises. If you do two 7-day cruises back to back, you will see the same 7 menus twice, I believe.

[Annecj]

Just came off the 11 night sailing on the Equinox and the menu was never repeated. I'll add that the food was the best we have ever had on any of our many cruises.