Regionally themed MDR choices

[LMaxwell]

Carnival has recently rolled out and Princess is rolling out new regionally themed menus for Caribbean / Mexican cruises to reflect more of the flavors of regions visited. I happen to like RCI's food quality and presentation, I just find the MDR menus to be a big boring/stale, very old school banquet more often than not.

 

Does any of the frequent cruisers here know of any changes in the works? Would you be more interested to have some MDR course options more targeted to the particular itinerary you are on? I would. I think it would be a good opportunity to try out some new ethnic dishes and not get so burned out on repetitive menus.

[PompeySailor]

Have no insider information.

But a great idea, maybe for each port of call, have the traditional dish of the destination

I would be up for trying some local fair:)

[LMaxwell]

Some poutine or lobster roll on a new england cruise.

 

Conch salad for a bahamas route.

 

Stewed or curried spiced meats and fish for caribbean

 

The options for Europe would be bountiful

 

Time for another letter to the line.

[dancinman66]

Yes they do change food according to region due to both cluentelle and good availability

 

Ie snails only available some areas. Use scallops otherwise

 

Asia has major changes to everything to suit cruisers

 

 

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[jessicalorene]

I would love to see itinerary specific menus and maybe keeping the classic's section as is (very traditional) for less adventurous appetites ;)

[beshears]

That sounds like a good idea to me, for ANY ship to do that. :)

[ehfl]

It would be nice for meals to actually taste like you are in the Caribbean, when you're in the Caribbean. Even if it cost a little more, I would love to have the option of local produce and seafood prepared in the local style.

[kwazi07]

It would be nice for meals to actually taste like you are in the Caribbean, when you're in the Caribbean. Even if it cost a little more, I would love to have the option of local produce and seafood prepared in the local style.

That would be so nice. Imam a little disappointed that menus are generally the same fleetwide, many items were meh.

[Galveston Cruiser]

That sounds like a good idea to me, for ANY ship to do that. :)

 

MSC does. At least the 21 day repositioning from Italy to Florida offered one or two regional dishes from every port we visited - from Italian to Moroccan to Caribbean to turkey & dressing for Christmas dinner.

 

The food was outstanding and it was nice to look forward to different cuisine other than the standard fare.

Edited August 13, 2014 by Galveston Cruiser

[leo72976]

We just recently returned from a Carnival cruise and while overall the food was so so we definetly enjoyed the regional food choices. They gave 3 choices everynight that were tailored to the port we were in. It was nice to eat Bahamian food in the Bahamas and Puerto Rican food in Puerto Rico. I think RCL could definetly pull this off and I think it would be well received by guests.

[A2Mich]

We just recently returned from a Carnival cruise and while overall the food was so so we definetly enjoyed the regional food choices. They gave 3 choices everynight that were tailored to the port we were in. It was nice to eat Bahamian food in the Bahamas and Puerto Rican food in Puerto Rico. I think RCL could definetly pull this off and I think it would be well received by guests.

 

 

I think it could be well received by some, but not all cruisers. Not everyone is very adventurous when it comes to deviating from their tried-and-true routine. I personally would love the option of local foods, though I think it might lead to serious waste issues for the cruise lines. First, I don't think that most cruise lines would actually prepare the dishes as well as a local could. Second, some of the ingredients may not be available in the US (where the food stores are purchased and loaded). Third, cruise ship galleys prepare hundreds of meals at one time, AHEAD of time, and could therefore create a lot of waste if that particular sailing's guests were all pot roast and mashed potato kind of people, where the optional local dishes were not ordered.

 

While I think it's really a great idea, and I would love to try it myself, I doubt the cruise lines are willing to take that kind of a financial risk.

[39august]

There used to be Italian night and Caribbean night themed menus in the MDR. Tho' we enjoyed the jerk chicken, people came on these boards and endlessly complained about Caribbean night.