Compare NCL food in main dining room with similar on RCCI

[Sue's Mom]

Our last cruise was on RCCI to the Canary Islands our of Southampton. We have sailed a few times with Royal and each time we have noticed a drop in the standard and variety of food in the dining room. This really put us off Royal so much that we will not sail with them again. To be fair, the cruise did not cost a lot but we would prefer to pay more and have a higher standard. We did not expect there to be an inexpensive home staple to be on a cruise menu.

 

So what are your thoughts on the food served in the MDR, particularly on board Spirit?

[KeithJenner]

Unfortunately you really have to try it to find out whether you like it.

 

On here you will get a variety of responses from people saying it is really good to others saying it is barely edible.

 

I usually dismiss both of those extremes, and my experience is that it is somewhere in the middle. Generally pretty good, in my opinion, with some dishes that stand out as being particularly good and others a bit disappointing.

 

 

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[SouthLyonCruiser]

As they say, "beauty is in the eye of the beholder". As the previous reply stated; there will be people who hate the fare and those who love it.

[JAMESCC]

As much as I love rccl for everything, they are our preferred cruise line, but the food on NCL breakaway was better in the main dining room and free spots like Sheehan's although service was extremely slow. The pay restaurants were about the same I think. Oh and I thought the buffet on NCL was better but not by miles, just better. That's my take anyway.

 

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[rmurray847]

As they say, "beauty is in the eye of the beholder". As the previous reply stated; there will be people who hate the fare and those who love it.

 

Certainly true. I consider myself someone who is usually right in the middle. The food is seldom terrible (I've one or two individual items that were clunkers...but never has the entire meal been inedible). For the most part, we find the food to be very decent. I also feel RCCL has declined SLIGHTLY. I have found NCL, IN MY OPINION, to be slightly better than RCCL. But it's a really close race.

[DarkJedi]

Comparing Carnival, Costa, and NCL:

Food is generally decent compared to land based places. Up or down seems to depend on what the item is more than which line it is on.

For me, I would say Costa did the best job in main dining, but still not that different.

[RebeccatheGeek]

My experience has been that NCL's food is much better than RCCL's in the main dining rooms. For reference I've sailed on the Breakaway and the Gem and found the food to be great at best and mediocre at worst. I expected the same when I sailed on RCCL's the Anthem of the Seas. Sadly, I found almost all of the food in the main dining rooms bad to inedible. I'm afraid the buffet wasn't much better. Though that could've just been that ship!

 

I found the food in the specialty dining rooms magnificent on both NCL and RCCL.

 

Background: I consider myself a foodie though I do have an appreciation for food that is horrible for me but tastes fantastic.

[Hearthosesteeldrumsplayin]

The last time we sailed RCCL (Nov 2016) the dining room was VERY crowed (tables very close together), warm, and while the food and service was fine, I felt it was not as good as previous RCCL cruises. We never returned to the dining room and instead ate in our cabin. On NCL, it seems the tables are not so crowded together (maybe the anytime dining allows for more room since cruisers are not seated all at the same time), the dining room temps have been comfortable, and food and service generally pleasing. That said, NCL is the ONLY cruise line where we have received a "NO" when asking for something. While the "no" eventually became a "yes", it took speaking with someone higher to get there. I was really just amazed that we didn't get "I'll have to check" instead of an outright "we can't do that". (For the record, the request was to turn down the music in the dining room, as it was very overpowering for conversation; the other request was for a certain wine, which we had seen on the ship, so knew that it was available .....and it was on the menu. As I said, the issues were rectified, I was just surprised that a service industry would have an initial response of "no", and this from different servers.) We have not had this issue repeated, so I am hoping that my comments to the HD had a positive affect. (And we sailed the same ship last year with no issues.)

I can't speak specifically to the Spirit, as we have not sailed on her. But we have sailed on several different classes of ships for NCL and have been happy with all of them.

[Giantfan13]

WE sailed RCCL twice last year (one, a TA) and just got off a 14 day cruise on the Breakaway. We do not eat any meat, but do eat seafood, so our comparisons are just for that. AND, we usually eat in the MDR, anytime dining.

We found them both, sort of hit and miss. On the last RCCL cruise, in Nov, a couple of times, we had to send the Salmon back as it was overcooked. Other dishes were very good to acceptable. So, NCL was about the same. we had several excellent dishes and again, a couple we sent back as they were just too over cooked and dry. If you enjoy Salmon, you have to tell them to undercook it a bit as it will cook when they serve it.

To be honest, we preferred the food on Carnival over either of these lines. Our last 3 cruises on Carnival, we had perfect fish dishes at every meal.

Cheers

Len

[Sue's Mom]

Thank you everyone. Most informative.