Grand Dining Room Menu

[pinotlover]

Very few of the cruises have the big Brunch, but they are a treat when they do! I typically end up canceling any dinner reservations, for the evening, because no additional food is necessary.

 

Another occasion event that occurs, in the same light, is when the chef chooses to do the extravagant Afternoon Tea. These events are nothing similar to the regular Teas. Sheer Opulence! Same effect there, the over the top extravaganza Tea at 4:00 or dinner. Both are not possible for mere humans! Since these only occur very rarely, Dinner is easily missed! It’s almost like in the movie “Chocolat “, with the mayor in the shop window!

[sitraveler]

The dining room shrimp cocktail is a sad cousin when compared to Polo's.  

[Paulchili]

16 minutes ago, sitraveler said:

The dining room shrimp cocktail is a sad cousin when compared to Polo's.  

Maybe the Polo’s baby brother? 😄

[tine-tine]

13 hours ago, babysteps said:

The pictures reflect the special (sometimes Sunday) brunch that O does on select voyages - in the GDR and usually (always?) on a sea day of a longer itinerary. 

 

tine-tine you may not have missed anything - some shorter port-intensive cruises may not have a brunch at all.

Thank you and thank goodness for that I would hate to think I had missed a dining opportunity, I will be more vigilant reading the Currents in  future!😋

[Flatbush Flyer]

1 hour ago, tine-tine said:

Thank you and thank goodness for that I would hate to think I had missed a dining opportunity, I will be more vigilant reading the Currents in  future!😋

Hard to miss the announcement. 

[LHT28]

On 12/2/2018 at 4:52 AM, tine-tine said:

Excuse my ignorance, is it only the R class ships that do the "Midweek Buffet"? My cruises have always been on 'O' ships and this is something of which I was totally unaware! 😕

The  Special  brunch is usually on longer sailings  we have had them on 18 day sailing  but  not on shorter ones

both class of ships have them not just the R ships

Sometime  they will also have  a grand  afternoon tea  with many special  desserts  also on longer trips

[JVNYC]

I wanted to move this thread up to see if anyone has any recent thoughts about the menu selections and overall GDR and Terrace experiences. 

 

Has there been any improvements since the new menus rolled out last year? Are things still being repeated every few days?  I know many have not been thrilled with the reduction of menu choices in the GDR and Terrace and others not happy with the quality of food.  Many have said the GDR and Terrace are not the Oceania they knew.

 

My last cruise with Oceania was in 2016 and I have something booked for 2020.  Of course I'm concerned because the dining is one of the main reasons I like Oceania.  Let me know your thoughts.  Thanks!

[LHT28]

In April  they did have some appetizers, soups & salads repeat  more often than usual

The entrees  I never really paid that much attention how often they repeated

Just gave me more chances to try something I liked

 

 Some of the older menu rotation they would have 2 dishes on the menu I liked but  I only would choose one   then would have to do another cruise to  have the other  😉

I do not order extra  entrees as to me it is wasteful

 

For us it is not  a big deal if they repeat items more often during the cruise 

The GDR lunch menu is smaller than previous years  some standard  choices daily but also some that changed  daily

 

I guess  I am the type of person that goes with the flow  & not let things like that bother me  

YMMV

 

 

 

[Mura]

We were on board when the "new" menus first came out and we were disappointed.  We don't order lots of courses either but we were used to a larger list of choices -- and also not used to having a fair percentage of the items on the menu one night being repeated within a couple of nights.  It's not like we never found nothing we wanted, but there were fewer choices that tempted us.

 

As to the quality of the food in GDR we didn't notice a decline BUT our last cruise was in May 2018 so these comments may well be right on the mark today.

 

Mura

[pinotlover]

In August on the Nautica, I didn’t notice an actual decrease in menu items in the GDR. What they appeared to do was to remove some of the “ regular “ items and replace them with vegetarian or vegan dishes that we had no desire to eat. Others seemed happy about the move.

 

Too many of the dishes continue to be made more bland. I won’t beat that dead horse. Overall food was good in the GDR.

 

We only ate in the Terrace once for dinner , arriving at about 7:00., and it was a disaster. We like Red Ginger and it was RG Night. RG it wasn’t. Much of the difficulty revolves around the restaurant’s inability to keep food warm. Stone cold sea bass. The calamari was cold and like rubber bands. The Pad Thai had been stripped of most seasoning like tamarind, oyster oil, and peanuts so it was not only luke warm but boring. I had asked the grill to fix a lobster to go with the pad Thai.  Only the thick end was edible. He cooked it so hard and so long I could barely cut it with a knife. They had a station for the duck watermelon salad with all the ingredients in separate containers. I ask the server to just make me the salad like in the RG . The server told me he had no clue as to how the salad is made, just tell him which ingredients I wanted added and how much! My shot at it was so-so, but the duck pieces had been fried to a crackle , and nothing like duck confit which is the actual ingredient. So if they blew a major ingredient, I’m not sure it could have turned out well anyway.

 

We never went back to the Terrace again except for a quick breakfast. The Terrace makes the GDR look marvelous!

[clo]

2 hours ago, pinotlover said:

We never went back to the Terrace again except for a quick breakfast. The Terrace makes the GDR look marvelous!

Yikes!  I'm glad I'm reading these things because clearly my expectations were too high.  On the fewer than ten cruises we've been on the only time I thought the food was really good was on Hurtigruten to Antarctica.

[Mura]

Cool your jets, Clo.  Firstly, we do like Terrace on all the ships -- but you can't compare Terrace on Marina/Riviera to the "R" ships because they have so much more space.  The "R" ships have indeed added a grill since it was such a hit on the larger ships but even so, not much room.

 

I don't know if Pinot is generalizing to all of the ships about food temp, etc., but we haven't noticed that problem.  I will admit that often I just head over to the grill where various food is prepared right there for you, so no sitting in a warming plate.

 

We've also considered the GDR and Terrace equally desirable.  Perhaps Pinot's Nautica cruise was an unusual degradation in quality, I don't know.  We've been on Nautica (although not for a few years) and weren't unhappy with quality of food in Terrace. 

 

We all taste food differently, of course.

 

I know you love good food and are a fine chef yourself.  I'm considered a great cook by my friends as well (although I don't categorize my cooking as such) so I think if I'm happy, you should be.  OTOH, I won't be on your cruise so we won't be able to compare our reactions!

 

Pinot, I'm not trying to negate your reactions or diminish them.  If you only ate once in Terrace on that Nautica cruise, perhaps it was an unusually "off" night.  I'd like to think so!

 

Mura

[clo]

1 minute ago, Mura said:

so I think if I'm happy, you should be. 

Just exhaled 🙂  And IMneverHO it takes little to impress people with my cooking 🙂

[ShopperfiendTO]

7 hours ago, JVNYC said:

Has there been any improvements since the new menus rolled out last year? Are things still being repeated every few days?  I know many have not been thrilled with the reduction of menu choices in the GDR and Terrace and others not happy with the quality of food.  Many have said the GDR and Terrace are not the Oceania they knew.

 

We were on an R-ship this past summer.  IMHO there have not been improvements in the GDR, but we don't think the quality has dropped very much if at all.

 

There is definitely less variety in the GDR menu for both lunch and for dinner, but the eliminated items seem to be the "middle-of-the-road" options so the reduction isn't really that bad.

 

There are definitely repeaters almost every day, for example lobster bisque (which was very nice even without the brandy :)), jumbo prawns and caesar saled, but as someone mentioned, I think it allows you to save it for another day.

 

We didn't feel that the changes in the dinner menu materially affected our enjoyment of the cruise and was similar to our past cruises.

 

However, we weren't a big fan of the lunch menus when the GDR was open (it was closed for a couple of our port days, but wasn't too bad for us as we weren't planning to return to the ship early those days anyway).  Lunch is the GDR seemed to be a set menu for the entire cruise with "daily specials" along the right column.  The specials were pretty close to what we would have chosen for as our lunch entree for our past cruises so it was a small disappointment but nothing to raise an alarm about.

 

Also, if we're being nit-picky, I feel the pastries, in particular the flaky pastries like the chocolate croissants, are not as flaky as they were.  They were good but they weren't fantastic like on our last cruise.  The cakes and tartines are still very good though. 

 

We enjoyed our meals on this cruise as much as we did our last couple of O cruises.  Yes there were changes but they did not materially affect our experience.

[pinotlover]

Mura;

 

It could logically be reasoned the Red Ginger food is outside of the normal wheelhouse of menu items for the Terrace Cafe, and that unfortunately they just do it poorly. That I’d accept and go on.

 

However the greatest issue, which has been chronicled by other threaders, is the warming trays and their inability to keep buffet line food warm. We ate at 7:00. If it had been 9:00, I might have understood items sitting there to long and not staying warm. I don’t expect that 30 minutes after opening. I suppose those expectations were too high. The sea bass would have probably been good if it hadn’t been stone cold. Same with the calamari.

 

So to not to beat a dead horse, I opted not to mention the 800 lb gorilla which was ever present there that night. That being the issue of attempting to obtain an adult beverage in that venue while dining.

 

We mostly throughly enjoyed our meals and service in the GDR and felt no desire or compulsion to return to the Terrace.

 

On the issue of salt, it was our impression that the chefs had cut back considerably on the salt in most of the dishes. We rarely additionally salt any dishes brought out to us, but several dishes needed it in our opinion. That was fine with us. We can always salt to taste, but others can’t take it out if need be. One of the most noted items with reduced salt or seasoning was the scrambled eggs ( if it is eggs) in the Terrace. They needed help to be edible!

[tine-tine]

The eggs on board in liquid form are pasteurised (gone through a heat process), if you want fresh whole eggs scrambled you have to ask at the grill station where they cook to order, which I do and have never had a problem apart from explaining that I like my scramble very soft! 

Edited October 1, 2019 by tine-tine
additional info

[JPR]

3 hours ago, tine-tine said:

The eggs on board in liquid form are pasteurised (gone through a heat process), if you want fresh whole eggs scrambled you have to ask at the grill station where they cook to order, which I do and have never had a problem apart from explaining that I like my scramble very soft! 

 

Me too! Like Ian Fleming’s James Bond liked his scrambled eggs. Cooked very slowly at home on low heat and stirred constantly, then served when still soft and creamy, with just a dash of salt...

[Mura]

35 minutes ago, JPR said:

 

Me too! Like Ian Fleming’s James Bond liked his scrambled eggs. Cooked very slowly at home on low heat and stirred constantly, then served when still soft and creamy, with just a dash of salt...

Same for me but I'm talking about omelets.  I always order them "soft" because the standard omelet comes out of the kitchen cooked more than I like.  I'm talking more about the GDR, though ... it's easier to tell the guy in Terrace how you want your omelet, just as it is to tell him (or her) how you want your scrambled eggs.

 

[Mura]

5 hours ago, pinotlover said:

Mura;

 

We mostly throughly enjoyed our meals and service in the GDR and felt no desire or compulsion to return to the Terrace.

 

On the issue of salt, it was our impression that the chefs had cut back considerably on the salt in most of the dishes. We rarely additionally salt any dishes brought out to us, but several dishes needed it in our opinion. That was fine with us. We can always salt to taste, but others can’t take it out if need be. One of the most noted items with reduced salt or seasoning was the scrambled eggs ( if it is eggs) in the Terrace. They needed help to be edible!

I agree with much of what you say, and besides -- I can't debate the issues you described on that night since I wasn't on the cruise, let alone dining in Terrace.  But I find the same problem in buffets all over the place where warming trays really don't keep things all that warm, especially as the amounts of the contents diminish.

 

We have always enjoyed the GDR as well.  I'm just not happy with the menu changes, but I can live with them.  There's always something I want to try even with the choices are more limited these days.

 

As to salt, I much prefer that they let me add the amount I want!  Far better than asking someone to eat food that they consider too salty.

 

We haven't had the problems you have often described regarding alcohol service -- again, it's more than a year since we've been on board.  We did have a problem one night when our butler brought a bottle of wine to Terrace from our room but unfortunately he gave it to a wine steward who never made an attempt to find us.  This even when we'd asked a wine steward about our missing wine!  It probably was a different wine steward, but even so ... In the end our butler had to go back to Terrace to retrieve our wine.  We managed without ...

 

Mura

Edited October 1, 2019 by Mura
afterthoughts

[pinotlover]

5 minutes ago, Mura said:

Same for me but I'm talking about omelets.  I always order them "soft" because the standard omelet comes out of the kitchen cooked more than I like.  I'm talking more about the GDR, though ... it's easier to tell the guy in Terrace how you want your omelet, just as it is to tell him (or her) how you want your scrambled eggs.

 

While I agree with Mura ( I typically do), breakfast in the Terrace is always a catch as catch can for us. If we have a Sea day or a late docking, we have a relaxing breakfast in the GDR. If rushed do to an early docking and tour or time changes, we do the Butler or room service. That leaves the Terrace, for us, as the tweener. Enough time for a full buffet selection, but not much time to diddle around. Think going to breakfast at ~7:00 when meeting up with your tour group at 7:50-8:00, 8:30 when one is lucky. The ever present line at the omelet station wards off many of us most mornings. We’re there for the ports and something to hold us until lunch somewhere ashore, not a leisurely breakfast and a wait in line,. So only rarely is that wait in line a realistic option. Like when there is only two people ahead of you in line, instead of six, with half of them getting double orders for themselves  and the gentler half. 

[Mura]

Pretty much the same for us, Pinot.  If a tour day, we have breakfast in the room.  If a sea day (or we don't plan on leaving the ship early) we go to the GDR.

 

A couple of years ago we took a downsell to a B1 from a PH for a bundle of money, and so on tour days we went to Terrace for breakfast.  We hadn't done so in years, just because of crowds ... NOT because of food quality or availability.

 

I have to credit my mother for convincing us to have breakfast in the GDR when we could.  We took her on our first Oceania cruise and since that's what she preferred, that's what we did.  And we discovered we preferred it to the buffet -- unless there were times when Terrace was better.

 

Mura

 

[JPR]

1 hour ago, Mura said:

Same for me but I'm talking about omelets.  I always order them "soft" because the standard omelet comes out of the kitchen cooked more than I like.  I'm talking more about the GDR, though ... it's easier to tell the guy in Terrace how you want your omelet, just as it is to tell him (or her) how you want your scrambled eggs.

 

 

Yes, omelets soft too. Double mushroom, onion, and spinach with a little cheese...

[Classiccruiser777]

On 9/30/2019 at 3:45 PM, clo said:

Yikes!  I'm glad I'm reading these things because clearly my expectations were too high.  On the fewer than ten cruises we've been on the only time I thought the food was really good was on Hurtigruten to Antarctica.

 

One persons opinion...

 

[Mura]

33 minutes ago, JPR said:

 

Yes, omelets soft too. Double mushroom, onion, and spinach with a little cheese...

Here we agree.  When I make them at home, always mushrooms and cheddar, and often spinach or some other green ... tomatoes, too.  It depends on what is around.

 

I've been making (occasionally) a Spanish scrambled egg dish that has asparagus, potatoes and sausage ... Truly delish.

 

Mura

[clo]

17 minutes ago, Mura said:

Here we agree.  When I make them at home, always mushrooms and cheddar, and often spinach or some other green ... tomatoes, too.  It depends on what is around.

 

I've been making (occasionally) a Spanish scrambled egg dish that has asparagus, potatoes and sausage ... Truly delish.

 

Mura

I make omelets out of dang near anything...even leftover salad 🙂