Culinary Cruises

[jan-n-john]

I was perusing the Silversea website and noticed among their specialty cruises they have some promoted as "Culinary Sailings" (there are five during 2022), but was unable to find more specific information as to how the culinary offerings on such cruises differ. If anyone has tried one of these or has information I'd be interested to hear.

[Gourmet Gal]

I was booked on one last year and of course it was cancelled.  It was London to Lisbon on The Cloud, an expedition ship, and it included many excursions that delved into the culinary culture of each area and included a dinner onshore, wine-tasting, visiting an oyster farm and cooking classes.  So perhaps check out the excursions offered on the sailings you’re considering. I’m sure others can also comment on the onboard focus.

[FauxNom]

Here's a recent thread that will give you a lot of good information:

 

[Gourmet Gal]

19 minutes ago, FauxNom said:

Here's a recent thread that will give you a lot of good information:

 

In rereading that thread it occurs to me that there was nothing in my cancelled Cloud Culinary sailing indicating any special culinary activities onboard or special lectures.  The OP of that thread described a sailing from 2013 so perhaps the specifics have been scaled back since.  

[Unibok]

With the presence of the SALT offerings on the Moon and Dawn, I've been wondering if all of their sailings might be considered as having a local culinary focus for those who are interested. What do you all think?

[Gourmet Gal]

Sounds logical and so great!

[jan-n-john]

Regarding the answers to the effect that the culinary part tends to be on land not the ship, that has some seeming logic to it, but it doesn't comport well with the fact that of the five "culinary voyages" Silversea is promoting for 2022, two are transpac repositioning cruises between Japan and Alaska,.  I took a quick look at the included and extra cost excursions for those two at the various ports which revealed almost nothing related to culinary pursuits (a couple of extra cost "cooking lessons" in Yokahama), and in fact most of the ports would seem to be unlikely places to find serious culinary options (e.g. Dutch Harbor Alaska, Petropavlovsk Kamchatsky Russia???).  So I have my doubts that's what makes them culinary -- seems it almost has to be something on the ship. Those two are both on the Muse BTW. There's a third one on Muse and one each on Wind and Whisper.

 

I may give them a call and inquire further.  If I do I'll post what I learn.

Edited August 8, 2021 by jan-n-john
Further information

[jan-n-john]

OK so I did call them.  FWIW. The rep had to check with marketing and came back with the explanation that the deal is that on these particular trips they will be taking aboard some additional chefs with specific skills for the cuisines of countries being visited and they will be cooking in some of the other (not S.A.L.T.) restaurants on the ship (the Muse for example doesn't have SALT) where there will be sort of additional menus alongside the regular menus and these parallel menus will feature local-type items. So perhaps one can think of it as adding the SALT concept where there isn't an actual SALT???

 

 

[Gourmet Gal]

36 minutes ago, jan-n-john said:

OK so I did call them.  FWIW. The rep had to check with marketing and came back with the explanation that the deal is that on these particular trips they will be taking aboard some additional chefs with specific skills for the cuisines of countries being visited and they will be cooking in some of the other (not S.A.L.T.) restaurants on the ship (the Muse for example doesn't have SALT) where there will be sort of additional menus alongside the regular menus and these parallel menus will feature local-type items. So perhaps one can think of it as adding the SALT concept where there isn't an actual SALT???

 

 

Then that is definitely a watered down version of what it used to be.

[FauxNom]

Bringing on local chefs and wine experts was the approach on a cruise a few years ago on the Explorer, which JP described in that thread I linked. No shore activities at all, but lots of cooking demo's and tastings, plus things that seemed pretty spontaneous like a lunch at the grill featuring local foods and the visiting chefs. It was great!!!

But it was not like the cruise Gourmet Gal was hoping to take on the Cloud, which did sound more shore-focused.