Dine My Way & all new Dining questions since cruising restart!!

[suzyed]

21 hours ago, profesionalstudent said:

Hi

We are completely new to Princess Cruises.  Will be on the Sky Princess in February.  I'm trying to figure out how dining will work with this newish system.  Any words of wisdom are welcome.  Will they still offer a early and late seating?  Will you pick one of the three dining rooms (Estrella, Soleil and Cielo) and arrive at a certain time for dinner unless you have opted for a specialty restaurant on any given night?  If you're just a standard cruiser, are your breakfast and lunch options the buffet?  TIA  

All meals will be offered in the Buffet each day.  Breakfast and Lunch are offered in the MDR (main dining room) on Sea days.  Just Dinner in the MDR on Port Days.

[Kay S]

20 hours ago, memoak said:

Breakfast is served every day. Lunch only in sea days. 

That's how I remember it. (The MDR)

[suzyed]

2 minutes ago, Kay S said:

That's how I remember it. (The MDR)

LOL!  I guess we were unaware of breakfast in the MDR on port days since we never get up early enough to run to the dining room before it closes at 9 or 9:30 as the case may be.

 

[PR-Texas]

2 minutes ago, suzyed said:

LOL!  I guess we were unaware of breakfast in the MDR on port days since we never get up early enough to run to the dining room before it closes at 9 or 9:30 as the case may be.

That's me.  The only way I'll be up that early is if I need to be up and eat early to get to an excursion.  Oh well, I can sleep in on sea days.

[memoak]

9 minutes ago, suzyed said:

LOL!  I guess we were unaware of breakfast in the MDR on port days since we never get up early enough to run to the dining room before it closes at 9 or 9:30 as the case may be.

 

We almost always eat breakfast and dinner. Lunch is our smallest meal

[suzyed]

1 minute ago, memoak said:

We almost always eat breakfast and dinner. Lunch is our smallest meal

We eat a small breakfast, usually no lunch but then a normal size dinner....and lately we can't even eat a normal size dinner.   We ate in Crown Grill for our anniversary last cruise and we didn't get apps, I got the Black and Blue soup, and we each ate half of our entree.  They brought us a dessert to share for our anniversary and we each took a bite.  

[memoak]

9 minutes ago, suzyed said:

We eat a small breakfast, usually no lunch but then a normal size dinner....and lately we can't even eat a normal size dinner.   We ate in Crown Grill for our anniversary last cruise and we didn't get apps, I got the Black and Blue soup, and we each ate half of our entree.  They brought us a dessert to share for our anniversary and we each took a bite.  

We have an app each and probably finish maybe 2/3 of our steaks with no dessert. But it is just so tasty

[suzyed]

18 minutes ago, memoak said:

We have an app each and probably finish maybe 2/3 of our steaks with no dessert. But it is just so tasty

I know!!  The waiter kept asking us if everything was ok and we had to reassure him that the food was great and we just couldn't eat it all.  We had less trouble with our wine ironically!  We brought a bottle of Caymus to celebrate with but we shared that with our waiter...he was happy about that...no questions asked!  LOL!

I wonder if they would let you buy one dinner and share it....nah, probably not!

Edited June 24 by suzyed

[PR-Texas]

1 hour ago, suzyed said:

I wonder if they would let you buy one dinner and share it....nah, probably not!

I doubt it but we would really like that.  We often buy one dinner and share it when dining out... or order off the kids menu if allowed. Our last cruise was Disney with traditional type dining so the same waiters throughout the cruise. I told the waiters the first night that I wouldn't be "cleaning my plate". Has nothing to do with the quality of the food, just the quantity.

Edited June 24 by PR-Texas

[memoak]

32 minutes ago, PR-Texas said:

I doubt it but we would really like that.  We often buy one dinner and share it when dining out... or order off the kids menu if allowed. Our last cruise was Disney with traditional type dining so the same waiters throughout the cruise. I told the waiters the first night that I wouldn't be "cleaning my plate". Has nothing to do with the quality of the food, just the quantity.

Really in an inclusive menu ?  It not my like you are ordering separate plates on a ship

 

[PR-Texas]

I hate to see food go to waste. If I don't eat it, it goes in the trash. I remember reading somewhere that someone wished they could share so they could stretch their included casual meals to 4 visits instead of just 2, which would be nice on a 14 day cruise.

[memoak]

34 minutes ago, PR-Texas said:

I hate to see food go to waste. If I don't eat it, it goes in the trash. I remember reading somewhere that someone wished they could share so they could stretch their included casual meals to 4 visits instead of just 2, which would be nice on a 14 day cruise.

In Vines you can share a charcuterie plate. We have done it on 3 different ships. The Gastropub is a different animal 

[suzyed]

10 hours ago, PR-Texas said:

I hate to see food go to waste. If I don't eat it, it goes in the trash. I remember reading somewhere that someone wished they could share so they could stretch their included casual meals to 4 visits instead of just 2, which would be nice on a 14 day cruise.

I didn't even think about stretching it out, I just hate wasting food. At least at home we can get a doggie bag and eat it later.

I am contemplating cancelling some of our specialty dinners on our upcoming sailing.

[Sea Hag]

1 hour ago, suzyed said:

I didn't even think about stretching it out, I just hate wasting food. At least at home we can get a doggie bag and eat it later.

I am contemplating cancelling some of our specialty dinners on our upcoming sailing.

My solution is to order lamb chops. I love them, and it's a smaller size than even the small filet. If I do that, I can mostly finish the full meal. Mostly.

[Kay S]

4 hours ago, Sea Hag said:

My solution is to order lamb chops. I love them, and it's a smaller size than even the small filet. If I do that, I can mostly finish the full meal. Mostly.

Yes.  The lamb chops are stellar.

[suzyed]

5 hours ago, Sea Hag said:

My solution is to order lamb chops. I love them, and it's a smaller size than even the small filet. If I do that, I can mostly finish the full meal. Mostly.

Yes, have done the same.  Or one of the fish dishes...they don't seem to fill us up as much!

 

[Thrak]

17 hours ago, memoak said:

In Vines you can share a charcuterie plate. We have done it on 3 different ships. The Gastropub is a different animal 

 

This is good to hear. When we sailed on Grand Princess last year we weren't allowed to only order for one in Vines or Alfredo's. We went out night before last and had Tapas at a local spot. The waiter kept coming by and asking if we wanted a dinner menu and didn't seem to understand when we told him what we had was more than enough food for us. We both walked out quite full at the end. We really can't eat a lot and hate ordering stuff and leaving it uneaten so it will be good if we can share a charcuterie plate or a pizza.

[memoak]

2 hours ago, Thrak said:

 

This is good to hear. When we sailed on Grand Princess last year we weren't allowed to only order for one in Vines or Alfredo's. We went out night before last and had Tapas at a local spot. The waiter kept coming by and asking if we wanted a dinner menu and didn't seem to understand when we told him what we had was more than enough food for us. We both walked out quite full at the end. We really can't eat a lot and hate ordering stuff and leaving it uneaten so it will be good if we can share a charcuterie plate or a pizza.

We were able to do that in Vines on the Crown and the Ruby. We sail for 14 days on the Grand July / August. We will see what happens 

[Iamcruzin]

On 4/23/2024 at 3:38 PM, julie3fan said:

 

I'd guess that if either TD or reservation dining rooms are under-utilized, that overflow walk up guests might be redirected to one of those dining rooms.

They did that years ago before booking reservations was a thing. We have been booking Anytime since 2006. Over the years as it became more popular and over crowded they would start seating people in the Traditional dining room which started to become empty as more and more passengers were eating at the buffet and specialty restaurants.  

[Tedferg]

6 hours ago, Iamcruzin said:

They did that years ago before booking reservations was a thing. We have been booking Anytime since 2006. Over the years as it became more popular and over crowded they would start seating people in the Traditional dining room which started to become empty as more and more passengers were eating at the buffet and specialty restaurants.  

And the old complaint that TD diners missed their seating and turned up at Anytime. This should not be as much of a problem since 'Anytimers' will be fewer with the ability to reserve.

[Iamcruzin]

16 minutes ago, Tedferg said:

And the old complaint that TD diners missed their seating and turned up at Anytime. This should not be as much of a problem since 'Anytimers' will be fewer with the ability to reserve.

Actually in the beginning when AT first started. The rules weren't clear and some in traditional thought that they could interchange. The only reason I know this is because the last time I booked traditional my table of 8 was empty most of the time. When they did show up on Formal nights they were all talking about their experience in AT. From that point on we have always booked AT.

[Thrak]

When we had TD and, for whatever reason missed our dining time, we always ate at an alternate venue rather than MDR. It just seemed the "right" thing to do. We did have a poor TD experience on one cruise. We were at a table for 8 and the other 6 people formed a group. We were rarely included in the conversation and had several evenings where the "group" did other things so we were 2 people sitting at a table for 8. It was definitely weird and uncomfortable.

 

Since the restart with reservations we've had reservations with friends on a couple of cruises at a set time in a set dining room. On our latest cruise (Total Eclipse Cruise) we booked private dining for the same time every night for 5 of us. Sadly, our son and family had to back out of the cruise and it took us a few nights to get it through the heads of the dining room staff that there were only 2 of us instead of 5. We ended up sharing some nights and at a two top some nights. It worked out pretty well. On the multi-leg 63 day stint on Grand Princess we shared every night. Some nights were vastly better than others with a couple of nights being not good at all.

 

I'm trying to decide how to book our dining for next year but there's a lot of time before we sail to figure it out and things are changing well before we sail.

[Tedferg]

7 minutes ago, Thrak said:

 We did have a poor TD experience on one cruise. We were at a table for 8 and the other 6 people formed a group. We were rarely included in the conversation

I never saw the fascination with TD, unless it is with a group that you already know. Always enjoy 'shared' tables but no the same group every night.

[Kay S]

41 minutes ago, Tedferg said:

I never saw the fascination with TD, unless it is with a group that you already know. Always enjoy 'shared' tables but no the same group every night.

I guess we have just been lucky.  40+ cruises over five lines, and we have only had maybe three bad experiences with tablemates.  

[memoak]

55 minutes ago, Thrak said:

When we had TD and, for whatever reason missed our dining time, we always ate at an alternate venue rather than MDR. It just seemed the "right" thing to do. We did have a poor TD experience on one cruise. We were at a table for 8 and the other 6 people formed a group. We were rarely included in the conversation and had several evenings where the "group" did other things so we were 2 people sitting at a table for 8. It was definitely weird and uncomfortable.

 

Since the restart with reservations we've had reservations with friends on a couple of cruises at a set time in a set dining room. On our latest cruise (Total Eclipse Cruise) we booked private dining for the same time every night for 5 of us. Sadly, our son and family had to back out of the cruise and it took us a few nights to get it through the heads of the dining room staff that there were only 2 of us instead of 5. We ended up sharing some nights and at a two top some nights. It worked out pretty well. On the multi-leg 63 day stint on Grand Princess we shared every night. Some nights were vastly better than others with a couple of nights being not good at all.

 

I'm trying to decide how to book our dining for next year but there's a lot of time before we sail to figure it out and things are changing well before we sail.

Back when we had TD and got a bad table we would go to the manager and request a different restaurant and table. We had some bad experiences glad TD is over