First time - Noodle around - The Galley

[Nexus101]

Hi all,

 

Due to be sailing on our first virgin Voyage in the comming weeks. We managed to get sea rivers thru the status match which is great.

 

Our question is about the noodle around, one of our favourite cuisines however it seems to just be a pork or mushroom option?

 

Is it the same for the rest of the Galley with the same option each day. I have search forums and seen it mentioned on similar discussions.

 

Tia

[jon81uk]

There may be daily specials on the burger and diner counters although that’s more on Valiant Lady with the longer itineraries. But the ramen and taco counters generally don’t change their menu, it is just the three options all the time. 
 

The salad counter does allow build your own if you go up and there might also be specials on the bread counter if you walk up. Always worth a walk around the stations at lunch to see if there is anything not on the printed menu.

[aqlollipop]

They also do a late night ramen special sometimes. I'm sorry I don't remember what it was, but I think we saw it on our 4 night sailing on Scarlet in December.

[rebeccac]

When I was on in April, I got them to make the Miso Udon spicy.  It was really good.  

[leisuretraveler223]

Most of the Galley food stations really only had two or three options and they really didn't change. So it is actually rather limited compared to the casual dining option on most other lines.

[cantgetin]

 It depends on your cruise.  On the April 2023 TA, there were daily specials in Burgers, salads, tacos, NOODLE AROUND,  sandwiches, deserts,  and casserole type things in the bread place,  This was at lunch...and sometimes places had more than one special.  It was not unusual to find 2 salad specials and 2 soup specials at the salad place--these were things that were different, requiring ingredients not normally available.  At dinner each night there was another meal special.  In addition, many of the restaurants had nightly specials of entrees, deserts, or both,

Noodle around had 3 standard options + one special most days,

[leisuretraveler223]

6 minutes ago, cantgetin said:

 It depends on your cruise.  On the April 2023 TA, there were daily specials in Burgers, salads, tacos, NOODLE AROUND,  sandwiches, deserts,  and casserole type things in the bread place,  This was at lunch...and sometimes places had more than one special.  It was not unusual to find 2 salad specials and 2 soup specials at the salad place--these were things that were different, requiring ingredients not normally available.  At dinner each night there was another meal special.  In addition, many of the restaurants had nightly specials of entrees, deserts, or both,

Noodle around had 3 standard options + one special most days,

 

Question: Did the specials appear on the menu that come up from the QR code at the tables? Or did you have to walk around and see what they were?

[Nexus101]

Be great to have some daily variety, exspecially if it's standard across the fleet.

[jon81uk]

1 hour ago, Nexus101 said:

Be great to have some daily variety, exspecially if it's standard across the fleet.

I think it’s still only mainly on the longer cruises, which makes sense as if you are only on for 4-5 nights then with the options at the Dock and the Social Club too there is quite a lot of casual food. But yes once you get over a week lunch can get repetitive.

[Nexus101]

1 minute ago, jon81uk said:

I think it’s still only mainly on the longer cruises, which makes sense as if you are only on for 4-5 nights then with the options at the Dock and the Social Club too there is quite a lot of casual food. But yes once you get over a week lunch can get repetitive.

We are on a back to back sailing on resilient lady from 21st May. Hoping it won't be reptertive. We have booked all the restaurants which looks good... 🤞

[jon81uk]

8 minutes ago, Nexus101 said:

We are on a back to back sailing on resilient lady from 21st May. Hoping it won't be reptertive. We have booked all the restaurants which looks good... 🤞

Having done the transatlantic last October and another three cruises before that I didn’t actually get bored of the main restaurant menus. On the transatlantic though I was happy to have some lunch specials in the Galley as otherwise I would have had a more of the hot sandwiches. But it was also nice just to get choose your own salads a lot for a lighter option. 

[cantgetin]

8 hours ago, leisuretraveler223 said:

 

Question: Did the specials appear on the menu that come up from the QR code at the tables? Or did you have to walk around and see what they were?

Nothing appeared on the menu.  The servers rarely knew what the specials were (in fairness, there were 6 or more each day!). In The Galley, you had to walk around and look before sitting to order.  The dinner specials were posted in the paper guide each day, and the servers knew those.

[Shaded Lady]

On 5/9/2023 at 5:27 PM, jon81uk said:

Having done the transatlantic last October and another three cruises before that I didn’t actually get bored of the main restaurant menus. On the transatlantic though I was happy to have some lunch specials in the Galley as otherwise I would have had a more of the hot sandwiches. But it was also nice just to get choose your own salads a lot for a lighter option. 

I'm on the TA this October and at the risk of invading OP's thread, can you tell me if your cruise was at capacity for your sailing? How did you find the dining venues? If you didn't get reservations were you able to walk up and wait?

 

On regular shorter cruises I've been told you can only make reservations at the same restaurant twice- does that apply to the 2 week TA?

 

I've never sailed VV before and I'm so looking forward to it!

[neverendingcruising]

If the sailing is 6 days or less you can only book each restaurant once in advance. For 7+ days you can do 3 times per restaurant. You can do walk ups or request a restaurant to make you an additional booking while onboard. 

[cantgetin]

40 minutes ago, Shaded Lady said:

I'm on the TA this October and at the risk of invading OP's thread, can you tell me if your cruise was at capacity for your sailing? How did you find the dining venues? If you didn't get reservations were you able to walk up and wait?

 

On regular shorter cruises I've been told you can only make reservations at the same restaurant twice- does that apply to the 2 week TA?

 

I've never sailed VV before and I'm so looking forward to it!

I was on the October 22 and the April 23 TA cruises.  On cruises of 6 nights or less, you can only make one ADVANCE  DINNER reservation in each restaurant.  For cruises of 7 nights or more, you can make 3 advance reservations in each restaurant.  Brunch reservations, which can only be made after boarding, do not count.  After you board, you can go to the restaurants and make as many as you want, provided they have openings.  You could eat at the same restaurant each night if you wanted to.

The October 22 cruise had 1400 sailors; April 23 had 1813.  We had no trouble doing walk ups on either cruise and the wait was never more than 5 minutes.  We also moved reservations several times when we realized that they were earlier than we liked; again, no problem. We made reservations in advance for each night, but then discovered that they often didn't fit with our plans.   VV definitely added more lunch specials in April.  In addition, there was a dinner special (listed on the daily program) each night in The Galley, and several of the restaurants had occasional entree and/or desert specials.  For example, one evening Razzle Dazzle had an Indian chicken curry, another night they had a shrimp dish available as an appetizer or an entree.  Special deserts included chocolate pecan pie, key lime pie, carrot cake, etc.  On port days, the specials in The Galley at lunch often reflected traditional recipes of the place we were ported.

OK, deep dark truth.....overall, the food was better in October than in April.  We were less than thrilled with things in several restaurants in April.  For instance, in The Wake, we sat for 45 minutes before anyone showed up to take our order.  The meal was fine, but it took 2 1/2 hours because the service was SO slow.  There seemed to be many servers just standing around.  We canceled all future bookings there because we find 90 minutes about right for dinner and there was better food available elsewhere!  The clam chowder and the warm bread were great.  The marinated beef in Gumbae was very fatty; our server noticed it and without anyone saying a word, got a better batch from somewhere. The best steak on the ship was not served at The Wake in our opinion.  We were served cold pasta twice in Pink Agave.  I don't mean "not hot," I mean cold like it had been sitting on a refrigerated surface.  It also was not seasoned as well as it had been in October,  I was disappointed as this had been one of our favorites in October.  The Galley was much improved with better service as well as many special options.  We really liked RD (which prior to my first sailing, I hadn't expected).  The food was good and the service was excellent.  This was also one of the places with frequent specials.

So......there was some room for improvement in dining, but we never went hungry.  Make note that most of The Galley locations close at 10:30.  This was a good place to get a salad or a desert to take to the room for "midnight munchies."  Of course, room service "Ship Eats" are also an option as is late night pizza.  

To learn more of what to expect, I would strongly recommend the You Tube videos by Walter.  He is "Cruising Walter" on these boards and something slightly different on You Tube. His videos are accurate and factual, well done, and educational.