There has been a lot of talk, online especially, about the new menus in the Main Dining Room. Until it was announced that Royal Caribbean would be testing out new menus, there were complaints about how stale the menus had gotten and how it would be nice if they changed things up. Now that they have changed things up, there are new complaints.
What changes did they make? Each night there is a different theme and the menu items, while often missing the mark, tend to match up with that theme. Some themes include Bon Voyage Night, Italian Night, Caribbean Night, Latin Night and USA night. Before there would be 6-8 items that would change each night in each of the categories of Appetizer, Entree and Dessert as well as Classics that would be the same every night of the cruise. The new menu has fewer items as it has gotten rid of the separate Classics section and incorporated many of the classics in each night’s menu.
Why did they make these changes? Other than to shake things up and keep things interesting, it has been stated by Royal Caribbean that the main reason to pare down the menu is to allow for a shorter dinner service and more accurate quality control. Their goal is to make sure that every meal arrives the appropriate temperature and that dinner service lasts around 75 minutes. Many have stated that the real reason for these changes is to cut costs and cut corners.
While I can understand that many people, especially those with dietary restrictions, have gotten very comfortable with the previous menus, it is apparent to me that the servers are as willing as ever to make sure that every person in the dining room is accommodated. Each night, there were vegetarian options, vegan options, gluten free options and dairy free options. Also, as with before, if anyone had any allergies then they could discuss that with their servers who would make sure that they had something safe for them to eat. Aside from that, there were new and different options to try, which is always fun to do while on vacation.
We were excited to give the new menus a try and to experience the service in the Main Dining Room. On our previous cruise, we had the Ultimate Dining Package so we didn’t dine in the MDR. We found, first of all, that the service in the MDR was the best that we had ever experienced. They were friendly, efficient, and accommodating, which was especially helpful with our picky kiddos. The food was excellent. We tried a bunch of new items and we really enjoyed most everything that we tried. Not everything was our favorite but it was still very tasty. One thing that we had heard was delicious but never really tried till now was the Indian food. Previously, the Indian dishes were, in a way, a secret menu item. We knew that you could order it but, since it was never listed on the menu, we never did. Now, each night there is an Indian dish on the menu, and every single one was so so good. And, we still found plenty of our favorites listed each night.
All in all, we were pleasantly surprised by the new menus as we had been reading for months quite a bit of criticism about the changes. While we do enjoy the specialty restaurants, we definitely don’t feel the need to purchase the dining packages in order to experience good food and service. We look forward to being back in the Main Dining Room on our next cruise.
