Ben & David review of MDR new menus, not positive!!

[CanHardlyWait]

3 minutes ago, FionaMG said:

This was ours on Anthem a couple of weeks ago, with and without shell:

I've seen people on their death bed in hospital get more broccoli than that. Sadly, I'm not joking.

[NCBuckeye]

I'm on Wonder right now and while the MDR food is fine in terms of taste, I've yet to receive a hot piece of food. Actually, I've yet to receive a dessert at the appropriate temperature either. A chocolate custard was served essentially hot and was a disaster. The creme brulee was so warm it was soup. They have a huge temperature problem with the food. 

[FionaMG]

27 minutes ago, CanHardlyWait said:

I've seen people on their death bed in hospital get more broccoli than that. Sadly, I'm not joking.

My DH won't even eat that miserly serving. I always have his as well as my own.

Lucky we're not big eaters, though, or we'd have had to order something else to supplement it. You can see from the pics that there's not a lot of food on the plate but it tasted fine.

[Randon1234]

35 minutes ago, FionaMG said:

This was ours on Anthem a couple of weeks ago, with and without shell:

Looks like a very reasonable dish. Gives just enough for a taste and allows room for other dishes to be consumed. But the real question is, how did it taste? 

[FionaMG]

2 minutes ago, Randon1234 said:

Looks like a very reasonable dish. Gives just enough for a taste and allows room for other dishes to be consumed. But the real question is, how did it taste? 

I enjoyed every bite.

[RoyallyCruisin]

We did Liberty earlier this year and had a very similar experience - worst dining experience we’ve ever had on Royal. Cold food, any meat product was unable to be cut from how hard they were (the chicken cordon bleu was basically a baseball). Only good meal during the trip was chicken parm even though it was luke warm. Sent the food back the first night and ended up getting worse replacements so didn’t even attempt it after that. Head waiter came by once to ask how everything was and we told him not great and he apologized and left. We chalked it up to being a new menu and a learning curve but there were so many issues and no attempt at all to correct them. Waiter of course told us a sob story his final night about his family and asked us to leave him five stars (we didn’t). 
 

We’ve got a lot of cruises with Royal booked over the next two years and have been absolutely dreading it since that experience, however we’re currently on Independence and it’s honestly been the best MDR experience we’ve ever had. Food, speed, service is all excellent - only issue has been hard bread occasionally but that’s not a big deal. Plating and presentation has been fantastic as well, best we’ve seen. It’s literally like it’s a different company running the two ships even though it’s the same class and same route only 3 months apart. Now to be fair liberty had a number of other issues as well when we were on it and Independence has so far appeared to be the best ran ship we’ve been on so it seems to be an overall top down management issue when comparing. Really hoping Royal takes note of which ships have their ship together and makes future hiring decisions accordingly - I don’t want to sail on another ship ran by whoever was running Liberty earlier this year or whoever is running the one in the video. 

[Xaa]

14 hours ago, CanHardlyWait said:

I've seen people on their death bed in hospital get more broccoli than that. Sadly, I'm not joking.

They'll bring you as much broccoli as you want.

[DublinFC]

17 hours ago, FionaMG said:

This was ours on Anthem a couple of weeks ago, with and without shell:

Thanks for sharing, plate seems to be just meh.  I hope it all tasted amazing and was hot!

[FionaMG]

1 hour ago, DublinFC said:

Thanks for sharing, plate seems to be just meh.  I hope it all tasted amazing and was hot!

It was very good. And, in fact, everything we had in the MDR on Anthem was very good. We never had to send anything back.

Our only issue was with the limited choices. I'm not a picky eater so I was able to find something to my liking most nights (although if we had had the Mexican menu on our cruise that night would have been a bust). But DH and DS, who are both pickier than me, struggled and both had the strip steak several times because there was nothing else to their liking on the menu.

[Mr.Cruiser]

What a sad experience Ben & David had to go through. Especially the thing with the lunch at MDR is really unacceptable. So far I was lucky and never had to make such experiences. But the fact that it all happened to them on the Symphony worries me, since I will also be on this ship this summer.... 
Apparently well trained staff was laid off during the pandemic and now they needed a lot of new staff quickly and it is a matter of luck which service you get on your ship.

Does anyone know what 12 night cruise this was exactly and what ports were called?

[Ampurp85]

3 minutes ago, Mr.Cruiser said:

What a sad experience Ben & David had to go through. Especially the thing with the lunch at MDR is really unacceptable. So far I was lucky and never had to make such experiences. But the fact that it all happened to them on the Symphony worries me, since I will also be on this ship this summer.... 
Apparently well trained staff was laid off during the pandemic and now they needed a lot of new staff quickly and it is a matter of luck which service you get on your ship.

Does anyone know what 12 night cruise this was exactly and what ports were called?

This was a transatlantic, meaning this ship was going from the US to the Med to start the season there. 

[KevinJ]

Just finished our first week on Harmony MDR was great. We had the early seating. Service was great, we were usually done in less than an hour, just two of us. All the food was warm or hot, I actually don’t like really hot food. Only had one meal I didn’t like, but I was trying something new. There are several nights that I’m not happy with the selections. The Caribbean and Mexican nights don’t appeal to us. So we did Johnny Rockets. I booked Wonderland for the second week to avoid one night.

[DublinFC]

On 5/18/2023 at 1:18 PM, FionaMG said:

It was very good. And, in fact, everything we had in the MDR on Anthem was very good. We never had to send anything back.

Our only issue was with the limited choices. I'm not a picky eater so I was able to find something to my liking most nights (although if we had had the Mexican menu on our cruise that night would have been a bust). But DH and DS, who are both pickier than me, struggled and both had the strip steak several times because there was nothing else to their liking on the menu.

We ate twice in the MDR on our Harmony sailing last week.  Lamb Kofta was was amazingly good, asked for 1/2 portion more.  The Asian Pork Bao Tacos were superb as well.  I liked the swiftness of the MDR and what we had was overall really good. 

[Pooch]

Harmony the beginning of May.  We had no issues (temp, portion, taste) with the offerings in the MDR with the exception of Mexican night.  I tried 3 different dishes & could not eat any of them.  Rest of the week was delicious.

[loki007]

On 5/1/2023 at 5:11 PM, Chippertrips said:

I love Ben and David and just watched their MDR review.  YIKES! With three upcoming RC cruises scheduled I am worried.  First time cruiser here. I wonder if it varies by ship and time of day? Early vs late dining I mean. Any thoughts from cruisers currently on Grandeur or Serenade of the Seas?

since the restart the food seems to differ significantly between ships. i like the new menu. Caribbean night was really great on my cruise last month. one of the best things with the new themed menus is the windjammer serves the same food so if you don't feel like the MDR just head to the buffet. 

[Aron_Ross]

Just an update

We disembarked from our Ovation to Alaska on May 19th and overall the cruise was FANTASTIC!!  We had such great weather from our 2 days prior in Vancouver and 1 day post cruise in Seattle.  The only time we saw a little rain was in Sitka.  We were so lucky to have that kind of weather.  

As for the WJ and MDR food..well I would say WJ was about a 6.5, some foods were quite good and some were really bad.  Our first day for lunch was not good at all with cold burgers, soupy mac and cheese, and stale hard hamburger buns.  A few other items for lunch were bad too.  The rest of the cruise was hit or miss for the WJ.  We liked the Mediterranean food in the Solarium Bistro.  Went to the MDR 3 times and really enjoyed our meals.  They were definitely more fresh, tasty and hot compared to WJ.  

And since we are on the Ben and David topic who are one of our favorite YouTubers...the day before the cruise my girlfriend and I were at the Capilano Suspension Bridge Park in Vancouver.  We almost didn't make it there out of debating if it would be worth it.  As I was looking out into the wonder of nature I hear her say, "oh my god we love you guys!"  And there they were, Ben and David.  I just couldn't believe my eyes!  We might cruise at the most twice a year and never thought we would run into them.  They had just gotten off with Stef from their 16 day NCL Spirit from Hawaii.  We had such a great conversation and must have chatted with them for about a half an hour.  I brought up the Symphony MDR experience and asked if Royal had contacted them.  You all guessed it, the answer was NO.  Anyhow, I wish we had taken a picture with them but didn't want to be a bother.  

Meeting them was one of the many highlights of this trip, and next to our first time sailing to the Caribbean out of New Orleans in 2017, it's probably the best out of 9 cruises we've taken, and our best vacation so far!

[Healthy life coach]

On 5/3/2023 at 8:23 AM, Bmac said:

I truly hate this aspect of how corporations do business now. I don't like getting a service and being harassed to give a good review so the company can show the shareholders "look at our great customer reviews". I get these surveys from my doctor and dentist and just think of how tacky it is, it makes me feel like going to my doctor is the same as getting my car serviced. If I truly enjoyed the service I received I make sure to let people know and recommend it to friends. Filling out a survey doesn't seem to make a difference at the consumer level as I never see suggestions being put into effect. I've never been contacted about a single survey that I've submitted so what's the point? 

The food was awful, but we were told that the wait staff, who were amazing , would be held responsible for the awful menu choice we had each night as a vegan. We didn't want to harm the wait staff so we gave them all positive reviews .  Pretty crappy way to attach the food and service together. 

[Bmac]

On 10/5/2023 at 8:12 PM, Healthy life coach said:

  Pretty crappy way to attach the food and service together. 

I agree 100%. Just another reason I don't like these surveys.

[CanHardlyWait]

On 10/5/2023 at 8:12 PM, Healthy life coach said:

The food was awful, but we were told that the wait staff, who were amazing , would be held responsible for the awful menu choice we had each night as a vegan. We didn't want to harm the wait staff so we gave them all positive reviews .  Pretty crappy way to attach the food and service together. 

Totally disagree. Food will never improve if people don't speak up. Do you really believe they toss out crew and spend money replacing them because of negative MDR food reviews? Please. 

[ScottD]

Just proof of how subjective food is.... on my recent sailing, MOST people in our FB group raved about the food and how much better it was than expected because of all of the reviews. I agreed and really enjoyed 95% of the meals last week. But there has been 2-3 people swearing up and down that it was terrible. So I guess it really all depends on taste and expectations. I'm by no means a foodie (I run a cheesesteak review group on FB...not exactly talking 5 star dining here) so maybe I'm just not picky enough. But I really couldn't find much to complain about minus a dessert or two. 

[ChessE4]

That is welcome news! Over the years we've always had the odd dish we wouldn't order again but liked the food enough to dress up for it. MTD has been the real disappointment, so we stick to traditional dining when we can.

[bretts173]

22 hours ago, ScottD said:

Just proof of how subjective food is.... on my recent sailing, MOST people in our FB group raved about the food and how much better it was than expected because of all of the reviews. I agreed and really enjoyed 95% of the meals last week. But there has been 2-3 people swearing up and down that it was terrible. So I guess it really all depends on taste and expectations. I'm by no means a foodie (I run a cheesesteak review group on FB...not exactly talking 5 star dining here) so maybe I'm just not picky enough. But I really couldn't find much to complain about minus a dessert or two. 

Saying things are terrible makes certain people feel big sometimes. It's just how they are. Some people also like to disagree for the sake of it. Unfortunately if 90% of people like something people will still take as much or notice of the other 10%.