How to Eat Well on a Cruise

Seems like an oxymoron, doesn't it? People always tell you that you don't cruise for the "quality" of the food, but the "quantity". And truth be told, food was our greatest concern when we booked our vacation -- would we find ourselves eating room service BLTs every night instead of abysmal beef Wellington and fake-ice-cream baked Alaska?

While Princess is by no means considered a "luxury" cruise line, it generally seems to garner "premium" ratings by reviewers. So, this post can't really be taken as anything more than our experience on the Caribbean Princess, one of the largest and newest ships in a "premium" fleet.

What We Loved:

• Shrimp cocktail. Every night. By the 3rd night, our waiter just knew to bring one out between our soup and appetizer without us having to ask. Fresh shrimp, spicy cocktail sauce; all worth risking iodine poisoning for.
• Chilled soups. These were a revelation, though in hindsight, it makes a hell of a lot more sense for large-scale production than hot soups. My favorite was an exquisitely silky yogurt & tamarind soup. It was the most divine appetizer on a steamingly humid night.
• We were shocked -- SHOCKED -- at how good the escargots were. An obscene amount of butter, high-quality snails, and plenty of fresh herbs resulted in one of the best classic appetizers we had.
• Room service 24-hours a day, with some of the best BLTs I've had anywhere -- always delivered with a fresh chocolate chip cookie, requested or not.
• Exceptional service, nearly everywhere. We tipped our room steward, Ernesto, $20 as soon as we arrived, and he took the most amazing care of us, from fresh ice 2 or 3 times per day to stemware for all of our wine, before we ever had to request it. The kicker? He brought us bowls of fresh whole fruit every day, and three days in, knew what we liked and ate, and brought the appropriate quantities of them.
• Really great pizza and burgers all day long. In fact, the pizza was better than the majority of what we can get here in California -- the ship has a wood-burning oven churning out margherita, pepperoni and a "special" every day.
• Lots and lots of icy-cold pina coladas and Mai Tais delivered to you poolside.
• Our very, very favorite thing of all? Princess lets you bring wine and champagne aboard. We brought along plenty of Rose, several Pinot Grigios, a few Rieslings, and a couple of reds, which were the only bottles we didn't touch. Princess' wine policy rocks.
• The Galley Tour. Wow. They churn out over 4,000 dinners per night. You wouldn't believe it if you saw this galley. It was an incredibly cool tour.
• A big, huge, bowl of fresh berries (raspberries, blueberries, blackberries & strawberries) with lightly sweetened whipped cream or vanilla ice cream for dessert every night. Seriously.

What Left Us Hanging:

• OK, so we're snobs. We get it. We want to upgrade, not just our room but our whole ship -- we never felt like there was anyone we could share a dinner table with, so we sat at two-tops every night.
• And also, we're kind of snobby. But really, what's with no Maker's Mark or Knob Creek aboard? Seriously, Jim Beam is the "top shelf" bourbon? I know it's not a particularly popular spirit but come on, now!
• Generally speaking, while the beef on board was fine, none of it was aged or "beefy". Go for fish dishes when they appeal to you. Except for the pool-side burgers. Those were good. Especially when served with a side of all-beef hot dog and a pina colada.
• If you really love a waiter, try to make a standing reservation in his or her section for the rest of the cruise. We skipped this, and really regretted it as we ended up with less-cool waiters a couple of nights.
• The buffets were totally hit-or-miss. Frankly, we found the most ethnic dishes to be the best -- watch the crew on-board, and eat in the buffets when they focus on the dishes from the crews' ethnic groups. For obvious reasons, these are the meals that most of the masses won't be so into, but they will also be the most authentic.

Frankly, I can't wait for our next cruise. C is a go-go-go traveler, and gets bored with too much downtime. On the other hand, I am all about laying about, reading a book, dozing off, sipping another frosty beverage, and repeat. Cruising is really the perfect combination for us -- at-sea days are all mine, while port days are all C's.

Finally, if you can afford it, you MUST go for a balcony stateroom. The extra space and the privacy are, frankly, priceless. I can't even express how sensuously relaxing it is to lay on your balcony, the gentle wake lulling you to a half-sleep while you fake-read and sip a gin & tonic or glass of wine.

More photos are to come this week, along with our foodie explorations at port. Suffice it to say that we ate at the diviest, most local joints in town (well, really outside of town) nearly everywhere. Would you expect anything less?

Tags: Caribbean, Hurricane, Ernesto, Cruise, Vacation, San Francisco, Food, Food & Drink

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