Haven Menu Questions

[CarolinaMamma]

Just booked for our family of 5. This will be our 10th cruise overall, our 4th time on NCL, and our first time in the Haven. We have some dietary restrictions in our family, which have not been a problem on any of our previous cruises. Given the higher level of service in the Haven and the fact that the menu is the same every day, I’m wondering how best to handle them. 

 

Our 20 year old is vegetarian, and I see almost no main courses on the Haven menu that are vegetarian. I’ve heard that “they will get you whatever you want,” but what does this mean exactly? Does the person have to think of what they want and ask for it? Should they look at menus from other restaurants? Will the staff offer some options? Will they serve you something from a specialty restaurant, and if so, is there an up charge? In the past, we’ve done a different specialty restaurant every night and the vegetarian just picked from the one or two vegetarian options on the menu, and it didn’t get monotonous, because we were in a different restaurant every night.

 

My husband and I both eat keto/low-carb, and are pretty good at figuring out what we can eat. On a cruise, we usually do a salad, a protein, skip the sauce, and a vegetable that grows above the ground, and if we have dessert, it’s a cheese plate. The sauces and salad dressings can have hidden flour or sugar. Are the wait staff in the Haven more knowledgeable than in other restaurants about what is in the food? Would they get to know us and remember our dietary preferences? I don’t want to waste a lot of their time sending them to the kitchen during a busy mealtime to ask if this or that has sugar in it. Is it possible to meet with someone in advance (if so, who?) to go over the menu so we know what we can eat? Would the Haven be willing to adapt a sauce or dressing to eliminate the sugar/flour, or do they only make it in large batches? Just trying to get an idea of how best to work with them to meet our requirements in the most efficient way while still having interesting options. 

 

Thank you. 

[NLH Arizona]

Contact the Access Desk prior to your cruise.

 

 

[dexddd]

You can order pretty much anything from anywhere except say Teppanyaki and per some reports sushi.  If there is a normal charge for that item at the restaurant, you'll get charged.  I'd just check with the restaurant staff the first day at lunch.

 

Dinner menus for the MDRs are usually posted around lunch time so you can get an idea of what would be available.  Yes, they'd like to know in advance if you are ordering non-Haven food.

[Peachypooh]

Before they take your order they ask if there are any dietary needs. I would think talking to them

ahead of time at the restaurant would result in faster service if they know ahead of time you

need something not on the menu.

[FLcruisergrl]

Our daughter has celiac. We always planned that evening’s dinner at breakfast. The Asst. Maitre ‘d would come to our table and she would order whatever she wanted, regardless of if it was on the menu or not. They made it happen!

[tomservo]

We're in a similar situation, my wife is vegetarian and I'm also doing keto (although I will take a break for the cruise and resume once done). I haven't asked for anything keto/low carb in the Haven before, but I would play it safe. You can certainly ask, but I expect that most of the crew will not be familiar with low-carb foods. Like you said, stick to proteins and green vegetables, you will probably be ok with creamy salad dressings but you never know if they have sugar in them (you can always get oil and vinegar). You can ask if they dressings are made in house or pre-made, if they're made in house you have a better chance of finding out exactly what's in them. Dessert-wise you might be able to ask for berries or something with no sugar added depending on your carb allowance/tolerance (MDR and buffet have NSA desserts).

 

Vegetarian is a little trickier. We were in the Haven on the Getaway and they were reasonably accommodating, but they didn't really go out of their way either. I asked what were some off menu vegetarian options the chef could whip up since there's only one dinner option for her, and they couldn't think of anything. They kept asking what she would like, but she's not good at coming up with something, she likes having options to choose from. I asked if they could make her any indian dishes and they said no, which was weird because I thought it was supposed to be easy to get indian food on a cruise since a lot of the chefs are indian. Finally I asked to look at the MDR menu and they were happy to accommodate with 1 day's notice. They did end up making her vegetarian version of the Butternut Squash soup, and she got a grilled eggplant and vegetable dish from the MDR. We didn't get a chance to go back to the Haven for dinner, so she didn't get to try the ravioli but I hear it's excellent. I did have the filet and it was very good too.

 

Your best best is to figure out which days you want to eat in the Haven and speak to the maitre'd to see if they can make something or have something brought up from the MDR. They have the MDR menus for the week for you to look at. They don't mind making these kind of arrangements, they just want a reasonable amount of notice.

[BostonGal35]

best bet is to email the concierge desk ahead of time and indicate you have special dietary restrictions.  they will then have someone work with you to meal plan for the week.  

 

you can usually get whatever you want in the haven, but it requires advance planning.  for example, we have had spaghetti and meatballs sent up for dinner and a NY strip steak.  but we ask either at lunchtime if we can have it for dinner that night or the next.  if you just sit down for dinner and order off menu it probably wont happen because they wont have hte item in the kitchen.