Princess dining for Christmas lunch

[Kaylacool]

Have never sailed over Christmas before and curious to know of what happens for Christmas lunch on Princess or is it more likely the evening meal is the focus. We are sailing to New Zealand as a couple so no family will be with us.  

Do you prebook into the main dining rooms or are specialty restaurants more the way to go to celebrate Christmas on the ship?

Any insight on what to expect would be appreciated.

 

 

[Coral]

A few things.

 

Christmas meal is usually in the evening.

 

Though one year, we disembarked on December 26th. They did have a very nice Christmas festive lunch.

[skynight]

The main meal will usually be in the evening. If Christmas is a sea day then lunch will be served in a DR. There probably will be some special selections.

You can book a specialty restaurant for Christmas dinner if you want. The menu will probably be the same as other evenings, maybe a few differences. The MDRs will have special menu selections for Christmas dinner.

[MissP22]

5 minutes ago, skynight said:

The main meal will usually be in the evening. If Christmas is a sea day then lunch will be served in a DR. There probably will be some special selections.

You can book a specialty restaurant for Christmas dinner if you want. The menu will probably be the same as other evenings, maybe a few differences. The MDRs will have special menu selections for Christmas dinner.

You sound like you've been on board for a Christmas cruise. 

While we don't normally eat in the DR for lunch I think we just might give it a try. 

[cruisequeen4ever]

The special Christmas meal is at dinner. They, at least Pre-Pandemic, had turkey and ham as well as the usual nice dinner items. For dessert, they offered Christmas desserts from various parts of Europe, which was fun, and then each table would get a plate of Christmas cookies. 

[Roatanfans]

I don't remember anything particularly special about lunch, but dinner is really good.  Desserts usually include gingerbread souffle, cookies, some sort of English Christmas pudding.  Other foods you will see on the ship that are special for the holidays are stollen and decorated Christmas cookies with milk.  They used to have a gingerbread house decorating contest pre pandemic and there are lots of holiday activities including a kids fair and Santa passing out gifts to the kids (stuffed animals on the cruises we went on).  We love the Christmas cruises and all the beautiful decorations!

[Tak8]

Normally you can find Eggnog at breakfast.  My favorite Princess dessert is the Gingerbread Souffle served at dinner.

[Kaylacool]

On 8/25/2022 at 10:27 PM, skynight said:

The main meal will usually be in the evening. If Christmas is a sea day then lunch will be served in a DR. There probably will be some special selections.

You can book a specialty restaurant for Christmas dinner if you want. The menu will probably be the same as other evenings, maybe a few differences. The MDRs will have special menu selections for Christmas dinner.

Thanks for your response.  Is it any different in relation to selecting table size?  ie.  table for 2 or shared table. You can't seem to select table size like you used to when participating in a shared table with the mediallion app only have been able to select the time and dining room.  

[Kaylacool]

39 minutes ago, Roatanfans said:

I don't remember anything particularly special about lunch, but dinner is really good.  Desserts usually include gingerbread souffle, cookies, some sort of English Christmas pudding.  Other foods you will see on the ship that are special for the holidays are stollen and decorated Christmas cookies with milk.  They used to have a gingerbread house decorating contest pre pandemic and there are lots of holiday activities including a kids fair and Santa passing out gifts to the kids (stuffed animals on the cruises we went on).  We love the Christmas cruises and all the beautiful decorations!

Thank Roatanfans.  As this cruise is out of Australia to NZ would the Christmas dinner be more likely to be themed from those countries as your Christmas dinner sounds amazing but is it perhaps more what you would expect for Christmas dinner from the destination your cruising from/too :)

[MissP22]

10 hours ago, Roatanfans said:

I don't remember anything particularly special about lunch, but dinner is really good.  Desserts usually include gingerbread souffle, cookies, some sort of English Christmas pudding.  Other foods you will see on the ship that are special for the holidays are stollen and decorated Christmas cookies with milk.  They used to have a gingerbread house decorating contest pre pandemic and there are lots of holiday activities including a kids fair and Santa passing out gifts to the kids (stuffed animals on the cruises we went on).  We love the Christmas cruises and all the beautiful decorations!

It sounds great !

I'm all for trying anything that's from other cultures that's different, especially the desserts.

[OzKiwiJJ]

12 hours ago, Kaylacool said:

Thank Roatanfans.  As this cruise is out of Australia to NZ would the Christmas dinner be more likely to be themed from those countries as your Christmas dinner sounds amazing but is it perhaps more what you would expect for Christmas dinner from the destination your cruising from/too 🙂

Although it's a few years since we did a Xmas cruise on Princess the Christmas menu was pretty much as Roatanfans described. Princess doesn't really alter its menus much for our local Australasian itineraries. Christmas here is a mix of traditional British cuisine (despite it being summer) of turkey and steamed fruit pudding, or seafood and pavlova. And I won't tell you what I think of the pathetic things Princess calls pavlova - they'd ban me if I did! 🙄😯🤣

[MissP22]

8 minutes ago, OzKiwiJJ said:

I won't tell you what I think of the pathetic things Princess calls pavlova - they'd ban me if I did! 🙄😯🤣

It certainly looks good but then again so does their pumpkin pie and pecan pie. 

Edited August 27, 2022 by MissP22

[Roatanfans]

On 8/26/2022 at 8:09 PM, Kaylacool said:

Thank Roatanfans.  As this cruise is out of Australia to NZ would the Christmas dinner be more likely to be themed from those countries as your Christmas dinner sounds amazing but is it perhaps more what you would expect for Christmas dinner from the destination your cruising from/too 🙂

We did a Grand Asia Christmas cruise for 2018-2019.  Christmas didn't feature any special foods from Asia other than the always available items (won ton soup was a favorite for my kids).  Not sure about NZ but I'm guessing it will be more English and American dishes but maybe they will do something with lamb or a local fish.

[Essence08]

@Kaylacool There is a role call for this cruise if you'd like to join - quite a few CC people will be on the cruise. I am travelling with my husband and 2 kids, as well as my parents, and my in laws. 

We have done a Christmas cruise on RCL and loved it, looking forward to this cruise!!!! 

[Jadn13]

Can you not select a shared table in the App? It was an option in the past  has that changed? 

Edited August 31, 2022 by Jadn13

[Coral]

On 8/26/2022 at 6:40 PM, Tak8 said:

Normally you can find Eggnog at breakfast.  My favorite Princess dessert is the Gingerbread Souffle served at dinner.

It is funny - I cruised at Christmas this past year and ordered the gingerbread soufflé. I love soufflés. It came out as a vanilla souffle. I said something to the waiter and he looked at me, grabbed the menu and pointed to it and said it was gingerbread. It was truly vanilla. I found it funny that pointing to it on the menu didn't really make it gingerbread.

 

I had previously had the gingerbread soufflé and do know the difference.

Edited August 31, 2022 by Coral

[Coral]

Here was Christmas dinner in 2021. Looked at lunch menu and it was nothing special.

 

Edited August 31, 2022 by Coral

[rocklinmom]

Thank you Coral for posting this menu! We are considering booking this year's holiday cruise so was excited to see this. 

[MissP22]

2 hours ago, Coral said:

Here was Christmas dinner in 2021. Looked at lunch menu and it was nothing special.

 

 

 

 

It looks fairly generic to me, but at least I didn't have to prepare it.

[Coral]

2 hours ago, MissP22 said:

It looks fairly generic to me, but at least I didn't have to prepare it.

It is in the desserts.

[PescadoAmarillo]

Here are the Christmas lunch and dinner menus from the Ruby Princess in 2019, just prior to COVID. 
 

http://pescadoamarillo.blogspot.com/2019/12/day-92-christmas-day-at-sea.html

[Coral]

Here is Christmas lunch from 2021 (normal). As stated earlier, when we got off the ship on the 26th years earlier, they did a very nice Christmas lunch.

 

 

 

[rocklinmom]

Ooh Christmas lunch too! Thank you! And thank you also to Yellow Fish for the 2019 ones as well 🙂

[Kaylacool]

20 hours ago, Essence08 said:

@Kaylacool There is a role call for this cruise if you'd like to join - quite a few CC people will be on the cruise. I am travelling with my husband and 2 kids, as well as my parents, and my in laws. 

We have done a Christmas cruise on RCL and loved it, looking forward to this cruise!!!! 

thanks @Essence08  I have joined the roll call.  It's great that you have your family joining you too.