Enchantment MDR Food Review (March 2023) + Chops Grille Lunch

[maysill88]

Just got back from cruising on the Enchantment 3/3/23-3/11/23 and thought I'd pop on to do a quick review of the MDR food since it was SO GOOD this time around.  I don't know if anyone will bother to read all of this, but it's here if you want to.. haha.  We were on this ship 3 times before, most recently in November, and I thought the food was the best (outstanding!) on this March cruise.  The new menus are in place.  We usually do the late dining but ended up in My Time dining each night at 7:45pm because they ran out of two tops at the fixed dinner.  I don't know if that made a difference with us getting nice hot food.. it is usually just barely warm, but most nights this time it was HOT! 

 

Anyway, here are the dinners I had with some notes about what really stood out as being great (everything was at least good, unless otherwise indicated).    Basically, I would order ALL of these items again except the sticky toffee pudding and the pulled pork enchiladas...  We ate dinner in the Windjammer the first night since we had to get our dining table assignment fixed, so I'll start with Day 2.

 

Day 2 - parmesan arancini, lasagna al forno, Italian chocolate hazelnut cake - The lasagna is always consistently great to me; big portion, lots of flavor. I never had this appetizer or dessert before, but they were both memorable and I would recommend them; really nice flavors from both.  

 

Day 3 - French onion soup, curried lamb rogan josh, toasted almond cream puffs - Nothing special about these except the dessert.  I remember cream puffs on previous cruises tasting like they just came out of the refrigerator (cold, hard, really not pleasant to eat); however, these were up there as one of my favorite desserts this time; tasted very fresh, soft pastry, lots of chocolate sauce, great filling, highly recommend!

 

Day 4 - mozzarella cheese sticks, fish and chips, sticky toffee pudding / English trifle - I was surprised by how tasty the cheese sticks were; they were seasoned with garlic and nice and gooey.  Fish and chips were unremarkable/standard fare.  I expected more from the sticky toffee pudding for some reason; it was very dry and kind of bland, so I traded with my husband for his trifle (he is not big on desserts like I am) and enjoyed that much better.

 

Day 5 - grilled sweet corn cakes, pulled pork enchiladas, warm chocolate chip cookie - The corn cakes were my favorite appetizer of the whole cruise!! Very flavorful and fluffy; I could have eaten probably 3 or 4 plates of these as my whole meal; the avocado salsa on top was plentiful.  Now this was the only entrée of the whole cruise that was a total flop to me.  The enchiladas were actually one big burrito looking thing (I thought enchiladas were skinnier and open-ended with the filling pouring out??); the tortilla was super thick, tasted almost deep-fried, the filling was dry, there was hardly any sauce or cheese on top... just overall not what I expected; would not recommend unless you see it served at other tables and it actually looks good.  I read about the warm chocolate chip cookie on the boards before going on the cruise, and it lived up to the hype; it's basically half baked cookie dough in a ramekin and is absolutely delicious; they could just rotate this and the toasted almond cream puffs all week and I'd be happy.

 

Day 6 - French onion soup and coconut jumbo shrimp, pesto tagliatelle, royal chocolate cake - Nothing remarkable here except the PESTO TAGLIATELLE.  I've had this on previous cruises and enjoyed it every time, but they really stepped it up a notch on this cruise; way more pesto, sundried tomatoes, and mushrooms.  This was definitely my favorite entrée of the cruise.  If you're a pasta fan, then I would definitely recommend this dish!!  I think it is served on the same night as the garlic tiger shrimp, which always seems to get more attention; but those shrimp always look so small and unremarkable, so I am not sure what all the hype is about; had that entrée one time and never again.  To me, the tagliatelle is leaps and bounds better than the garlic tiger shrimp.  Give it a try!

 

Day 7 - seafood cake, NY strip steak + lobster tail, peach trifle - The seafood cake was a bit heavy (it is deep fried) but tasted good.  I wanted to do the steak as my main and just add a lobster tail to that plate, but they had to serve each entrée separately.  I feel bad doing it that way since I don't eat the sides that come with the lobster tail... The steak is consistently good to me on any cruise.  The lobster was cooked just fine and tasted good, but it was still pretty small for me to consider it a standalone entrée item; I certainly would not pay an extra $17 for another tail because they are still so small.  The peach trifle was light and refreshing; if you ever want a lighter dessert, just go for one of the trifles/shortcakes because they are always on the lighter/refreshing side.

 

Day 8 - Vidalia onion tart, Mediterranean steak, strawberry shortcake - All of these tasted as I expected; nothing really remarkable about any of them; just some good, consistently prepared choices.

 

Overall, I am very pleased with the new menus.  It seems like they really turned up the flavor on the items that had appeared on the old menus.  I tend to order a lot of the same stuff from cruise to cruise, and I definitely noticed an increase in quality and taste compared to our cruise in November.

 

Now I'll add a little review of the Chops Grille Lunch, which we did on embarkation day.  I had the beef carpaccio, Caesar salad with filet mignon, and warm chocolate cake.  The beef carpaccio had so many flavors going on, it was fantastic.  The filet was cooked perfectly and was well-seasoned; the croutons on the salad are something else (in a good way); so buttery, they melt in your mouth; the cake is excellent.  My husband had the shrimp cocktail, steak burger, and key lime pie.  The shrimp were HUGE.  The burger was really over the top (lots of toppings) and was delicious per my husband.  I can't remember any details about the key lime pie; I was probably too engrossed in the chocolate cake to notice.  We both chose asparagus as our side, and those were cooked perfectly and were also well-seasoned.  I felt like this was a great deal at $21.99 per person on Day 1 (sale price); I can't get a filet mignon meal like this at home for anywhere near that price.  It was also a nice way to spend our time waiting for the room to be available.  It almost seems like a hack to do Chops for lunch on any day, instead of dinner, if you are going mainly for a filet.  I think the prices are usually like $26 for lunch and $50 for dinner.  I'm only ever interested in the filet mignon, and I can get the same portion filet at lunch as at dinner, but at half the price.  I don't need all the other choices they add for appetizers and sides at dinner, so the lunch option is perfect and way cheaper.  I think we will do the embarkation lunch at Chops from now on as our only specialty restaurant visit.

 

Ok, so if you got to the end of this and have any other questions about the food or really anything about this cruise, let me know and I'll be happy to answer.  In the meantime I'll be planning our next trip on the Enchantment! 🙂

 

[LouChamp]

Aloha.  Thank you for your post. Glad you had a great time!

[hancock]

Thanks for the review.  Will be getting on the Enchantment 7 weeks from today for her TA.

[mcatmcat]

Wow. Thank you 

[foodsvcmgr]

I’m glad to read a review about the new MDR menus that is fair and balanced and gives credit where it is due, not just another pile on that everything is inedible garbage.

Thanks for your assessment.

[maysill88]

On 3/12/2023 at 4:05 PM, hancock said:

Thanks for the review.  Will be getting on the Enchantment 7 weeks from today for her TA.

 

Enjoy your cruise!  I didn't realize Enchantment is leaving Baltimore already!

[maysill88]

On 3/12/2023 at 7:36 PM, foodsvcmgr said:

I’m glad to read a review about the new MDR menus that is fair and balanced and gives credit where it is due, not just another pile on that everything is inedible garbage.

Thanks for your assessment.

 

Thank you.  I appreciate that.

[ginnynj]

Thanks for your review and update on dining on the EN. After reading your review of the Chops Grille E. day lunch, it sounds like a great experience. Did you pre-purchase it, or once on board? Also, do you recall the hours it was available? Thanks for any extra information. 

[maysill88]

10 minutes ago, ginnynj said:

Thanks for your review and update on dining on the EN. After reading your review of the Chops Grille E. day lunch, it sounds like a great experience. Did you pre-purchase it, or once on board? Also, do you recall the hours it was available? Thanks for any extra information. 

 

I pre-purchased it.  I think the reservation options were every fifteen minutes from 12:00 to 1:30.

[ginnynj]

Thanks for the added information. Looking forward to our cruise soon. Have a great day and be well!

[shipgeeks]

We just returned from the Enchantment cruise following yours.  We had many MDR items different from yours, and all were quite good to excellent.  No complaints at all, either with the new menus, nor with the quality.

[Brehede]

Thanks very much for your review, great to hear you had a good experience. We have a cruise on Enchantment booked for May, but I was getting a bit concerned reading all the negative comments about RC food and menu changes. One quick question - how were the portion sizes in general? We have 2 young adult sons/ teens who loved MDR food on our last cruise (on Celebrity pre Covid) and I was concerned to hear portions were small in MDR. I know it is possible to order a second entree but sounds awkward! 
 

[trackstarsmom]

Great review thank you so much.   Could you tell me what bottled water they serve it chops?