Symphony OTS: Ben & David review the new menu & dining experience

[topnole]

On 5/2/2023 at 3:05 AM, boxman52 said:

It's not subjective if food is hot or cold. It's either one or the other. If it's too hot for your taste wait a minute and it will cool down. But really no-one ever says please send my dish back it's too hot!

As for Ben & David they don't give negative reviews and I'd say they are honest

Also if a sauce has separated it's not subjective nor is a bland dish.

Being realistic this new menu has been introduced so they can cut down staffing levels in the food & beverage department. Staff morale, being overworked and other cuts will be behind the poor food 

If people want to pay more for less, or defend private company profiteering it's up to them. Others can give poor reviews and make other choices for vacations.

I hope Royal pays attention and understands that a brand takes a long time to build but is quickly ruined

My wife says stuff is cold all the time and yet it is way too hot for me.  She literally calls hot coffee cold when I can’t even drink it.  There is certainly subjectivity to hot and cold and humans have wide and varying tolerances to it and thus preferences.  That is a fact.  

[topnole]

20 hours ago, boxman52 said:

It's not comfortable for lots of British people to complain, not all but lots of people like my wife would rather suffer and say nothing than make a complaint.

I'm not sure it's up to guests to be Royals quality control system. They should be able to serve food hot it's kind of the ABC of running a kitchen

As for the vloggers I can well understand that. Although these days people don't care, they have their music playing loud at the pool, videos for the kids blurring out at dinner or facetime calls at breakfast. It seems more and more people are have little regard or courtesy.

Sorry for the off topic rant!

I have no idea who these vloggers are, but I do recognize they have motives for

doing everything they do.  They are in the game to make money.  Exaggeration good or bad is common and I’m sure

many of these folks get free things

after widely viewed good reviews, but also widely viewed bad reviews with the hopes they will report better feedback.  They also make more money with more views.  You don’t get more views reporting same old same old.  You have to have some things that create a stir.  
 

I’m not saying anything they reported is bogus, just that people need to realize most of these are like reality TV, which means it is all for the ratings (to make money) and little to any of it is real.  Make no mistake, if someone is a v logger, their priority one is making money.   

 

 

[BennyandBo]

3 minutes ago, topnole said:

I have no idea who these vloggers are, but I do recognize they have motives for

doing everything they do.  They are in the game to make money.  Exaggeration good or bad is common and I’m sure

many of these folks get free things

after widely viewed good reviews, but also widely viewed bad reviews with the hopes they will report better feedback.  They also make more money with more views.  You don’t get more views reporting same old same old.  You have to have some things that create a stir.  
 

I’m not saying anything they reported is bogus, just that people need to realize most of these are like reality TV, which means it is all for the ratings (to make money) and little to any of it is real.  Make no mistake, if someone is a v logger, their priority one is making money.   

 

 

You are exactly saying they reported bogus. 

[boxman52]

14 minutes ago, topnole said:

My wife says stuff is cold all the time and yet it is way too hot for me.  She literally calls hot coffee cold when I can’t even drink it.  There is certainly subjectivity to hot and cold and humans have wide and varying tolerances to it and thus preferences.  That is a fact.  

You are talking about preferences. Food temperature can be measured with a simple thermometer.

Every chef and kitchen will know the correct temperature to serve food. It's really really simple.

On to preferences if food is too hot for a customers preference then they wait a very short period of time and it cools down 

If it's too cold then unless they have a mini microwave next to them what can they do? This is why you never get good sent back for being too hot but you do for too cold 

I'm genuinely at a loss as to the logic behind your post.

[topnole]

Just now, BennyandBo said:

You are exactly saying they reported bogus. 

No I didn’t.  I said all of them have the motive of making money.  Do you believe every review you hear or read?   I should hope not.  The reviewing of things is an entire industry within itself.   Anyone posting videos regularly is doing it to make money and that is just a fact.   People can decide on their own how much it impacts the review.   But on the occasions I’ve watched a few reviews, I hear a lot of over the top stuff I know is ridiculously sensationalized or flat out wrong.  It’s just part of the business and you have to take things with a grain of salt.   

[BennyandBo]

4 minutes ago, topnole said:

No I didn’t.  I said all of them have the motive of making money.  Do you believe every review you hear or read?   I should hope not.  The reviewing of things is an entire industry within itself.   Anyone posting videos regularly is doing it to make money and that is just a fact.   People can decide on their own how much it impacts the review.   But on the occasions I’ve watched a few reviews, I hear a lot of over the top stuff I know is ridiculously sensationalized or flat out wrong.  It’s just part of the business and you have to take things with a grain of salt.   

But your grain of salt is Anything Royal Caribbean negative has to be wrong, money motivated, bogus, etc etc. Why can't it just be food and service are going downhill fast and need fixing?

[topnole]

6 minutes ago, boxman52 said:

You are talking about preferences. Food temperature can be measured with a simple thermometer.

Every chef and kitchen will know the correct temperature to serve food. It's really really simple.

On to preferences if food is too hot for a customers preference then they wait a very short period of time and it cools down 

If it's too cold then unless they have a mini microwave next to them what can they do? This is why you never get good sent back for being too hot but you do for too cold 

I'm genuinely at a loss as to the logic behind your post.

Let’s try this again.  Here was your first sentence I replied to.  
 

It's not subjective if food is hot or cold. It's either one or the other. 

 

Here is my logic.  It is subjective.  This isn’t complicated.  What tastes hot to you may not taste hot to someone else (regardless of the appropriate serving temperature).  For some folks their soup is cold while for others that same soup might be too hot.  It is most definitely different from person to person, and thus it is subjective.   This is different than fish being frozen in middle which is obviously and objective issue, yet the soup scenario surely happens quite often so it is quite relevant.   Pretending everything is objective on this is silly and inaccurate.  

[BennyandBo]

2 minutes ago, topnole said:

Let’s try this again.  Here was your first sentence I replied to.  
 

It's not subjective if food is hot or cold. It's either one or the other. 

 

Here is my logic.  It is subjective.  This isn’t complicated.  What tastes hot to you may not taste hot to someone else (regardless of the appropriate serving temperature).  For some folks their soup is cold while for others that same soup might be too hot.  It is most definitely different from person to person, and thus it is subjective.   This is different than fish being frozen in middle which is obviously and objective issue, yet the soup scenario surely happens quite often so it is quite relevant.   Pretending everything is objective on this is silly and inaccurate.  

Again, why can't it be the food was just cold? Why is it so impossible to you things are not up to par? 

[topnole]

4 minutes ago, BennyandBo said:

But your grain of salt is Anything Royal Caribbean negative has to be wrong, money motivated, bogus, etc etc. Why can't it just be food and service are going downhill fast and need fixing?

Nope, not true at all.  I’ve expressed opinions on food saying it has decreased in quality so your comment is flat out wrong.  But I prefer judging based on my own experiences, not making judgements based off a bloggers video.  I could care less what two bloggers say in a video.  

[teddie]

On 5/1/2023 at 9:35 PM, Thisguylikestocruise said:

They come off as entitled rather than unbiased critics.

 

 

Not sure if you've watched other vlogs by Ben and David, as your take could not be farther from the truth.  They are consistently polite, self-effacing, and I believe, extremely objective.  Even in this video, they tried for the bright side whenever possible. I trust their judgement.

Teddie

[topnole]

Just now, BennyandBo said:

Again, why can't it be the food was just cold? Why is it so impossible to you things are not up to par? 

How would I know if I felt the food was cold if I didn’t taste it?  Temperature tolerance are very different person to person.  Im not taking about any specific incident.  

[BennyandBo]

3 minutes ago, topnole said:

Nope, not true at all.  I’ve expressed opinions on food saying it has decreased in quality so your comment is flat out wrong.  But I prefer judging based on my own experiences, not making judgements based off a bloggers video.  I could care less what two bloggers say in a video.  

Well for those who can only do something like this every 10 years or so, reviews are essential. There is no do over 3 months later. No last week wasn't great but hopefully next month will be better.

[BennyandBo]

2 minutes ago, topnole said:

How would I know if I felt the food was cold if I didn’t taste it?  Temperature tolerance are very different person to person.  Im not taking about any specific incident.  

If someone says ice cold, it's ice cold. My God why is this so difficult to accept.

[BennyandBo]

Again, when judging negative reviews one must look at sheer volume as a clue. Food is subjective, temperature of food is subjective, etc. When a large number of people all start saying the same thing, we've gone past individual subjective taste.

Edited May 3, 2023 by BennyandBo

[topnole]

1 minute ago, teddie said:

Not sure if you've watched other vlogs by Ben and David, as your take could not be farther from the truth.  They are consistently polite, self-effacing, and I believe, extremely objective.  Even in this video, they tried for the bright side whenever possible. I trust their judgement.

Teddie

Like I said.  Never heard of them.
 

 I have zero idea who’s onscreen persona is close to their own or completely made up.   Anyone believing all these videos from video bloggers are authentic is also not living in reality.  The ones that get lots of views make tons of money.  It’s all about ratings for these folks.  This is reality.  

 

Now maybe these folks are 100% authentic.  I don’t know and don’t care because I’ve never seen one of their videos.  But I take any review with a grain of salt.  That would include any Amazon review or a video review.  It’s just someone else’s opinion anyhow.  
 

I’m glad many folks trust them and perhaps they’re spot on authentic with every video they do.  But that generally isn’t the way folks make money doing videos (Obviously exceptions exist) and  

that doesn’t mean my experience will be the same.  

[topnole]

8 minutes ago, BennyandBo said:

Well for those who can only do something like this every 10 years or so, reviews are essential. There is no do over 3 months later. No last week wasn't great but hopefully next month will be better.

Yeah, but you have to take the reviews with a grain of salt.  Hotels, restaurants, etc.   They all get good and bad.  

[boxman52]

13 minutes ago, topnole said:

Let’s try this again.  Here was your first sentence I replied to.  
 

It's not subjective if food is hot or cold. It's either one or the other. 

 

Here is my logic.  It is subjective.  This isn’t complicated.  What tastes hot to you may not taste hot to someone else (regardless of the appropriate serving temperature).  For some folks their soup is cold while for others that same soup might be too hot.  It is most definitely different from person to person, and thus it is subjective.   This is different than fish being frozen in middle which is obviously and objective issue, yet the soup scenario surely happens quite often so it is quite relevant.   Pretending everything is objective on this is silly and inaccurate.  

 Can't believe I'm replying to this but here goes.

Every single professional kitchen will know what the correct template is to serve food. Regardless of the food type.

It is absolutely nothing at all to do with customer preference. People who work in kitchens will know if food goes out below a certain temperature it will not be well received

This is why kitchens have a "pass" and that is where you will find the head chef or section head monitoring the food before it goes out. They also work on the timings so the food isn't left standing as it goes guess what cold

I can only think you have some sort of financial interest in Royal or the cruise industry in general so illogical is your thinking 

[BennyandBo]

4 minutes ago, topnole said:

Yeah, but you have to take the reviews with a grain of salt.  Hotels, restaurants, etc.   They all get good and bad.  

Like with online shopping I look at volume. If a large number have the same complaint, I know there is a real good chance something is there. 

 

Again, I dont understand how you can't see your stuck on one side of this. 

Edited May 3, 2023 by BennyandBo

[topnole]

8 minutes ago, BennyandBo said:

If someone says ice cold, it's ice cold. My God why is this so difficult to accept.

I acknowledged that some of it is objective (proper serving temps are

objective).  Ice cold clearly implies below 32 degrees so that would be objective.  However you may mean someone saying that in an exaggerated way which I’ve heard a million times between a couple family members I have.  In that sense ice cold is very much subjective.  It seems hard for you to accept there is also subjectivity involved in it too (soup temp is common example).   

[BennyandBo]

1 minute ago, topnole said:

I acknowledged that some of it is objective (proper serving temps are

objective).  Ice cold clearly implies below 32 degrees so that would be objective.  However you may mean someone saying that in an exaggerated way which I’ve heard a million times between a couple family members I have.  In that sense ice cold is very much subjective.  It seems hard for you to accept there is also subjectivity involved in it too (soup temp is common example).   

Your talking about 32 degrees. You literally sound nuts. I give up.

[topnole]

6 minutes ago, boxman52 said:

 Can't believe I'm replying to this but here goes.

Every single professional kitchen will know what the correct template is to serve food. Regardless of the food type.

It is absolutely nothing at all to do with customer preference. People who work in kitchens will know if food goes out below a certain temperature it will not be well received

This is why kitchens have a "pass" and that is where you will find the head chef or section head monitoring the food before it goes out. They also work on the timings so the food isn't left standing as it goes guess what cold

I can only think you have some sort of financial interest in Royal or the cruise industry in general so illogical is your thinking 

But what does this have to do with someone feeling something isn’t hot enough for them (even if it is served at proper temperature)?   I’ve experienced seeing others return piping hot food many times simply because what is scalding to me seems only warm to them?

[topnole]

1 minute ago, BennyandBo said:

Your talking about 32 degrees. You literally sound nuts. I give up.

You ice cold example is the perfect one for why temp is subjective.  Some people literally call warm food ice cold.  Why is that so hard to understand.   

[BennyandBo]

Has anyone here ever seen food with steam coming off of it (my definition of piping hot) be sent back? Ever? Does this all sound nuts anymore?

[BennyandBo]

2 minutes ago, topnole said:

You ice cold example is the perfect one for why temp is subjective.  Some people literally call warm food ice cold.  Why is that so hard to understand.   

Again, multiple bad reviews = something is wrong. 2 + 2 = 4. 

[topnole]

1 minute ago, BennyandBo said:

Has anyone here ever seen food with steam coming off of it (my definition of piping hot) be sent back? Ever? Does this all sound nuts anymore?

Oh I’ve seen it, unfortunately.  If you wait just a minute or two with certain food it is no longer that hot.