Rant about Infinity MDR

[cruisestitch]

13 hours ago, Covepointcruiser said:

Is this recent, proteins being provisioned from the U.S.?   On our pre COVID transatlantics from Southampton and from Barcelona, the fish and meat did not come from the U.S.    The beef loaded on Barcelona was bad.   The captain apologized and said he had sent back two shipments of beef and finally had to settle on the third shipment though it was not satisfactory.    

No it’s not recent.  It is the standard procedure.  

[cruisestitch]

12 hours ago, ECCruise said:

Has been going on for many years, long before COVID.

 

As with most things, nothing is 100%.  Although the majority of proteins are container based, there are supplemental supplies often added locally.

 

Not sure why a Captain would be checking the quality of the food.  That would be in the purview of the provisions manager, the Exec Chef and the HD.  How did you know that the initial meat and fish did not come from the US in containers and been rejected?  We've seen that happen several times which forced local provisioning, which is always a shot in the dark.

I suspect it wasn’t the Master of the ship, but the chief of the dining room who many people in land-based restaurants  call Captain 

[ChucktownSteve]

6 hours ago, kwokpot said:

I'm on a Carnival cruise now, a 30 Day TP from Seattle to Brisbane on an old ship. The food has been surprisingly excellent. Lobster served at least 3x, prime rib multiple times, beef Wellington, and an exact menu has yet to be repeated as of day 27 (entrees and starters repeat but they are paired up differently and preparation is different).

The food has been superior to our Solstice cruise last February and on par to our cruise on the Apex in July. Quite frankly I'm a bit surprised. Some pictures of entrees throughout the current cruise. 

 

 

TY for sharing the pictures.  While the presentations may be lacking, it looks as if they have a better variety and more varied menu (appetizers and entrees) than I experienced on Reflection and Apex last year. I got bored with the offerings.

[kwokpot]

1 minute ago, ChucktownSteve said:

 

TY for sharing the pictures.  While the presentations may be lacking, it looks as if they have a better variety and more varied menu (appetizers and entrees) than I experienced on Reflection and Apex last year. I got bored with the offerings.

I agree with your conclusions. Carnival's platings are more on the basic side. The E-Class with it's extra starters, entrees, and desserts do and additional variety to the MDR offerings that the M & S Class don't offer. Additionally I do give credit that the Beyond and presumably the Ascent do/will offer a slightly altered MDR food selection. 

[di T]

13 hours ago, iandjm said:

Exactly the same food being served 2 weeks ago on Silhouette. Dreadful presentation and choice compared to past experiences.  

Same last month on Reflection, still had a lovely time but did not book a future cruise while on the ship for first time in years.

[mayleeman]

8 hours ago, RichYak said:

Geez, real starter courses. Well, I guess we can count on X's Michelin starred soups and salads to satisfy us.

 

Maybe Michelin doesn't mean what we think it does.  People have complained about steaks being tough or rubbery....

[sunlover33]

14 hours ago, Cruise till you drop said:

I’m all for people being heard but it just gets so repetitive from the same people and the same comments.  Getting kinda boring to be honest

As you seem to be an expert on all the comments and the people who make comment. Would you care to elaborate on what you think are interesting or acceptable comments ? 

[RedIguana]

15 hours ago, ECCruise said:

With supply chains being what they have been recently, I would think that would be the absolute worst time to throw sourcing to hundreds of different providers worldwide. 

If "supply chains" were actually the cause, it would be the BEST time to throw sourcing to different providers. I think "supply chains" has become an overused and misused term though. In the case of foodstocks, there may be supply shortages, or quality shortages due to low production, which is not the same as supply chain issues. If a ranch is only producing 1000 cows for processing, when they used to produce 2000, that would be a supply shortage (and quality, as less meat of that thousand meet guidelines). If the ranch is still producing 2000, but there are not enough butchers, processing space, cryo packaging, or shipping capacity, that would be supply chain. And in that case, sourcing additional local might alleviate some of the issue. And it could be argued if the shipping capacity is an issue, that falls under logistics, not supply chain, which local sourcing would help alleviate. Another example is wine production. A reduced harvest is a supply issue, not enough bottles for a harvest is a supply chain issue. Although the cost of quality beef has gone up, it has become readily available again. I don't think Celebrity's issue is obtaining quality foodstuffs, I think they don't want to pay the 30% or so it has gone up. Filet's in my local restaurant's have increased from the low to mid $30's to the low to mid $40's, but are still the same quality. I can get whole prime tenderloins without any issues, and they are running $20 lb vs the $15 lb they were pre-pandemic. Surprisingly, I found my local bonefish grill has a pretty damn good filet for $28 (which I find extremely cheap). 

[ECCruise]

19 minutes ago, RedIguana said:

If "supply chains" were actually the cause, it would be the BEST time to throw sourcing to different providers. 

So instead of dealing with a handful of providers in Florida, you would think it would be better to deal with hundreds of suppliers in dozens of cities and continents scattered around the world?  With the ships being responsible for much more than simply checking the inventory and overall quality of said provisions?

 

If I am running things at Corporate, that would be a hard pass for me. 

[RedIguana]

7 minutes ago, ECCruise said:

So instead of dealing with a handful of providers in Florida, you would think it would be better to deal with hundreds of suppliers in dozens of cities and continents scattered around the world?  With the ships being responsible for much more than simply checking the inventory and overall quality of said provisions?

 

If I am running things at Corporate, that would be a hard pass for me. 

If the handful of suppliers in Florida are unable to produce the required supplies, why would you not send a few people over to your homeports to source from where supply is available? When our lime suppliers could no longer supply the quality we needed, we went elsewhere. Same with salt. If you were running things at Corporate, why would you want to trash your product? Wait a sec.....are you running things at Corporate?

[ECCruise]

2 minutes ago, RedIguana said:

If the handful of suppliers in Florida are unable to produce the required supplies, why would you not send a few people over to your homeports to source from where supply is available

Going pretty far off thread here, but I never said that those now supplying the ships couldn't produce the required supplies, so not sure where that come from.  

[hankandteri]

It’s time to put the old supply chains excuse to bed. If you’ve visited a grocery store anywhere in Europe or the US lately, you know that produce and quality meats are readily available. 
 

Other lines (see Carnival post above) are having no difficulty sourcing quality foodstuffs. 

[RedIguana]

6 minutes ago, ECCruise said:

Going pretty far off thread here, but I never said that those now supplying the ships couldn't produce the required supplies, so not sure where that come from.

This whole thread is about the lack of foodstuffs that were common and are now gone or have severely suffered in quality. They are not receiving the same supplies they were even just last year. You suggested it was due to supply chain issues i.e. their current suppliers not being able to produce the required supplies, not because of shortages but specifically due to supply chains. Quite a few of us happen to feel that Celebrity just does not want to do what needs to be done to maintain the quality of their brand, and is happy to let it become what RCL was, as RCL morphs into Carnival. Last year on Celebrity if you wanted steak and lobster on chic night, you ordered the filet and asked to have a lobster added. This year it is questionable if you can get either. Yet this year on Princess they had filet and  lobster as the main, no need to even combine. If it is "supply chain" issues, they are not trying very hard to figure it out. 

[kywildcatfanone]

7 minutes ago, hankandteri said:

It’s time to put the old supply chains excuse to bed. If you’ve visited a grocery store anywhere in Europe or the US lately, you know that produce and quality meats are readily available. 
 

Other lines (see Carnival post above) are having no difficulty sourcing quality foodstuffs. 

Agree.  I think it's safe to say that any perceived decline in options or quality are decisions made purposefully by the cruise line, presumably as a cost cutting measure.

[ldubs]

14 hours ago, RichYak said:

Geez, real starter courses. Well, I guess we can count on X's Michelin starred soups and salads to satisfy us.

 

The chefs might have earned a Michelin star, but even at its best it wasn't for the cruise ship food being served. 

[Cruise till you drop]

9 hours ago, sunlover33 said:

As you seem to be an expert on all the comments and the people who make comment. Would you care to elaborate on what you think are interesting or acceptable comments ? 

Any subject that doesn’t lead to a lot of moaning, whining and complaining endlessly, of which allows those people to get off on each others sufferable comments 

[ldubs]

47 minutes ago, Cruise till you drop said:

Any subject that doesn’t lead to a lot of moaning, whining and complaining endlessly, of which allows those people to get off on each others sufferable comments 

 

One poster in particular has been doing that throughout this entire thread.       

[Dr65]

I have to agree with the downturn in quality of food in general on Celebrity. Just off Japan cruise on Millenium and concur MDR was just fair at best. The Celebrity magic of old ( 20 cruises starting with Horizon in ‘94) is completely gone. Ship was very clean and crew was superb but we have done our last Celebrity cruise. Lines were too long, very hard to find seats in the buffet, and no comedian!  Ocean cafe had the ambiance of a college dorm and quality wasn’t much better. MDR was crowded, slow and waiters were overwhelmed. Saving grace was Cafe il Bacio which had FAR better desserts than any other venue. The Celebrity shore excursions were underwhelming at best and not nearly worth the $. We recently cruised Azamara and will stick to the smaller ships(price is comparable without all the Celebrity nickel and dime games). RIP Celebrity

[ChucktownSteve]

21 hours ago, mayleeman said:

 

Maybe Michelin doesn't mean what we think it does.  People have complained about steaks being tough or rubbery....

As in tire. ROFL

[RedIguana]

6 hours ago, ChucktownSteve said:

As in tire. ROFL

And if you can find some of the dry-aged bias-ply you don't even need to trim around the steel bands....

[rmalbers]

The supply chain issues are long gone, this is all about reducing debt load, and RC has some serious debt.  The current interest rates are NOT what these companies need when refinancing debt.  It's really that simple.  If food is really important it's not the time to sail X.  RC/X put up their E class ships as collateral and RC has to do everything they can to keep going. 

[indy406]

We've done a couple of Celebrity cruises in the last year and noticed the menus and quality of food in Blu isn't as good as in previous years. Fact is, we've started checking the menu mid-afternoon and decided to keep wearing our shorts and head to the buffet for dinner a few times. It wasn't a huge thing about Blu. Just very noticeable and disappointing. FYI, the recent cruises were on Reflection and Silhouette. 

[Team Stag]

On 10/11/2023 at 8:22 PM, Cruise till you drop said:

I’m all for people being heard but it just gets so repetitive from the same people and the same comments.  Getting kinda boring to be honest

I agree with this post.  Someone will post about food & then you can almost predict who is going to pile on bashing the food as well.  What's funny is some of them have sworn they are done with Celebrity yet they continue to come back to this board to provide their service of complaining about food.  While others, bash the food and then tell you about their future X cruises.  😂.  I find it amusing.

As someone who ventured out to a different cruise line, I quickly discovered that there is a lot more about the cruise experience than just food. 

[RichYak]

On 10/12/2023 at 7:33 PM, Cruise till you drop said:

Any subject that doesn’t lead to a lot of moaning, whining and complaining endlessly, of which allows those people to get off on each others sufferable comments 

Are your moaning, whining, complaining insufferable comments exempt? Asking for a friend. 

[Cruise till you drop]

19 minutes ago, RichYak said:

Are your moaning, whining, complaining insufferable comments exempt? Asking for a friend. 

Let it go