Low quality food on the islands and Cabanas

Chipping in that at least part of it was the leftover European food - I was on the first Dream cruise after the transatlantic and heard a Cast Member explaining the cocktail sauce situation to someone, explaining they were using up the rest of the European stuff before switching over. I thought that was weird, but the first day was a little scuffed anyway with us boarding and leaving port very late (and a later fire situation in one of the garbage areas) so there were a few different things going on that day. I personally thought Castaway Cay was fine that trip, although coming off 2.5 hours in the snorkel lagoon, anything would've been good for me!
I don't know if I want to cry or raise holy hell with DCL.
 


And thus why the Vanellope's cupcakes were stale and unlike any disney cupcake I had before: they were at least a week old and baked in Europe.
 
I don't know if I want to cry or raise holy hell with DCL.
I'm admittedly pessimistic when it comes to giving feedback to Disney (love the place, but...you know) and that feedback actually being heard, but it may be worth saying something since this was related to food, particularly the freshness and quality of food. Especially with things like Vanellope's that aren't included in the cruise cost - you pay extra for the treats there, right? Not that it's okay to serve stale food anywhere onboard, but even less so when it's an extra thing like that :sad2:
 
I'm admittedly pessimistic when it comes to giving feedback to Disney (love the place, but...you know) and that feedback actually being heard, but it may be worth saying something since this was related to food, particularly the freshness and quality of food. Especially with things like Vanellope's that aren't included in the cruise cost - you pay extra for the treats there, right? Not that it's okay to serve stale food anywhere onboard, but even less so when it's an extra thing like that :sad2:
Yes $5/cupcake. I bought one and it sucked. Mealy stale cake, no frosting, just a disk of mousse on top.
 


We haven’t eaten at Cookies on Castaway for a few cruises now, ever since our youngest turned 18. If you can do it, go to the BBQ at Serenity Bay. We had our steaks cooked to order while we waited, so we could get them done the way we liked. Burgers were also served right off the grill and were really good too.
 
We haven’t eaten at Cookies on Castaway for a few cruises now, ever since our youngest turned 18. If you can do it, go to the BBQ at Serenity Bay. We had our steaks cooked to order while we waited, so we could get them done the way we liked. Burgers were also served right off the grill and were really good too.
We were a group of adults and we only went to Serentity Bay. They didn't have the steaks. The label was there but it was empty and I saw no steaks on the grill. I didn't see anyone else with a steak. I probably could've eaten the burger except the bun was stale and dry. Even with a ton of mayo. it was tough to get down one bite.
 
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Let's pay $8000 horrible food, most of which is leftover from the last transatlantic cruise! What a joke!

I may not even go back to Fort Wilderness I'm so disgusted,

I thought cruising was this great luxury experience with long buffet hours and fine dining. Cabanas was barely open when we were there! The dining rooms were fine and my server was great, but it's banquet food! It's on the level of Be Our Guest or your cousin's wedding in Fort Lauderdale. IT'S A SHIP FULL OF AMERICANS! YOU HAVE TO HAVE COCKTAIL SAUCE FOR THE PEEL AND EAT SHRIMP LOL!

I could've gone back to Victoria & Albert's and got the Chef's Table. I could've gone to Vegas and got better food at a mid level casino.

Lesson learned.
 
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Let's pay $8000 horrible food, most of which is leftover from the last transatlantic cruise! What a joke!

I may not even go back to Fort Wilderness I'm so disgusted,

I thought cruising was this great luxury experience with long buffet hours and fine dining. Cabanas was barely open when we were there! The dining rooms were fine and my server was great, but it's banquet food! It's on the level of Be Our Guest or your cousin's wedding in Fort Lauderdale. IT'S A SHIP FULL OF AMERICANS! YOU HAVE TO HAVE COCKTAIL SAUCE FOR THE PEEL AND EAT SHRIMP LOL!

I could've gone back to Victoria & Albert's and got the Chef's Table. I could've gone to Vegas and got better food at a mid level casino.

Lesson learned.
I agree. I hate to see food wasted. It's fine to still serve things that aren't stale, but there's no reason to not open some cocktail sauce just because you haven't finished the shrimp from the other ship. And if people were reporting that the shrimp tasted funny, it should have been thrown out immediately. I would have been livid if I had paid all that money and didn't have cocktail sauce for the shrimp and was served stale food.
 
I agree. I hate to see food wasted. It's fine to still serve things that aren't stale, but there's no reason to not open some cocktail sauce just because you haven't finished the shrimp from the other ship. And if people were reporting that the shrimp tasted funny, it should have been thrown out immediately. I would have been livid if I had paid all that money and didn't have cocktail sauce for the shrimp and was served stale food.
Yes I agree with you! This was my first cruise, so I'm not a DCL apologist like many here. I am livid. I'm waiting and assembling my thoughts before I call and complain. Everyone says Disney doesn't care, but at least I'm not going to sit here and say "Oh yeah, that's just the food on CC or LP or Cabanas, it's not very good, we don't eat it. On to my next DCL cruise!" That's absolutely ridiculous.
 
We were on the Fantasy last month and the chicken tenders were the original super yummy ones. I have to assume this was a momentary supply chain disruption. The legendary chicken tenders are a part of Ant Man’s script in the Marvel show and I can’t imagine hiring Paul Rudd to record a new line—they have to keep the tenders!
 
Yes I agree with you! This was my first cruise, so I'm not a DCL apologist like many here. I am livid. I'm waiting and assembling my thoughts before I call and complain. Everyone says Disney doesn't care, but at least I'm not going to sit here and say "Oh yeah, that's just the food on CC or LP or Cabanas, it's not very good, we don't eat it. On to my next DCL cruise!" That's absolutely ridiculous.
It definitely sounds like you had a subpar food experience and I can understand why you're upset. DCL charges a premium and serving leftover food that is not fresh should definitely not happen. I have little confidence they will do anything to right your experience, but you should definitely share your feedback. Sorry your first trip wasn't magical.
 
Let's pay $8000 horrible food, most of which is leftover from the last transatlantic cruise! What a joke!

I may not even go back to Fort Wilderness I'm so disgusted,

I thought cruising was this great luxury experience with long buffet hours and fine dining. Cabanas was barely open when we were there! The dining rooms were fine and my server was great, but it's banquet food! It's on the level of Be Our Guest or your cousin's wedding in Fort Lauderdale. IT'S A SHIP FULL OF AMERICANS! YOU HAVE TO HAVE COCKTAIL SAUCE FOR THE PEEL AND EAT SHRIMP LOL!

I could've gone back to Victoria & Albert's and got the Chef's Table. I could've gone to Vegas and got better food at a mid level casino.

Lesson learned.

Not sure why you thought mass market cruising was going to give you a fine dining experience? The only fine dining experiences on the Dream would be at Palo & Remy. Did you try either of those? If so how were they?

Disney also does not offer long buffet hours since Cabanas is not open for dinner (and even back when it was open for dinner it was not a buffet.)

Cruise Line food is typically good; never great. Sounds like your experience may have been a slight downgrade from even a normal cruise, but I also think your exceptions were not grounded in reality.
 
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Not sure why you thought mass market cruising was going to give you a fine dining experience? The only fine dining experiences on the Dream would be at Palo & Remy. Did you try either of those? If so how were they?

Disney also does not offer long buffet hours since Cabanas is not open for dinner (and even back when it was open for dinner it was not a buffet.)

Cruise Line food is typically good; never great. Sounds like your experience may have been a slight downgrade from even a normal cruise, but I also think your exceptions were not grounded in reality.

I generally agree with this, but between DCL and Celebrity, Celebrity had significantly better food that would probably be closer to what @Dopey420 expected. The buffet was still buffet quality food, but generally better with more variety. Celebrity's one shortcoming was the desserts on their buffets, which were slightly sweet flour-tasting cake things, no matter how the shape or form changed from day to day. They always looked great, but tasted terrible. DCL's buffet desserts aren't great either, but still better than Celebrity.

But the MDR's on Celebrity were worlds better. The dishes tasted much closer to a pretty good restaurant on land, and more like they were cooked to order than DCL. Some of the dishes were so good that we circled back to the same MDR to get them a second time. Sure, not fine dining, but a step closer than DCL. DCL food is passable for me, sometimes good, sometimes bad, never great, but just mostly average. I have also noticed a decline in quality and preparation post pandemic, and some pretty significant variations from ship to ship. For example, a pasta dish I enjoyed on the Magic tasted completely different on the Wonder two weeks later.

I do think we tend to give DCL too much of a pass when it comes to food. Our expectations have slowly been lowered. I can see why someone would expect at least better food than what DCL provides if they haven't cruised with them a lot.
 
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Not sure why you thought mass market cruising was going to give you a fine dining experience? The only fine dining experiences on the Dream would be at Palo & Remy. Did you try either of those? If so how were they?

Disney also does not offer long buffet hours since Cabanas is not open for dinner (and even back when it was open for dinner it was not a buffet.)

Cruise Line food is typically good; never great. Sounds like your experience may have been a slight downgrade from even a normal cruise, but I also think your exceptions were not grounded in reality.
I got that idea from reading message boards and talking to people who had cruised before, Everyone in my party had cruised before. They have all even been on the Dream. They all said they don't remember the food being this bad,

I expected the buffet to be at least as good as the kids buffet at Boma, Cape May, etc. Decent fresh chicken nuggets, decent m&c, pasta with meatballs, etc. It wasn't even that good.

I cancelled Palo reservations after being so underwhelmed. I am a foodie. I have been to V & A's and loved it, so many quality restaurants in NYC, SF, LA, etc. Maybe I wasn't expecting fine dining like I am having in 2 weeks in Las Vegas, but I EXPECTED FUN FOOD THAT TASTED GOOD! LOL! I EXPECTED COCKTAIL SAUCE WITH MY PEEL AND EAT SHRIMP! I EXPECTED FRESH FRUIT FROM THE ISLANDS, NOT FROM CALIFORNIA AND FLORIDA!!!

You Disney apologists keep spending your money with them. Enjoy the sub-mediocrity.
 
We were on the Fantasy last month and the chicken tenders were the original super yummy ones. I have to assume this was a momentary supply chain disruption. The legendary chicken tenders are a part of Ant Man’s script in the Marvel show and I can’t imagine hiring Paul Rudd to record a new line—they have to keep the tenders!
Genie said something about the chicken tenders in the Believe show and we all looked at each other and said "not these chicken nuggets."

Our chicken nuggets/tenders were more like schnitzel.
 
I think that cruise lines, in general, are wanting to go with the food no longer being included in your price. May take a while to come to fruition though.
 
I think that cruise lines, in general, are wanting to go with the food no longer being included in your price. May take a while to come to fruition though.
That would definitely be a hard sell. But I've started to see other cruiselines offer paid quick service food and more specialty dining options than in the past.

I personally like the idea of offering a cheap cruise with port stops every day and limited food. But I think unlimited food is a huge reason most cruisers vacation that way.
 


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