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We had very enjoyable dinners (2004
Menus
below) in the L'Ippocampo restaurant with our outstanding Italian
waiter, Sebastiano, the best waiter we've ever had.
Our assistant waiter, Wana, was from Indonesia.
We have lunch & breakfast menus, food photos and
midnight buffet photos, as well. Ours was
2nd sitting with one other couple, our cousins, Lorraine & Ed. The food
generally was good, with an occasional menu item not as good as the others.
The pasta (& risotto) was generally very good & al dente. Our waiter would
bring one plate with a half helping of the pasta & half of risotto if we wanted
it that way. The bread was good. The ice cream and sorbet were some
of the best we've had on cruises, though the other desserts were some of the
poorest we've had.
There were no large shrimp or scallops on the menu, except for the "Countess
shrimp-cocktail" (dinner 10) appetizer, which was better than most we've had.
Often, in seafood dishes, squid, cuttlefish, & octopus were used, which we like,
though many may not. If you did not want any of the entrees on the regular
menu, most nights
you could get, from the grill, salmon, chicken breast, and beef steak (with
French fries). I tried the salmon one night and it was good,
though cooked slightly more than I prefer (as were the other fish entrees, but
Diane found them to be very good). The "beef steak" was a thin steak which
I found to be of a poor cut of beef & was not very tasty (& difficult to prepare
rare or medium rare). The "Grilled Beef Filet with Barolo Sauce" (dinner
2) was good, the "Grilled beef steak with Choron sauce" (dinner 8) was prepared
as I like it, though a poor cut & not very tasty, & the "Wellington Filet"
(dinner 10) saved me from the worst lobster we've ever had, which as not
something we could eat (not the flavor of any lobster we've ever had...it was
not sweet as lobster usually is, had a disagreeable taste, & had a red sauce on
it, which we did not like, though we usually like most red sauces).
We were warned the lobster would not be good by a first sitting diner, & we wondered how
bad could lobster be, especially since they did not say it was overcooked.
We had some problems with ice tea, which was often not poured
with ice, & was in small glasses (4 or 5 ounces). It was difficult to get
a large glass. Glass size would not be a problem if the ice tea was
refilled within some reasonable time period, but that was not the case. I
asked for the ice tea pitcher to be left on the table & the assistant waiter
would not leave it, & would always point back to the waiter as if it was up to
me to tell the waiter. In addition, we always stirred our sweetener into
our ice tea with either a fork, or our butter knife, no spoon was ever provided
for the ice tea during the entire cruise, unless you ordered soup (a large
spoon) or at the end of the meal with the coffee (too late). About halfway though the cruise, larger glasses
were provided, & there was some improvement in refilling them. We
discovered the assistant waiters were not trained for the dining room, but
brought from the bar, & were being trained. They improved as the
cruise went on. Some
resolution for the ice tea may be on the next cruises, along with a few
other welcome additions.
In talking with others, we discovered the opinion that our
restaurant had better waiters & better food than the larger La Bussola
restaurant. Apparently, many of those who were assigned the La
Bussola, ate lunch & breakfast in our L'Ippocampo restaurant. The
restaurants have separate galleys (as also does the buffet area).
Upon boarding we found the dinner times to be earlier than those stated in the
cruise documents. We usually take 2nd sitting, but the cruise documents
had the dinner much later than we were accustomed, so we had asked for first
sitting. We had to stand in line for some time to change back to our usual
2nd sitting. We found several in the line were there because no table
or sitting had been assigned to them. When we were finally reassigned
a 2nd sitting table, the Maitre'D (of La Bussola) said in a rather agitated tone that he could
not take the time to show Diane on the chart where our table was to be, & said
she wouldn't understand the chart anyway. The other person there pointed
to the chart & Diane knew immediately where we were assigned.
This Maitre'D (of La Bussola) was in a better mood (generally smiling) the rest
of the cruise, however.
The dinner times were different for each
restaurant, though the same throughout the cruise. The La Bussola it was
5:45PM, & 7:45PM. The L'Ippocampo (ours) was 6:00PM, & 8:00PM. The
2nd sitting often started later than 8:00PM (usually five minutes or less), however, so we often had to wait in
a crowd. When we came to dinner on the 3rd night (Montego Bay), we found a
large line waiting to get into the restaurant, so we went outside & watched the
Jamaican band playing for about 15 or 20 minutes until the line subsided.
When we went into the restaurant, we found people were seated at our table, &
discovered by accident from a diner we knew that dinner had been changed this
night to open sitting for this night only. No waiter or Maitre'D
informed us of this. We stood in the middle of the restaurant with our
cousins for a short while & someone finally came to take us to a table.
When I asked the reception desk about it later, they claimed they had made an
announcement, though we never heard it.
Dinner Menus
Click on the thumbnail to enlarge
Due to Internet Explorer 6 shrinking the image to the screen size, we advise you
either try clicking the image & when the expander icon comes up at the bottom
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Sebastiano, our Italian waiter, the very best we've had in 19 cruises.
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Wana, our assistant waiter, from Indonesia. His assistant waiter skills improved throughout the cruise.
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Dinner menu Suggestions - Ft Lauderdale Day 1 Monday 1-26-2004
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Dinner menu - Ft Lauderdale Day 1 Monday 1-26-2004
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Dinner menu Suggestions - At Sea Day 2 Tuesday 1-27-2004
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Dinner menu - At Sea Day 2 Tuesday 1-27-2004
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Dinner menu Suggestions - Montego Bay Day 3 Wednesday 1-28-2004
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Dinner menu - Montego Bay Day 3 Wednesday 1-28-2004
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Dinner menu Suggestions - At Sea Day 4 Thursday 1-29-2004
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Dinner menu - At Sea Day 4 Thursday 1-29-2004
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Dinner menu Suggestions - Cartagena Day 5 Friday 1-30-2004
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Dinner menu - Cartagena Day 5 Friday 1-30-2004
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Dinner menu Suggestions - San Blas Islands Day 6 Saturday 1-31-2004
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Dinner menu - San Blas Islands Day 6 Saturday 1-31-2004
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Dinner menu Suggestions - Panama Canal Day 7 Sunday 2-1-2004
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Dinner menu - Panama Canal Day 7 Sunday 2-1-2004
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Dinner menu Suggestions - Puerto Limon Day 8 Monday 2-2-2004
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Dinner menu - Puerto Limon Day 8 Monday 2-2-2004
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Dinner menu Suggestions - At Sea Day 9 Tuesday 2-3-2004
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Dinner menu - At Sea Day 9 Tuesday 2-3-2004
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Dinner menu Suggestions - At Sea Day 10 Wednesday 2-4-2004
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Dinner menu - At Sea Day 10 Wednesday 2-4-2004
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Dinner menu Suggestions - Key West Day 11 Thursday 2-5-2004
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Dinner menu - Key West Day 11 Thursday 2-5-2004
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L'Ippocampo Dining Room
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L'Ippocampo Dining Room
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