Food is always a big deal on a cruise. From the moment you step onboard until the moment you leave, there will be something to eat somewhere… and you can bet that passengers will be taking advantage.
By far the most popular spot to eat each evening is the ship’s main dining room. It’s where the majority of passengers will eat their dinner, it’s included in your cruise fare, and it offers a fine-dining experience complete with white tablecloths and multi-course meals.
It’s also a bit of a production to dine here.
Go to a restaurant on land and you might expect it to take 45 minutes or an hour to eat your dinner from the time you sit down until the time you walk out. Eating in the main dining room on a cruise ship generally takes longer.
Here, you have multiple courses during your meal and there is usually a wait between each one. It’s not unusual for the meal to take an hour at minimum and more likely an hour and a half until you are finally finished.
Meanwhile, there’s a number of things going on around the ship at the same time you might want to attend and these days taking 90 minutes to dine is a rarity for most people. For those that are in a rush, they often end up eating dinner in the buffet in order to grab a quicker bite.
With that in mind, Carnival has announced a big change in the dining room.
Express Dining: Dining Room Meals in Under an Hour
The cruise line has announced that it’s rolling out a new feature in the dining room called Express Dining.
This program promises “a freshly prepared multi-course dinner experience in under an hour for groups of six guests or fewer.”
In other words, passengers who want to eat in the main dining room but don’t want it to be an all-evening ordeal now have reason to smile.
According to Carnival, passengers will be able to opt-in to the new expedited service through the cruise line’s app while on the ship.
“Our guests continue to tell us they value greater flexibility in how they spend their time on board, and Express Dining was designed with that in mind,” said Christine Duffy, president of Carnival Cruise Line. “Our pilot program generated positive feedback from our guests. With this in mind, we are excited to expand Express Dining to offer them the same high quality dishes and attentive service our dining rooms are known for, while giving guests the ability to use more of their time to enjoy all the other onboard fun.”
As of now the new faster dining option is available on about half the fleet — a total of 15 ships including Jubilee, Mardi Gras, and Celebration. It will roll out across the entire Carnival fleet by the end of May.
Soon, no passengers will be relegated to just eating in the buffet simply because they want a quicker meal option than the formal sit-down dining.
More on dining during a cruise:
- Everything to Know About Eating in the Main Dining Room on a Cruise
- 7 Dining Room Hacks You Want to Know Before You Cruise
When my family and I sailed on the Venezia from 2/1 to 2/8, they already had this option in place. We didn’t take advantage of it but it seemed like a good idea.