Europe 2015- Explorer of the Seas Dining: Part Two

In this post, I'm going to hit the highlight of our cruise dining and my least favorite meal. Because I like to take bad news first, let's start with the worst.

Giovanni's Table is the Italian specialty dining option on the Explorer of the Seas. I think the universe was trying to tell us something, when Dan and I had to bail on our first reservation at Giovanni's Table. Felix was having a rough day, so we missed dinner and Zoe went to the kid's club. Dan's parents dined without us and really had a wonderful time. They enjoyed it so much, that they wanted to go back and all six of us ended up dining there during the last days of our cruise.

Looking back on our experience, there were a number of factors that made this my least favorite meal. We dined late at night, after a very busy day and we were all very tired. It took nearly an hour for the first course to arrive and I was half asleep at the table. My first course was an uninspired caesar salad drowning in dressing. Here is a look at our starters.

Pizza was not on the menu, making the kids grumpy. However, they were able to order plain pasta with butter, always a kid pleaser.

Here is the big problem, I ordered the wrong thing. Dan's parents very much enjoyed their meals during both of their visits, but Dan and I did not. We both ordered the gnocchi with blue cheese sauce. It was heavy and far too rich. Neither of us could finish it. We should have known better than to order gnocchi. We live ten minutes from the best gnocchi in the world. The gnocchi bolognase at Trattoria Amici in Glendale is one of the best meals that I've eaten. At the risk of sounding like an Iron Chef judge, the gnocchi is like little pillows from heaven. So delicious. How could Giovanni's Table possible compete?

The starters and mains were lackluster, but the dessert cart was a fun touch. Who doesn't love dessert carts?

Gotta go with the cannoli.

Giovanni's Table = Meh.

However, the Explorer of the Seas had an amazing Japanese restaurant called Izumi.

We ate at Izumi twice, the first time was after one of the best days of the trip, a beach stop in Palma Mallorca, Spain. We ate while the ship was still in port and we had city views.

We started off with edamame and miso soup.

Living in Los Angeles, we have endless aray of amazing sushi restaurants. The sushi at Izumi was as good as anything we can get in Los Angeles. I could easily eat sushi every day of the week and by the second week of our trip, I had been missing it. Izumi gave me a taste of what I had been missing.

Fried rice came next. In the meantime, Zoe and Felix were happily eating chicken katsu and white rice. Felix actually declared the rice to be better than ice cream. This is a huge deal, because that kid loves his ice cream!

Although we started dinner with champagne, we switched to sake for the main course.

One of the signature dishes at Izumi is the hot stone. You can order various meats and vegetables, which are brought out raw with a sizzling stone, where you cook your own food. There are also several dipping sauces for more flavor.

The hot stone is entertaining, but also tricky. Certain items, like salmon, really stick to the stone. Since Dan's mom is a vegetarian, it worked out well to use one stone for all of the veggies, which were far more than she was able to eat. Izumi also offered vegetarian sushi. Really, Izumi had something to please everyone in our group.

Besides fun cooking methods, Izumi also had fun staff. They really went the extra mile to entertain us with napkin folding tricks. The best was this mouse, which they let the kids take home.

Zoe with binoculars.

Zoe as the Statue of Liberty.

Dessert included Mochi Balls, among other types of ice cream.

Our second visit to Izumi was on the last formal night of the cruise. Still full from our first visit, we tried to order less food. Tried being the key word.

Although Izumi was busier during our second visit, the staff still took the time to entertain us. This time they did origami for the kids. The butterfly was really pretty.

And to make things even more magical...we saw baby dolphins!

We skipped dessert at Izumi and headed to Ben and Jerry's. Trying to eat rapidly melting ice cream, while still in our formal attire, is one of my favorite memories from the trip.

Europe 2015- Explorer of the Seas Dining: Part One

It's an unconfirmed fact, the number one cruise activity is eating.

Seriously.

It's a very leisurely process, with dinner taking up to three hours. It was exhausting. Honestly, by the end of the cruise, my ideal fantasy for dinner involved me, sitting on a couch with a bag of chips in my PJ's.

Cruise ship dining technically begins as soon as you book your vacation. It starts with the wardrobe. You simply can't eat dinner without proper attire, it's part of the cruise experience. Wardrobe planning is stressful. For dinners, I ended up packing eight dresses, four skirts and seven pairs of shoes. For our two week cruise, we had three "formal" nights, about four "semi-formal" nights and the rest were designated "smart-casual". The dress code was open to a wide range of interpretation, but here is how we broke it down.

1. Formal- The adult men wore tuxes (or as the Brits call them, Dinner Jackets). To ease our packing, Dan was able to rent a tux on the ship. They brought it our stateroom with all of the accessories and shoes. He looked great. They don't do rentals for kids though, so Felix had to do with a button-down shirt and dress slacks. He's five and he looked snazzy. The women wore fancy cocktail dresses or dressy suits. Zoe, who just turned eight, looked beautiful in her dressiest dresses. The kids actually really enjoyed dressing up. They didn't so much enjoy the long meals.

2. Semi-Formal- Dress shirts, sports coats, summer dresses. This is the attire you would wear to a non-formal summer wedding.

3. Smart Casual- Short sleeve button-down shirts, "nice" jeans, less fancy sun dresses.

These dress codes applied to the main dining room and the specialty dining restaurants. A few nights we ate in the Windjammer cafe, which is the ultra casual,buffet option. The only dress-code in the Windjammer is no bathing suits. Although tee-shirts and shorts are fine in the Windjammer, you'll see people still adhering to the evening dress-code and they will give you the stink-eye if you're dressed down.

Dress code explained, let's get to the food. There are several dining options on the ship, some are part of the fare and some require an additional fee. In this post, I'm going to share our experiences at two of the specialty dining restaurants.

On our first day of the cruise, my in-laws purchased a specialty dining package, which included a discounted cover-charge at two of the restaurants (Chops Grille and Giovanni's Table), plus 20% off at Izumi.

On the first formal night, we dined at Chops Grille. Here we are, ready to head to dinner.

As suite guests, Chops Grille was actually our dining room for breakfast and lunch. When we came for dinner, we already knew the servers and we were seated at "our table".

Our appetizers included bacon wrapped scallops, crab cakes and a goat cheese salad.

Zoe showed her adventurous side and decided to try a "colossal shrimp cocktail" for her starter. Unfortunately, it wasn't what she had expected. I ate if for her, it was delicious. To be honest, it wasn't what I had anticipated either!

Luckily, Chops Grille had kid approved pizza and plain pasta with butter.

The adults feasted on steak, lobster and a variety of vegetables. My vegetarian mother-in-law, had a creamy pasta with mushrooms. This was a first-rate steak house meal.

The mud pie with strawberry sauce is not to be missed.

We enjoyed our dinner at Chops Grille so much, that we returned for our final dinner of the cruise.

On a more casual note, we ate lunch twice at Johnny Rockets.

Johnny Rockets is an American chain restaurant and really, it's not one of my favorites. We have one about ten minutes from our house and we rarely eat there. However, this was an awesome treat for the kids. They absolutely loved it and our meals there were a true highlight of our cruise.

The surcharge for Johnny Rockets was about five dollars a person, which included unlimited food from the menu. Beverages, including milkshakes, were an extra charge. How could anyone possibly resist the milkshakes? Look at these happy kids!

Felix's koala even got to join us. Koala enjoyed the ocean view.

The food was the same quality as Johnny Rockets in America. It was nice to have some burgers and hot dogs after all of the fancy cruise meals. Felix surprised us by being a bottomless pit for onion rings. He just kept eating them!

The staff is what made Johnny Rockets such a fun place to eat. Each table had a juke box and with certain songs, all of the servers would do a dance routine, like to the YMCA. The kids LOVED this! A stand-out server was Jess from the Philippines. Jess was the slickest dancer with his cool sunglasses, but he also did magic tricks. He was just super personable and attentive. There were many amazing crew members, but Jess was a particular stand-out, who went the extra mile to make our vacation special.

Europe 2015- Southhampton Port

This year we spiced up our annual trip to Europe with a two week mediterranean cruise. Even though it's just a brief taste with port stops, I was extremely excited to visit France and Spain, two new countries for me. This was a mega vacation, that didn't just include my two step-children, but also Dan's parents.

Six people + a two week cruise = a ton of luggage.

Who am I kidding, it was mostly mine. I'm the least traveled out of the group and I've not yet mastered the fine art of packing. Those large purple cases? Mostly my stuff. I brought eight dresses, including three for formal nights. I even brought my wedding dress, which was very non-traditional, yet still bulky.

To ease the stress of getting to the port, we left a day early. Dan's parents arranged for a car service to pick us up and they treated us to a night at the Premier Inn at Southhampton, just a stones throw from the docks.

My only other experience at a Premier Inn was a few years ago in Blackpool. Everything in Blackpool seemed a bit scummy and I was left with a negative impression. Well, that impression has changed. The Southhampton Premier Inn was very clean and inviting. Dan and I stayed in a family room with the kids.

Although considered an economy hotel, the Premier Inn offers a lot of extras and they have a "Good Night Guarantee." Basically, if you need anything or have a problem, they will go out of their way to fix it. The rooms come with a range of extra pillows in various firmness levels, which was appreciated. We also took advantage of the free wifi, which is a huge perk that not even many of the fancier hotels offer.

The Premier Inn is not only super close to the port, but it's walking distance to a huge mall. This was perfect, as we had a last minute shopping emergency when we learned that my step-daughter didn't have PJ's.

The hotel is flanked by several restaurants, an Ikea and a movie theatre. There is even a maritime museum with a Titanic exhibition, just in case you want a cautionary tale prior to embarking on your own cruise journey.

We ate both dinner and breakfast at the Premier Inn. Dinner was full service with a range of choices, including steaks, pizza and curry. The breakfast was a self-serve buffet, with both cold and hot choices. Good food at a good value.

We woke up refreshed and ready to head to the port for our cruise.