Carnival has totally revamped some of its dining options over the past 12 months. That has included redoing its main dining room (MDR) menus with the help of famed celebrity chef Emeril Lagasse.
Unlike Royal Caribbean, which trimmed its MDR menus and dropped the recurring “classics” that appeared every night, Carnival arguably improved its menus. Yes, some old favorites were dropped, but many new dishes were added, including a nightly three-course offering created by Lagasse himself.
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The cruise line also added an expanded late-night dining menu to give passengers options beyond pizza and room service. That new menu includes a meatball sub, chicken noodle soup, chicken tenders, and a handful of other items including chocolate chip and sugar cookies for a late dessert.
Cruise ship passengers, however, can be very sensitive to any menu changes. Some of the items Carnival dropped in the MDR may be not very popular, but to somebody, it was a favorite item that was a special part of cruising for them.
Any change gets noticed and when you make a change to the menu at one of the most popular onboard venues, passengers won’t just notice, they will complain. Complaining to Carnival, however, sometimes works and Brand Ambassador John Heald recently shared that the cruise line has begun making a dining change across the fleet because passengers asked for it.
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Guy Fieri has multiple restaurants on Carnival Cruise ships.
Image source: Ethan Miller/Getty Images for Caesars Entertainment
Guy Fieri has a huge Carnival presence
A few Carnival ships including Mardi Gras, Celebration, Jubilee, Panorama, and Horizon have Guy Fieri’s Pig & Anchor BBQ, an added-fee restaurant. Every ship in the fleet, however, has a Guy’s Burger Joint.
“When we went looking for someone to help us grill up the best burgers at sea, we found just the guy. Carnival teamed up with best-selling author, restaurateur, and Food Network personality Guy Fieri to bring all the authentic appeal of a roadside burger shack to Guy’s Burger Joint, the cool poolside spot for hot burgers and hand-cut fries,” the cruise line shared on its website.
Carnival, however, had at some point dropped the hand-cut fries. That was something passengers noticed and complained about.
Heald recently shared some good news for them.
“And those of you commenting about the fries, you may have noticed that on some ships we have returned to the original recipe hand cut fries and will be doing this throughout the fleet in the days and weeks ahead. Cheers to Richard our SVP of food and beverage for listening to you,” he wrote.
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Carnival passengers will be diners, who dive into fries
While there’s probably someone who loved the machine-cut, pre-made fries, most posts responding to Heald’s news were very positive.
“John Heald thank you! Hand-cut fries are the best! I had stopped getting fries at guys just to save on some cruise calories but I won’t say no to hand-cut fries! No ketchup for me on my burger,” Tami Spoeri posted.
Michelle Glover-Reaves seemed relieved at the news.
“Thank Goodness because the other fries aren’t good,” she wrote.
Some passengers would like to see some other changes.
“The fries we had last cruise were not the same. I would love to see the sautéed mushrooms back on the toppings bar too,” shared Kimberly Lamontagne Lobdell.
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Another poster lobbied Heald for a different celebrity restaurant to get a bigger presence on Carnival ships.
“Can you please ask whoever is in charge of dining to please find it in their heart to add more of the Shaq chicken restaurant to the Carnival fleet? Pretty please with a cherry on the top,” wrote Michelle Glover-Reaves.
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