Having someone else doing the shopping and cooking everyday is a key feature of cruising so the quality, tastiness, and variety of what you eat and drink aboard is an important consideration.
This was our first experience on Oceania Cruise Lines and we were very excited to try a product positioned as a "cut above" aboard Insignia.
In summary, we were pretty much blown away... The quality and variety of food is clearly a cut above that we've experienced on our previous cruises. Generally we cruise on medium to large sized ships (2000-5500 passengers) but have done several river cruises (~100 passengers) and a Windstar cruise (~200 passengers). So like Goldilocks, we'd tried both sides but found the middle choice to be the perfect alternative.
So what were the things that blew us away? Fish - first and foremost - we consistently had amazing fish of all types aboard Insignia - of particular excellence were the several banana leaf wrapped fish dishes that Valerie ordered.
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| Banana Leaf wrapped Sea Bass (note the little clothes pin that tied the wrap around the fish) |
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| Fresh cooked Tuna |
We also had a fresh tuna night - our Executive Chef Michael went shopping in St Lucia at the fishing boat docks and brought back just caught tuna that he and an assistant chef personally grilled to order for each customer on the Terrace Grill patio.
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| Exec Chef Michael cooking our tuna |
The other "new to us" experiences were being able to order grilled to order lobster each night in the Terrace and being able to get freshly cooked to order pasta or risotto most lunches and dinners in Terrace. After the first time, having a complete roast suckling pig on the Terrace buffet carving table was just "Ho Hum" - really?
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| Grilled Lobster from the buffet |
The food was accompanied by excellent, "high touch" service - lots of waiters and assistants - and even very nice "you'd be happy to have it on your own dinner table" place settings. We were also delighted to have several very nice discussions with our executive chef Michael (from Poland) - one discussion centered on the secrets of preparing risotto we'd seen him demonstrate during a cooking class on board. Just really fun to be able to learn about cooking when you're not having to do it yourself...
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| Executive Chef Michael (right) and his Assistant in our cooking demonstration class |
Another thing we found different aboard Insignia was actually looking forward to eating lunch or dinner in the buffet (Terrace) - we generally alternate between indoor and outdoor venues - if we ate lunch outdoors on the Terrace patio, we'd eat dinner in the Grand Dining Room and vice versa.
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| Terrace during Lunch |
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| The view from the Terrace at night |
A general observation aboard Insignia is that you can be as formal or country club casual as you'd like -- there were no designated "Formal Nights" - we tended to dress up for the Grand Dining Room or Specialty evenings and were more casual attired in Terrace.
The final general observation is that all of your dining is included in your cruise fare - Specialty and In Cabin course by course dining are not extra cost options.
Yes - safe to say we are now pretty much spoiled for anything less... Here's a more detailed look at eating aboard Insignia.
Eating on Oceania Insignia
There are four dining areas aboard Insignia - the Terrace Cafe (Buffet), Waves (Burgers and Dogs), the Grand Dining Room, and the Polo Grill. We'd managed to eat in each by the time we'd spent our first night docked in St George, Bermuda - nothing like eating your way across the Atlantic... Here are our impressions and experiences.
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Grand Dining Room (the main dining room) is set up with for couples with each table a window set up for twosomes.
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| Window Table for 2 |
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| Elegant Table Setting in Grand Dining Room |
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| Table in our favorite waiter Min's Section |
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| Lunch in Grand Dining Room |
I should preface discussion of the food we had in the Grand Dining Room by stating - for the record - we never ate breakfast in the Grand Dining Room. But we did eat lunch there about every other day and found that lunch is just as delicious as dinner with varied menus of cuisine from around the world. We quickly got used to being able to order sparkling water (Perrier, Pelegrino, and something fizzy in a big green plastic bottle) to accompany each meal (water is an included amenity for dining and in your room). Another thing we loved was being able to get our favorite spicy sauce - Sambal Oelek - in both the Grand Dining Room and Terrace. Our waiters loved bringing it our to us and Budi (from Bali) was even jazzing it up for us with specially chopped up peppers in the kitchen before he brought it to our table.
One of our highlights in the Grand Dining Room was their Gnocchi - Valerie has been searching, unsuccessfully, for the past 20+ years to replicate the Gnocchi she ate at an Italian Restaurant in Paris. She had Gnocchi twice on our cruise that took her right back to Paris, which, considering the fact we lived in Italia for two years and now live in Naples, FL (Italian restaurants on every block almost...), says how good the Gnocchi was aboard Insignia.
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| We had several "Tastes of ..." samplers at lunch -- they were all yummy - this was Taste of Scandanavia |
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| Standard Grand Dining Room fare - Wow! |
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| Our favorite waiters - Budi (from Bali) and Min (from Myanmar) |
Toscana experience
Toscana was our first Oceania specialty dining experience. By the time we ate in Toscana, we'd already experienced the high quality Italian cuisine being prepared by our kitchen in the Grand Dining Room and Terrace Grill. So we expected and experienced very good Italian food in Toscana. Our best individual dish was a bone-in Veal chop with porcini cream sauce. An unexpected treat was getting real buffalo mozzarella in our Caprese appetizer. We live in a city (Naples, FL) that prides itself on Italian cuisine -- in general the taste and quality of what we got aboard Insignia was better than any of the Italian restaurants we frequent in Naples. The experience was upscale as well with an olive oil and balsamic cart to accompany our fresh baked bread plate.
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| Yes - you will eat bread... |
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| Balsamic and Olive Oil cart |
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| Bone in Veal Chop with Porcini Mushroom Sauce - best Val's ever had |
The Polo Grill experience
The Polo Grill is the "Steak and Chop House" aboard Insignia -- and of the two Specialty Restaurants on Insignia -- by far the busier. Like Toscana, we had two included reservations for dinner in the Polo Grill and tried something different each evening. Our best dish in Polo was Valerie's perfectly cooked Rib Eye on our second evening in Polo
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| A Wonderful Beet Appetizer in Polo |
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| Perfect Rib Eye |
The Terrace Cafe - A key reason for eating in Terrace is location, location, location... Terrace on 9 deck aft occupies indoor and outdoor buffet dining which gives you the option of eating outdoors on beautiful Caribbean nights.
But it's not just the location - the food in the Terrace Cafe is the best buffet dining option we've ever experienced - better even than aboard River cruises in Europe and Asia. On an average evening, you can get cook to order lamb chops, lobster, filet mignon, freshly prepared sushi, and cook to order pasta offered alongside the evening's special focus (e.g. Cuban night, Tuna night, Asian night...)
Service in the Terrace Cafe is just as good as the service in the Grand Dining Room and we actually saw our executive chef more frequently prowling the buffet line and talking with customers in Terrace than we saw him in the Grand Dining Room. Clearly, buffet dining aboard Insignia is a point of pride and it shows in the product.
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| Nightly Sushi fare in Terrace |
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| Cook to Order Pasta in Terrace |
Waves
Waves is the other outdoor dining option aboard Insignia offering gourmet burgers, hot dogs, and fish items. We ate in Waves before golfing in Bermuda - Waygyu burger with truffle sauce, really?
Also can't fail to mention that the adjacent Ice Cream counter offers Shakes, Malts, Cones, and Cups of ice cream made aboard this ship - these are included in your fare.
Specialty Coffee
Genuine Italian coffee ala Illy is offered in the coffee bar on 5 deck aft (just outside the Grand Dining Room entrance). We quickly got into the habit of having "cafe" each afternoon - sometimes falling prey to the freshly baked cookies offered with your coffee. Specialty coffee is included in your fare.
In Suite Dining
We regularly enjoyed coffee delivered by our butler Rony each morning. We also sampled the offered canapés (included) on several afternoons. They were actually more interesting than most we've tried on other cruise lines. The best part of in suite dining on Insignia was being able to order off of the Specialty Dining menus (Toscano or Polo Grill) and have it served in your cabin. I had the best individual piece of tuna I've ever eaten in our cabin that night. So why eat in your cabin? In our case, we had spent all day out on the golf course and didn't feel like getting cleaned up and re-dressed for dinner. In Suite Dining, served course by course, is a wonderful option...
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| Afternoon Canapes |
Drink Packages
There are two different Beverage packages offered on board:
1) House Select - $39.95 per person/day and provides wine and beer by the glass at lunch and dinner meals - in restaurants or in your suite
2) Prestige Select - $59.95 per person/day and provides liquor, wine, and beer during all bar hours.
In addition to the Beverage packages, there is also a Wine by the Bottle package which starts at 7 bottles for $47.50/bottle.
We selected House Select (wine by the glass with lunch and dinner) and were pretty happy (drinkable choices but nothing really tasty) with the wines available by the glass. From a value perspective, we feel we got good value for our money. Our favorites from the available "by the glass" menu were a Bogle Chardonnay, a Noble Merlot, and a Woodbridge Cabernet.
In addition to these choices, we were also treated - thank you American Express - to a free wine tasting (and bottle of wine) and were delighted to find we also got to enjoy a Champagne breakfast in our cabin. This was our only breakfast while onboard and have to say the scrambled eggs were amazing.
Happy Hour is available each evening in the ship's bars - Early - 4:30 - 6pm and Late - 10-11pm - with 2 for 1 drinks offered.
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