My fiancé and I were blown away by "The Chef's Table" experience! The experience begins the night before, as you are presented with a formal invitation providing you with the details. The dinner group was an intimate size, 12 people. We joined the executive chef and his Sous Chef for a champagne reception, trust me when I say the champagne was flowing! We were taken on a wonderful tour of the kitchen, and were given a demonstration on how they make one of their award winning desserts. During the champagne reception, they treated us to the most wonderful hors d'oeuvres! We sampled a mango sphere on a rosemary biscuit, salmon tartar cornets, beef Carpaccio on air pillows with chocolate bacon and a candy apple ribbon, and double cooked lamb on tapioca. After the reception, we were led to a private table that was set up for us in the library. We were offered red or white wine with our dinner, and they certainly kept our goblets FULL!! We had the most delicious 7 course meal, the presentation was unlike anything I've ever seen! At the presentation of each course, the Sous Chef described to us how each of the courses was prepared and the different techniques that were utilized.

We dined on beet blanket, which was layered asparagus, cauliflower, and carrot, with spiced grape tea, garnished with mache and lemon streusel as the first course. The second course was a crab stack, with corn custard, polenta crackers, tangerine passion caviar. For the third course, we had duck textures on creamy quinoa, parmesan churros, olive snow, and port wine jus. The forth course was two types of bisque divided by tomatoes, basil, crisped brioche, and a garlic chip. We had Sea Bass for the fifth course, it had a chorizo crust, fried popcorn pudding, a lemon macaroon and lobster foam. For the sixth course we had Wagyu beef served with a bone marrow soufflé, scallion and garlic panisse, and a gremolata crisp. The dessert course was served with coffee, and was a beautiful presentation of sea salt praline chocolate, raspberry mojito, key lime cake, apricot vanilla gel, and citrus cream. There were "nonfood related" extra surprises thrown in as well, but I won't spoil the surprise. ANY future cruise we take, we will ALWAYS pay extra to experience the Chef's Table Dinner....it was the highlight of our cruise!!!! Now we know how the other half live!

Additionally, we participated in the cheers beverage program which included all alcoholic drinks under $10.00 as well as soda. We paid $575 for the program....and we came nowhere close to drinking our money's worth, HOWEVER, we did drink what we wanted. We appreciated being able to pay up front, so there were no surprise bills at the end. The bartenders were all wonderful and made delicious top shelf drinks! We would utilize the cheers program again. Read more