Our first dinner on the Norwegian Getaway Cruise Ship 2016!

This blog post details the dinner that we had on the first night of our seven-day cruise on the Norwegian Getaway Cruise ship in the Tropicana Room!  We had docked on February 7, 2016 at the Port of Miami and were on our way to four different countries (Bahamas; Ochos Rios, Jamaica; Grand Cayman; Cozumel Mexico).  

On the first night, we ate together with most of everybody else in the GenYTO group in the Tropicana Room.  The Norwegian Getaway cruise ship has seven complimentary restaurants, of which the Tropicana Room is one of their three Main Dining Rooms.

The Tropicana Room

Menu for Day 1 dinner

Just like last year on the cruise, we could choose anything we wanted on the menu and choose as many dishes as we wanted too.  It was amazing this year because I got to dine with my favourite foodies and we decided to order dishes to share together so that we could maximize our palate.  Also, Norwegian Getaway’s tag line is “Cruise like a Norwegian” which means that there are no set dinner times and that everything is quite “freeing”.  Yay!  This meant that we could all eat together as a group without worrying about us having different dining times (remember last year? :S). 😀

We had an early dinner at 6:30 p.m. (just the way I like it; I love eating dinner early so that I have ample time for digestion).

We ordered four starters, four main courses, and four desserts to share(!).

Norwegian Smoked Salmon Tartare
-avocado, English cucumbers, lemon-mustard dressing

The smoked salmon tartare was surprisingly disappointing.  I love salmon tartare and thought that this would have been delicious but it was just so-so.

Roasted Squash Panzanella
-butternut squash, Brussels sprouts, arugula, sherry vinaigrette

‘Louisiana’ Chicken Drums
-louisiana hot sauce, spring onions & cucumbers

I LOVED these Louisiana Chicken Drums!  They were perfectly seasoned and tasted so delicious!!  These were the best starters of the night.

Corn & Crab Chowder
-bacon crumbs

This chowder was pretty good but the others said it was a little too salty for their taste.

Wild Lump Crab Cakes
-sauce marie, frisee, apple slaw

These crab cakes were decent but not absolutely amazing.

Just a shot of our table with our starters! 😀

Grilled Mahi Mahi
-black bean rice, tropical salsa, fried plantains, citrus beurre blanc sauce

The fried plantains were very delicious.  The grilled mahi mahi was a little dry but definitely contained the traditional flavour.

Papardelle & Duck Confit
-shiitake mushrooms, green peas, duck jus

The duck was really salty here but maintained a fresh ‘duck’ taste.  I wasn’t a big fan of the papardelle as it was a little lumpy.

Whole Roasted Striploin
-baked potato: sour cream, chives & bacon, corn on the cob, broccoli, creamed horseradish, beef jus

The striploin was a little overdone. 😦  The corn on the cob was super sweet and really good!

Grilled Shrimp
-herb butter, jasmine rice, broccoli, garlic aioli

Yum!  I loved these grilled shrimp with herb butter.  I wish we had realized ahead of time that there was going to be a big lump of rice; we would have left it out since our intention was to try as many dishes as possible but not to fill up on carbs.

Our full-to-the-brim table! 😀

Turkey Sausage Lasagna
-spicy marinara sauce, kale, fennel seeds, ricotta cheese, smoked cheddar cheese

I tried a bite of this Turkey Sausage Lasagna from Sarah and it was so delicious!!

Pistachio Crème Brûlée
-florentine tuile

This was such a unique dessert and I was glad I got to try it.  I really liked it!  The others thought it was a little weird-tasting haha. 😛

Warm Chocolate Volcano
-strawberry compote, straccietella gelato

Yum!  This was really, really good!  Many people on the cruise loved this dessert.  Some of the desserts rotated every night so you could actually order this almost every night if you wanted to.

Pineapple Cup
-passion fruit & mint sauce, oreo cookie

Haha, I wanted a Pineapple Cup to help digestion (those fruit juices), but this didn’t arrive as a ‘cup’ form.  It was just a plate of pineapples with an oreo cookie.  It was so interesting.  It was good in a unique way.

Chocolate Butterscotch Brownie (no sugar added)
-vanilla ice cream

Our desserts!

I was so glad and happy that we got to share these dishes!  It was such a pleasure to dine together on the first night!  Stay tuned for the rest of my cruise 2016 posts! 🙂