Time for Prince S to get his "Crown" on

Even back when suite perks were the only way to get a specialty restaurant dinner included, we fell in love with the Crown Grill, the steakhouse onboard Princess Cruises. Now it's become an embarkation night tradition for us. The current price, unless you have the Premier package or are using your suite perk on embarkation day, is $55 per adult and $27.50 per child aged 3-12. If you are sailing on the Sun or Star ships, the rate is $60 per adult and $30 per child aged 3-12. Check out Princess' official website here to view a sample of the menu.

What follows is a collection of dishes ordered over multiple visits. We routinely skipped desserts due to appetite, time it took to complete the meal, and a lack of interest in the menu choices.

Prince S insisted on getting to look at the menu first.

Melted cheese on bread to start every Crown Grill dining experience? Umm, yes please!

Blue Iceberg Salad Appetizer (also noted as gluten free) - applewood smoked bacon, heirloom cherry tomatoes, blue cheese dressing. I've come to enjoy a blue cheese dressing but in the past there was never any problem having it changed to ranch if you're not a fan of blue cheese. I used to joke that an iceberg wedge salad at a steakhouse is the only way you'll see Dad willingly eating a salad but he's now expanded that palate to enjoy a Caesar salad as well. :)

Same salad another night:

Colossal Lump Crab Cake Appetizer - cognac mustard cream sauce, shaved asparagus fennel salad. You know this born and raised Maryland girl had to get a crab cake. Solid amount of crab meat versus filler and well prepared.

Chilled Jumbo Shrimp Appetizer - XO Brandy, fresh horseradish cocktail sauce

Shellfish Bisque Appetizer - lobster chunks and shrimp, aged cognac, and whipped cream. This was one of those soups where they bring you a bowl of the ingredients and then pour the broth in front of you at the table. This broth seemed unusually thin for a bisque and reminded me more of a brown gravy.

Porterhouse Steak - described on the menu as 20oz, 560 grams, the best of filet and sirloin, grilled on the bone. 

Dad's steak - Dad ordered the Loaded Idaho Baked Potato on the side. 

Rib-Eye Steak -described on the menu as 14oz, 400 grams, rich with heavy marbling.

The formerly known as truffle fries are now called Parmesan Fries on the menu. Sorry to say that the fries at Catch by Rudi have now taken the title of my favorite thing to order away from these fries at Crown Grill.

Another night's order of fries:

We laughed in surprise when the waiter served our Red Skin Mashed Potatoes that we both ordered as a serving platter of four white domes that looked like halved ice cream scoops. Yet gave us a larger bowl of fries that we also planned to share. I guess if they could have found a way to arrange the fries in half mounds, it would have looked like the mashed potatoes. I applaud the presentation but seems a bit silly when each of those mounds disappears after two to three forkfuls.

Grilled Asparagus side - they brought enough to share but you know I was the only one eating a non potato based vegetable.

We found a good bit of service issues throughout all the venues perhaps by default given how often the Premier package had us dining in specialty restaurants. We'd have issues getting drink refills, courses would take a long time to arrive, and often our server would either disappear into the server protection program or we'd spot them spending extra time chatting up a table nearby while we sat needing something. During those moments, we were often ignored when we'd politely try to get their attention. We'd have to ask for sides and toppings that were forgotten. One of the Crown Grill evenings, our waiter stopped by the table to ask if we liked how our steaks were cooked but then after spending our entire interaction looking back at a nearby table, raced back to chatting with the other table before we could even give him an answer. 

The inclusion of all the digital pictures taken by ship's photographers with the Premier package gives you tons of opportunities as the photographers routinely wander through the specialty restaurants asking to take your picture. Thank you to the few regular photographers we saw who would take the time to chat and then ask if you'd like your picture taken. Then there was one who swooped in during one of our Crown Grill dinners obviously tired of being told no thanks. He arrived at our table, stuck the camera with large flash bulb in my face while I was mid-bite, and yelled "Smile!" Being ambushed apparently didn't bode well for my ability to refrain from blinking at the strong light thrust in front of my eyes. The photographer complained about my blinking, shoved the camera and flash bulb back in my face, yelled again to smile, and snapped the picture all in the space of about 30 seconds before he left to visit another table.

I think I might save this one for the blooper reel and be thankful that I didn't have my mouth open. If you can't laugh at yourself, then who can you laugh at?

By the last few days of the cruise, we were reconsidering keeping any more of our specialty dining reservations. We had also shared our disappointment with Josue about the balcony dinner experience. A meeting with two officers from the food and restaurant departments was scheduled. I appreciate how the meeting was handled. I felt like our concerns were listened to and taken seriously. At the conclusion of the meeting, the officers encouraged us to give the specialty restaurants another try. We had initially decided to cancel plans to fit in one more visit to Crown Grill as the Reserve dining team had been amazing but we decided to go ahead with another visit the second to last night of the cruise. There was not only a marked improvement in service, especially since they pulled one of the servers we had praised from the Sabatini's experience to wait on us for this dinner in Crown Grill, but it was like we were unnecessarily fawned over. 

Several visits were made to the table by our server and fellow restaurant management making sure we were enjoying ourselves and wanted for nothing. The pastry chef stopped at our table to ask how she could improve the snacks being sent to our cabin. We were finding it tough to enjoy her treats when they'd dried out by the time we returned to our cabin in the evenings. She told us about how she takes in guest feedback for things like harder crunchier cookies versus soft. She offered to make a softer batch for us and together we came up with a solution of having the treats delivered later in the evening so they weren't sitting as long. 

The sommelier came over and tried setting up an impromptu personal wine tasting. When I didn't like any of the offerings, she produced a bottle of non-alcoholic wine from the Kylie Minogue collection. It tasted like a dry peach seltzer. If I only liked peach flavored items, this would have definitely been one non alcoholic wine I'd enjoy having with my meal. 

I don't recall what cut of steak we had during this dinner. I believe we both decided to try one from the Goodstock by Nolan Ryan upcharge section of the menu. I ordered mine medium while Dad ordered his medium well. Our server kept assuring us that the steaks were coming but that they took longer to cook being such premium thick cuts of meat. What did stick with me though was the way our server became more frantic at how long the steaks were taking to cook. She'd try to keep checking with the open kitchen but the manager would come up behind her gesturing and yelling at her to hurry up. She would get more and more flustered as she could only wait until the chef was finished preparing the dishes. We perfectly understood the need for extra time and appreciated her checking in at our table to explain. It left a proverbial poor taste in my mouth to see such treatment when it was a delay not in her control. 

When the steaks arrived, Dad's plate looked great and cooked exactly to his liking. 

Mine arrived swimming in the bloody beef juice that resembled more medium rare. The piece of meat slid around the plate like it was on an ice rink in all that red beef juice runoff. I've had medium cooked beef before and understand that it means I'll still see pink. This was more like it ought to still be mooing. I tried a piece or two and was just going to focus on eating the sides. Our server saw that I wasn't eating the steak and offered to cook it some more or get me something else. I turned down the offer insisting that we'd had plenty to eat already. When she persisted, I apologetically insisted it was my fault because I should have ordered more medium well. This unfortunately prompted the manager to visit the table and in turn the chef came over. I showed the chef the pool of bloody juice the steak was sitting in. He exclaimed "Yes, that's medium, it's perfect!" turned on his heel and headed back to the kitchen. None of my other medium ordered steaks we'd had earlier in the cruise had come out looking like this. I don't make a living cooking for others but I doubt cooking a thicker cut of beef to the same doneness level as the thinner cuts should translate to a timed cook versus an individual doneness level.

We finally bothered to order dessert on this final visit. I went with the standard ice cream and Dad chose the Triple Chocolate Treasure from the dessert menu.

Triple Chocolate Treasure - dark chocolate mousse, orange cremeux, hazelnut filling, blonde brownie crust, and golden chocolate macaroons.