A Case Against Rotational Dining on Disney Cruise Line

One of the foundational aspects of Disney Cruise Line since its beginnings with the Disney Magic in 1998 has been rotational dining. Basically, this means that throughout your cruise – whether it be 3 days or 7 – you will rotate from restaurant to restaurant at the same time each night. I'm here to argue that this system is a little archaic, a far too restrictive, and needs to go.

I recently disembarked from a wonderful four-day cruise aboard the Disney Dream, and overall, it was a truly magical experience – especially as it was my first time. But if there's one thing I didn't really enjoy, as has been the case on my prior Disney Cruises, it's the dining. Specifically, the rotational dining between the ship's three main dining locations – Animator's Palate, Royal Palace and Enchanted Garden. On cruises longer than 3 nights, you'll repeat each restaurant at least once.

We'll start off with the quality of the food itself, which yes, it's cruise ship food – so I cut it a little slack. However, I've had far better meals on competing cruise lines, like Norwegian and Royal Caribbean. More varied menus, with significantly better flavor profiles would be a great place to start to improve the experience.

My main issue with the system is the rotational dining itself, and the lack of other options. By the 3rd or 4th night on your voyage, visiting these restaurants can begin to feel like a chore. Which is not helped by the lackluster food. What's more, with the rotational system, you must visit each restaurant at the same time every day, which is typically either 5:45 or 8:15. If you're not hungry at that time, you kind of just have to go or go without. Some of the smaller quick service locations are open up on Deck 11, but that's just burgers and pizza.

But how to change this? I would just look at what other cruise ships do. Switch to a reservation system, where you can opt in to have the same dining time every day or participate in a walk-up system. This makes things far more flexible for guests and avoids having a massive rush of guests all at once, which I've found can lead to slow and forgetful service. Another way to mitigate demand is to keep Cabanas or Marceline Market on the Wish class open for the evening as well, as is done with similar venues on competing ships. That gives guests not only another venue to eat at, but the chance to possibly have some different food.

Maybe Disney Cruise Line also needs more up-charge locations. One of my most memorable experiences on my two Royal Caribbean cruises was dining in Izumi, their sushi and Asian eatery. Not only did this location offer very different items from the main dining location aboard that ship, but it also offered a very different type of dining experience – similar to Benihana or Teppan Edo at EPCOT. I definitely don't want to pay an arm and a leg for something like this, but I would be willing to pay a $30-50 uncharge for something different to eat – especially on a long cruise!

Do I see any of these changes happening? Absolutely not. The rotational dining has been a key marketing point of Disney Cruise Line, and it has appeared to work for them for nearly three decades. A case of, if it ain't broke, don't fix it. But this change, for me at least, would be the one thing that makes a wonderful vacation even better.