The recipe for a great cruise

Cruise lines can do what they want to spice up their entertainment or beef up their children’s clubs; they can draw up an a la carte list of shore excursions at every port of call, and even introduce pillow menus. But what most passengers expect is to eat well in as wide a variety of restaurants as possible during their chosen holiday at sea.
Which is why, no doubt, there has been a clutch of food-related announcements in the past few days. Here’s my table d’hôte selection . . .
MSC Preziosa, to be launched in Genoa in March, has teamed up with Italian chain Eataly, which began in Turin, now has restaurants in New York, Chicago, Japan, and 10 cities in Italy, and will be putting two outlets on board.
A refurbishment of Holland America’s smallest ship has resulted in the addition of a new Italian restaurant. Canaletto – a feature on every other ship in the fleet – has been set up in Prinsendam’s Winter Garden. The ship’s Lido Terrace has also been given a canopy.
Oceania Cruises has introduced some 85 new choices to the menus on Riviera’s Grand Dining Toom and will be rolling them out to Marina, Regatta and Nautica during the next three months.
The list includes three lobster dishes and a choice of 10 pastas and risottos. The pièce de resistance seems to be “roast Segovian suckling pig with rosemary fingerling potatoes and diver scallops over orange-braised endive with vanilla-vinaigrette salad.” Quite a mouthful.

Over at Celebrity, an episode of American TV’s Top Chef contest was recently filmed on board the ships Celebrity Milennium and Celebrity Infinity, and there will be a Top Chef cruise on Celebrity Constellation (NOT the ship in the video clip) in April.
How long before UK TV wakes up and takes an episode – or a series – of Masterchef or Bake Off to sea? I could give Gregg Wallace a miss, but who wouldn’t want to spend a week on a ship with Paul Hollywood and Mary Berry?
Meanwhile, at Silversea, Michelin-starred chef Jason Atherton is to host a dinner on Silver Shadow in the Far East in November.
The former Great British Menu chef, who runs Pollen Street Social in London’s Soho, and restaurants in Singapore, Shanghai and Hong Kong, will cook the four course menu and also take passengers on a tour of the fresh food market in Ha Long Bay, Vietnam.
The nine-day cruise leaves Singapore on November 25.