This was cruise # 44, and a late/quick book, filler one week vacation that was reasonably priced. We had been on three MSC cruises prior, but did not have the poor experience we had on Seaside. While the shows were TERRIFIC, and ship's common areas very attractive, the food on this ship was very POOR in many venues. The buffets on 8 and 16 were the exactly same every day/night and very basic with not much choice. While the Pizza was very good, it was always cold because the pies were not put out immediately after coming out of the oven, but stored underneath, so they were always cold when displayed. The bacon was always a mess ... a pile of entangled pieces, broken, fatty and clumped together. We thought this was their way to control overconsumption. The coffee was helped by the steamed milk provided, which made it passible. Chopped fruit sometimes had the taste of onions, as if knives used to prepare other foods were also used to cut fruit. Orange juice was sometimes too concentrated and had to be diluted to drink. To their credit, they did have cranberry juice always available. The lunch menu in the served restaurants (eg. Seashorea ) was exactly the same on each sea day, no change. Our experience was that the served meal in the main dining room at night was much better in terms of food quality and service, than the buffets. We did not experience any of the service issues in the dining rooms as mentioned by others. Our servers Pande and Derry did an excellent job for our table of two (#325). Tables always cleared in the buffets and there was always a table available as well as al fresco dining on either side of deck 8 Marketplace buffet, which was a nice touch..

We bought a three pack of Specialty Restaurants before we got on board, for $198 ( for two). Went to Ocean Cay the first night. We were the only cruisers there. The fresh Oysters were terribly fishy, I could not eat them. Our server told us they came from France???? The soft shell crabs I ordered were also very fishy, I could not eat them as well. Husband's Mediterranean Seabass had bones in it. Sorbet turned our to be sherbet … very disappointing meal. The next night we went to Butcher's Cut, which was a bad decision. I ordered the goat cheese tart which had a pastry bottom that was inedible, as hard as a rock and the goat cheese appetizer was smothered with raisins. It was dried out and tasteless. I ordered the rack of lamb which was perfectly grilled and tasted good. The accompanying asparagus were overcooked, dried out and tasted terrible. My husband ordered the marrow bone appetizer which he liked. His filet mignon was grilled perfectly and came with onion rings, which had a funny taste. The cheesecake which we ordered was sour in taste … we left it., after a few bites The only item that tasted off were the "created, flavored butters" for the bread which we later suspected were laden with bacteria and gave us severe food poisoning. By 2 am that evening I had something coming out of every orifice, pains all over my body, and remained tied to the bathroom for the next 12 hours and in bed for a total of 36 hours. My husband too suffered from severe diarrhea and was bedridden for 36 hours. We had to stay in our cabin from Sunday night until Tuesday afternoon and missed the first two ports. It wasn't until late Thursday that we began to feel normal, when we used our free pass to the Thermal spa that has a hydrothalassal pool and salt room.These two things helped to drain the posion out of us.

Our third specialty restaurant was the Asian Fusion on Thursday night and this was actually a very good meal .... one that did not make us sick. Try the steamed pork buns and order the appetizer platter ( which costs an extra $9.50). Another word about the specialty restaurants is that the package you buy has a "very limited menu" ... only one item can be ordered from each category. Otherwise, if you want to make changes it will cost 50% of the stated value for the extra item ordered. No other cruise line we have been on, makes you pay $40-$50 for a specialty meal and then limits what you can order. Read more