Culinary Adventures with Camilla

With food available on a cruise ship twenty-four hours a day, you could easily characterize it as a food parade. But I had no idea that there would be a literal parade of food. On our last formal evening, the kitchen crew paraded dozens of baked alaskas through the dining room while diners hooped, hollered, pounded on the tables, and waved their napkins in the air. We [heart] baked alaska. Here are some of the ones we've made: Chocolate-Barley Brownie Baked Alaska  and Mosaic Baked Alaska .

I am, admittedly, a food snob. So, I was not going into the cruise with any real expectations about the food...other than the fact that it's readily available 24 hours a day, each and every day. But I have to admit that I was floored by the quality and inventiveness of the food, at least the dinners. We feasted on minted melon balls drizzled with port, strawberry-thyme sorbets, peach-prosecco soup with fresh mint, lobster tails with lemon-butter, rhubarb gelato, braised halibut, chocolate mousse atop of chocolate brownie with an espresso-scented panna cotta, quail-venison terrine, king crab cakes with papaya coulis, and more. I will say that I'm grateful that my boys have fearless palates. For a child with picky tastes, dinners would have been torturous. But Riley and Dylan ordered something new every evening and loved it! The cruise actually inspired my menu for a dinner party next week.