Cruising Gluten Free on Sapphire Princess

From reviews I’ve read online about being gluten free on Princess Cruises, its safe to say I had high expectations. My South East Asian cruise on Sapphire Princess was my first time cruising with Princess Cruises, and having just had 3 mildly stressful days trying to eat gluten free in Singapore, what I wanted ideally was a stress-free experience!

It started so well…

On our first night, we ate in one of the four dining rooms. We were taken to our seats by one of the head waiters, who explained the usual cruise ship procedure of ordering the night before. He went through that evening’s menu with what I could and couldn’t have. There are some always available options such as chicken and salmon like my experience of eating gluten free on P&O Cruises, although unlike the sister company gluten free options aren’t marked on the menu.

It’s a small difference but a big difference – it means if you decide to go to a premium restaurant or the buffet one night, you don’t have to worry about pre-ordering quite as much.

An important lesson – communication is key!

Our first day was a sea day as we had a two-day sail to Bali, and we’d split up to do different activities – my parents had played shuffleboard and I’d been off at a ukelele lesson. As it looked like I was eating on my own I didn’t want to sit in a restaurant area – I initially went to the buffet which was a little too crowded – I’m a bit claustrophobic in crowds.

I then went to the grill and pizza places on the deck. There was a queue at both, but the pizza place was serving slices of huge pizzas rather than individual pizzas like on Holland America (which I’d got the impression Princess’s food was similar to). So it appeared that wasn’t going to be an option.

I went to the grill area and asked if anything was safe even if served without the buns, and was told that the burger patties and hot dog sausages all contained gluten and that the fries were cross contaminated. At least they were clear on that front.

I waited another hour or so for the queue in the buffet to go down and finally fought my way through to the counter, where I asked one of the cooks if he could tell me what on the hot food section was safe. There was an initial bustle of confusion as the guys I was asking didn’t seem to understand what I meant by gluten free, so they went to get their boss. He appeared, and quite dismissively told waving his hand along the buffet line that he didn’t think anything would be good but the salad was gluten free.

He did note that the ship can make gluten free pizza, though this was said with more than a slight air of “But it’s kind of inconvenient”

Not overly confident in what I was going to receive, and starting to feel super anxious and red faced about holding up the line I sloped off to get a plate of salad.

So that was that. I took my depressing looking salad to the back deck, just as my parents appeared. Shame on me, in a moment of weakness I did what anyone super hormonal and already having had 3 days stressing about food in Singapore does…I had a little frustrated cry. It’s so daft in retrospect, I fully admit that, but if you’re reading this and have a dietary requirement with the potential to make you ill, you’ll know that something like the availability of safe food can really make or break your holiday. It was my first visit to Southeast Asia – I didn’t want to be suffering from being glutened!

Seeing as I had company, I wiped away my frustration and we went down to Alfredo’s, an Italian restaurant in the ship’s Piazza, and grabbed a gluten-free pizza. That was perfectly fine, a bit overcooked and cardboardy, but an improvement on limp lettuce. Funnily enough, on subsequent Princess Cruises I’d easily say Princess Cruises have the best gluten free pizza at sea (thanks to Royal Princess for establishing that!)

The only way is up

I’m not one to say boo to a goose normally, something I need to start getting over where my gluten sensitivity is concerned. My mum is, however, which is how a strongly worded letter ended up getting written to the Maitre D’Hotel, who dutifully came and saw me that evening.

From then on…it couldn’t have been better! It was quite clear a firmly worded memo must have gone round, suddenly everyone was very helpful! I was quite persistently chased by several head waiters, and we suddenly got a plethora of information that hadn’t been made available before, cakes sent to our cabin, the whole shebang! One day when we were eating in the buffet, one of the head waiters even turned up at our table with a little tray of desserts brought up from the MDR to choose from.

It’s clear that communication is super important, especially finding out who you need to speak to. Number one lesson, always go straight to the top! Every since this cruise, I’ve gone to the Maitre D’Hotel on day one, and always found the head chef or a manager wherever possible. So with that in mind, here’s what you need to know.

Gluten Free food in the Horizon Court Buffet

At breakfast time the hot buffet offers American and British Bacon, along with scrambled eggs and fried eggs. Outside the buffet area is a toast area that had gluten free bread and a separate toaster. There was also an omelette station where you can choose lots of different fillings and have the omelette freshly cooked. Contamination warning though – one of the fillings is sausage which I was told wasn’t gluten free – I don’t think they clean pans between omelette so those with extreme sensitivity may get ill from this. If you want something more continental there is fruit and cheeses on the buffet and gluten free cereal if you ask a manager for it.

At lunch and dinner time, find a manager, one of the guys wandering round in the suits, to get you the information about what on the hot buffet is gluten free. Don’t rely on the waiters or guys behind the counters to give you the correct information. There was usually some form of grilled or roast meat that was safe with salad or vegetables.

Gluten Free food in the Dining Rooms

There were a few different dining rooms to choose from depending whether you were on anytime dining or set dining – each serves the same food but with different themed decor. We preferred to eat in the Pacific Moon Dining Room. As I mentioned, each has the standard procedure of preordering. The food quality is good, the desserts can be hit and miss.

Gluten Free pizza at Alfredo’s and Prego Pizzeria.

As well as the option of Alfredo’s, which is more of a smart casual setting, it eventually turned out you could have pizza from the Prego Pizzeria station on the lido deck, just give the guy 15 minutes to prepare it. It’s made as an individual pizza in a pan so it doesn’t touch the oven floor where normal pizza has been – I also observed the guy used clean utensils to cut it. This pizza was actually a lot nicer than the one in Alfredo’s.

Sundae’s Ice Cream bar

There was an ice cream bar (I think it was called Sundae’s) on the Lido deck, which offers soft serve ice cream which you can get in a cup instead of in a cone. There were also milkshakes available for a nominal fee – just make sure they don’t put malt in and ask if there is a clean blender available.

Gluten Free food at the International Cafe

This is found downstairs in the Piazza and offers coffees and snacks – the only gluten free options were salads and the occasional questionable gluten free dessert. They seem obsessed with tapioca pudding…

Overall thoughts on eating gluten free on Princess Cruises

Overall, the offering for gluten free requirements on Princess Cruises was ok, but the initial communication was poor, perhaps a bit of my bad but also not a huge amount of introductory information from their end. One of my top tips for first time cruisers and frequent cruisers alike, communicate with the managers! Princess Cruises would really benefit from offering dietary meetings on the first day as I know some other lines do, otherwise offer more information about where on the ship will be able to offer gluten free food.

Despite having an iffy first experience eating gluten free on Princess cruises, I’ve since sailed on Royal Princess on a British Isles cruise and Emerald Princess to the Greek islands and loved every second of it! Have you travelled on Princess Cruises with a dietary requirement? What was your experience? Let me know in the comments below.