Texas Eagle getting "Contemporary Dining?"

[ohle]

IMG_1534976088.799420.jpg

Documented consumption of chillaquas at lunch on 6.

Chilaquiles?

Yes, it's a very good Mexican dish, served at lunch.

I had it for lunch on the Eagle and Calif. Zephyr.

Trouble is, on my recent ride on the Starlight, NB from LAUPT, they were "out" of it (as well as the mussels dish listed on the menu) for lunch, the first meal out of LAUPT.

The attendant told us it was a "management decision" not to stock the dish.

 

[ohle]

 

[dclassical]

I was on Amtrak 21 yesterday and had breakfast, lunch and dinner. The desserts listed were not all available because of new menus coming up soon and the LSA and SA said that there was no contemporary dinner planned for the Texas Eagle. And all the food listed was available.

Desserts were flourless chocolate cake (dense, good), a cheesecake (quite good) and a parfait (did not try it).

I got to chat a little with the LSA and SA (who is retiring after 30+ years with the company) and the mood was good.

I want to take this opportunity to thank members of this forum who helped me (patiently) will my questions and concerns last year when I took my first trip on the Texas Eagle. My first experience was not great due to a lazy sleeper car attendant who just did not want to be bothered. Since then I have taken 5 trips, all wonderful, including yesterday where my sleeping car attendant told me that I could still have breakfast even though the dining car was officially closed.

Looking forward to my next trips!

 

[JayPea]

I had a very similar experience on 22 on Monday. Good mood and good food. BTW, you missed out on not trying the parfait!! It was very good!!

 

[dclassical]

I almost did, but it is hard for me to pass up cheesecake. There is always next month

 

[Bob Dylan]

Excellent News indeed that Boxed AMchow isnt coming to the Eagle soon!

 

[DevalDragon]

I was on Amtrak 21 yesterday and had breakfast, lunch and dinner. The desserts listed were not all available because of new menus coming up soon and the LSA and SA said that there was no contemporary dinner planned for the Texas Eagle. And all the food listed was available.

Desserts were flourless chocolate cake (dense, good), a cheesecake (quite good) and a parfait (did not try it).

I got to chat a little with the LSA and SA (who is retiring after 30+ years with the company) and the mood was good.

I want to take this opportunity to thank members of this forum who helped me (patiently) will my questions and concerns last year when I took my first trip on the Texas Eagle. My first experience was not great due to a lazy sleeper car attendant who just did not want to be bothered. Since then I have taken 5 trips, all wonderful, including yesterday where my sleeping car attendant told me that I could still have breakfast even though the dining car was officially closed.

Looking forward to my next trips!

It's quite interesting that your dining car staff and the one I had last month have a completely different outlook on this. I guess time will tell.

I did send Amtrak a letter asking for an explanation. I will post their response if/when I get it.

 

[TinCan782]

I was on Amtrak 21 yesterday and had breakfast, lunch and dinner. The desserts listed were not all available because of new menus coming up soon and the LSA and SA said that there was no contemporary dinner planned for the Texas Eagle. And all the food listed was available.

Desserts were flourless chocolate cake (dense, good), a cheesecake (quite good) and a parfait (did not try it).

I got to chat a little with the LSA and SA (who is retiring after 30+ years with the company) and the mood was good.

I want to take this opportunity to thank members of this forum who helped me (patiently) will my questions and concerns last year when I took my first trip on the Texas Eagle. My first experience was not great due to a lazy sleeper car attendant who just did not want to be bothered. Since then I have taken 5 trips, all wonderful, including yesterday where my sleeping car attendant told me that I could still have breakfast even though the dining car was officially closed.

Looking forward to my next trips!

It's quite interesting that your dining car staff and the one I had last month have a completely different outlook on this. I guess time will tell.

I did send Amtrak a letter asking for an explanation. I will post their response if/when I get it.

Yes, simply different interpretation of the same thing. The new menu (which is an annual occurrence) became the "Fresh and Contemporary" menu. Recall the "telephone game"? Even a month ago I was hearing from an Amtrak employee I know that the contemporary menu on the TE was rumor. We will see next month.

 

[Tennessee Traveler]

" The new menu (which is an annual occurrence)"
Having ridden several LD trains each year for several years, I honestly believe the current National Menu has been on the trains much more than a year and possibly two years. When the last change was made we went from Land and Sea being shrimp to seafood cake and the mussels and chilaquiles were added to lunch menu. I am ready for a change hopefully before my Chief and Zephyr trips October - November this year.

 

[DevalDragon]

New menus used to come out twice a year. The current menu has been in use since September of 2017.

 

[jis]

Just like the PDF timetables, the printed menus seem to have devolved into a vague guidance of what one might get. What one actually gets often is a different matter, since substitutions of many items are not that unusual these days.

 

[NativeSon5859]

Just nearing CHI on 6 and everything on the menu was available except for one of the desserts, IIRC.

 

[Tennessee Traveler]

New menus used to come out twice a year. The current menu has been in use since September of 2017.

I don't want to be augmentative, but I am pretty convinced I ordered off the current menu in April 2017 as I rode the Sunset Limited, Coast Starlight, Empire Builder and Capitol Limited since I had the Chilliquitos while on that trip and I remember the mussells(which I don't eat) were also on the menu and they had removed the shrimp from the Land and Sea item.

 

[ehbowen]

Well, I rode the Texas Eagle with a friend in May 2017 and the "Land & Sea" still was steak & shrimp. I have pictures to prove it:

/monthly_05_2017/post-4967-14956802345046.jpg

 

[jis]

In my last extended trip last month I had substitutions for the Mussels twice, for the Salmon once and the Land and Sea was simply not available with no substitution twice and once it had shrimp instead of the fish cake (or was it the other way round?). I really had no problem with the substitutions. There were numerous occasions when their were dessert subs too, again no problem at my end. But as I said the menu gives a good guideline but if you are hell bent on one specific item in the menu, you may be disappointed.

 

[DevalDragon]

See for yourself:

https://www.amtrak.com/meal-choices-and-menus-at-a-glance

Auto Train - 7/17

California Zephyr - 9/17

Capitol Limited - 5/18 (Contemporary Dining)

Cardinal - 10/17

City of New Orleans - 10/17
Coast Starlight - 9/17

Crescent - 9/17

Empire Builder - 9/17

Lake Short Limited - 5/18 (Contemporary Dining)

Silver Meteor - 9/16 (yikes!)

Southwest Chief - 9/17

Sunset Limited - 9/17

Texas Eagle 9/17

 

[cpotisch]

New menus used to come out twice a year. The current menu has been in use since September of 2017.

I don't want to be augmentative, but I am pretty convinced I ordered off the current menu in April 2017 as I rode the Sunset Limited, Coast Starlight, Empire Builder and Capitol Limited since I had the Chilliquitos while on that trip and I remember the mussells(which I don't eat) were also on the menu and they had removed the shrimp from the Land and Sea item.

Just because you had certain items currently on the menu in April last year doesn't mean that the menu has not changed since then. I am telling you that the Butternut Squash Risotto and the Sweet Potato Gnocchi were both added in the fall of last year. I took the Meteor round-trip with my mom and my grandfather to Delray Beach at the end of June last year, and those options were not available. It literally says that it's from September 2017 in the link and I think on the menu.

 

[cpotisch]

Silver Meteor - 9/16 (yikes!)

The Meteor's menu actually was updated in 2017, they just didn't update the website.

 

[Tennessee Traveler]

No problem. No matter when the Butternut Squash Risotto and the Sweet Potato Gnocchi were added, I have still not been offered those dishes on the trains I traveled on in February and June this calendar year. It could be the Squash was offered and ignored since I am not a big squash fan. I do like sweet potatoes and would have tried that since I get tired of having to order off the same menu all the time since I usually travel on two to four LD trains each time I travel since I have to fly from my non served city Nashville to ride the train.

 

[cpotisch]

No problem. No matter when the Butternut Squash Risotto and the Sweet Potato Gnocchi were added, I have still not been offered those dishes on the trains I traveled on in February and June this calendar year. It could be the Squash was offered and ignored since I am not a big squash fan. I do like sweet potatoes and would have tried that since I get tired of having to order off the same menu all the time since I usually travel on two to four LD trains each time I travel since I have to fly from my non served city Nashville to ride the train.

It doesn't have actual pieces of squash or sweet potatoes in it. If memory serves, they're actually just in the sauce. I'm not a fan of squash either, but they've both been delicious every time I've had them.

 

[NativeSon5859]

Please bring contemporary dining to the CONO!

This was the hot breakfast sandwich with fruit on 59 yesterday. The fruit was literally two small orange slices and one (1!) strawberry which was cut up into small bites.

Lunch and dinner were marginally better (just deli sandwiches though a hot Asian noodle bowl was offered for lunch) though desserts now aren’t even plated, you get a choice of cookie or brownie which is just handed to you in its packaging.

 

[user 14106]

I think it’s possible if new menus are indeed coming there could be radical changes even for the trains keeping chefs and table service. Maybe Amtrak is going to go with a new commissary vendor or new approach and maybe coming changes made some of the crews mistakenly think LSL/CL dining was coming but in fact it’s something else. Could be they are rebranding all the LD menus as “fresh and contemporary dining” even those that are retaining full dining. I guess we shall see.

 

[crescent-zephyr]

Wow... That's even worse than the breakfast I got on the chef-less City a year or so ago.

 

[user 14106]

I think it’s possible if new menus are indeed coming there could be radical changes even for the trains keeping chefs and table service. Maybe Amtrak is going to go with a new commissary vendor or new approach and maybe coming changes made some of the crews mistakenly think LSL/CL dining was coming but in fact it’s something else. Could be they are rebranding all the LD menus as “fresh and contemporary dining” even those that are retaining full dining. I guess we shall see.

And it's certainly possible they could introduce yet another new dining concept to test out. Already have a bunch of different concepts running now between the silver starvation, the LSL/CL boxed approach, the cardinal/former LSL diner-lite approach, the CCC approach, the auto train diner which I guess is a step above CCC dining but below the full diner. Why not throw yet another one out there?

 

[Bob Dylan]

IMG_5095.jpg

Please bring contemporary dining to the CONO!

This was the hot breakfast sandwich with fruit on 59 yesterday. The fruit was literally two small orange slices and one (1!) strawberry which was cut up into small bites.

Lunch and dinner were marginally better (just deli sandwiches though a hot Asian noodle bowl was offered for lunch) though desserts now arent even plated, you get a choice of cookie or brownie which is just handed to you in its packaging.

Yuuuuum! NOT!!!