Eight Thousand Meals a Day!

Betty Hinchliffe takes to the high seas and checks out the catering arrangements on the biggest luxury liner ever built.

It started with a generous husband who can't resist a good deal and a savvy travel agent who knows how to attract his clients - six days in luxury hotels in London and Paris and the inaugural Mediterranean cruise on the biggest and most luxurious ship ever built, Queen Mary 2. Irresistible? You bet. Clem said, "Let's go," and we did.

Embarkation is at Southampton in Southern England and the size of the ship has to be seen to be believed. Built in two years at Saint-Nazaire in France using American money, QM2 is awesome. She has 17 decks and towers 200 feet (61m) above the waterline, equal to the height of a 23-storey building. Her length is equal to four football fields, and is 147 feet longer than the Eiffel Tower is tall (984 feet). Once around the Promenade Deck is one-third of a mile (541 metres). There are 2600 passengers, 1253 ship's personnel (officers are mainly British, social staff British and American, 40 nationalities among other staff) and 1310 staterooms, each with TV, email facility and your own email address.

Amenities include five swimming pools, 1000-seat theatre, a planetarium, cinema, spa/health club, ballroom, casino, 10 restaurants, 14 bars, shops and a library. The power generated by the liner would be enough to provide electricity for a city of about 300,000 people. She has the latest technology and engineering, is daringly modern but appreciative of tradition, offers the smoothest ride of any ship and is so versatile she can dock with ease without the use of tugboats. Six hundred of the staff are in food service. They are recruited through advertisements in trade magazines around the world and are interviewed by Cunard staff or their agents. Desired experience is in 4- or 5-star hotels, and if more experience is needed they may be employed on other ships to bring them up to the standard required for
QM2.

The ship's Executive Chef, Jean Marie Zimmerman, was born in Alsace, trained in France and Germany and has had considerable international experience, including six years working on cruise ships. He joined Cunard one year ago specifically to become Executive Chef on QM2, and worked from the Miami office creating dishes and planning the concepts and infrastructure needed for the launch of QM2. Chef Zimmerman and his team - one Executive Sous Chef, five Chefs de Cuisine, 152 Chefs and no apprentices - are responsible for the 10 food outlets, each with a different concept, serving more than 8000 meals per day.

Britannia is the ship's elegant main dining room with seating for 1350 passengers. It is three storeys high and spans the full width of the ship. Breakfast and lunch are open sitting and there are two sittings for dinner. Menus feature a mix of what we would call "modern Australian", European, American, traditional British dishes and more eclectic offerings that combine seasonal and regional ingredients from ports of call (although most of the food is on board before the ship sails).

Choices are many and varied, including low-calorie dishes from the Canyon Ranch Spa (which is one of the on-board concessionaires).The food is excellent, as is the comprehensive and very large list of wines from around the world (including several from Australia - hardly surprising as the head sommelier is an Aussie from Wagga Wagga).

Exclusive to their own levels of accommodation are the 180-seat Princess Grill for the passengers in the luxurious Junior Suites, and the 206-seat Queens Grill for those occupying the Duplex Apartments and the most lavish suites. The food here is of a similar standard to Britannia but includes unlimited caviar, foie gras and lobsters. Kings Court has elaborate breakfast and lunch buffets with Carvery, Asian and Italian choices.

In the evening, the space becomes four different casual restaurants - The Carvery, La Piazza, Lotus and the Chefs Galley (with demonstrations by visiting chefs).Todd English is the signature restaurant of an American celebrity chef, and the food is excellent and innovative; dining here attracts a $US30 surcharge. For the more plebeian, the Golden Lion has pub grub and the Boardwalk
Grill serves soups, salads, sandwiches, hot dogs and hamburgers.

There is something for everyone on QM2, a great liner in every sense of the word and, hopefully, one day we'll see her at Circular Quay.