Le Grand Bistro on Celebrity Ascent: Specialty Dining Review

 

With so many outstanding dining options included in your cruise fare onboard Celebrity, you may be like me and wonder "Are the specialty dining options really worth the extra cost?" 

It's a great question! In this article you will get to see what the dining experience is like at Le Grand Bistro onboard Celebrity's newest ship the Ascent. You'll learn how much it costs, what the ambiance is like, and our favorite dishes that we tried. 

​Allons-y! :) 

Le Grand Bistro Celebrity Ascent

In this post: 

• About Le Grand Bistro 
• Le Grand Bistro Menu Celebrity Ascent 
• Restaurant Ambiance at Le Grand Bistro
• Cruise Food Photos - Le Grand Bistro
• Le Grand Bistro Review 
• ​Book Your Celebrity Cruise

 

Le Grand Bistro 

If you're dreaming of visiting France but find yourself on a Celebrity cruise to the Caribbean, don't worry! The boulangerie-patisserie Le Grand Bistro on Ascent will definitely do in a pinch! ;) 

And PS you can find plenty of Celebrity Cruises stopping in France ;D 

Outside Le Grand Bistro at night. The doors close for Le Petite Chef dining experience.

Le Grand Bistro is located on Deck 4, midship, between its upscale French dining neighbor, Le Voyage ​by Daniel Boulud and the buzzing Craft Social Bar where you can enjoy beer flights and bar bites. ​

Fresh Baked Breads on Display at Le Grand Bistro

​Whether you sit down to dine at dinner, enjoy a casual lunch, or prefer a demi baguette and a latte at breakfast  - Le Grand Bistro has something for you to try!
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Le Grand Bistro Menu on Ascent

Le Petit Chef Menu:

You have a few options if you're interested in dining at Le Grand Bistro.

The interactive dining experience Le Petite Chef can be reserved in the evenings for a fixed price. 

The Menu on Ascent was as follows:

• Magical Soup: Creamy Potato Leek
• Artificial Intelligence: Citrus Poached Cod Loin
• Magic Potion: Beef Tenderloin En Croute
• Candy Land: Chocolate Cremieux
  
  

As is the case in all specialty dining restaurants, 20% gratuity is added automatically to your check.

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Le Petit Chef Menu Celebrity Ascent

Le Grand Bistro Main Menu

On the other hand, if you're craving a morning croissant or an afternoon croque monsieur then the a la carte menu is for you! 

In addition to always-available starters, soups, salads, entrees, sandwiches, charcuterie, and pastries you will find "Plats du Jour" (Dish of the day)

If one of these French classic tickles your fancy you will want to time your visit accordingly each special dish is only available on a set day of the week. 

Le Grand Bistro Menu Celebrity Ascent

Le Grand Bistro Cocktail, wine, and beverage menu

Sip in style with French cocktails and wines or a hand crafted espresso-based beverage. Prices range from $4 for a single espresso to 25 for a glass of Veuve Clicquot, Yellow Label Champagne.

Le Grand Bistro Dessert Menu

​All of the desserts and tarts at Le Grand Bistro cost $5 each and include the following tasty treats:
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• Crème brûlée 
• Profiteroles
• Floating Island
• Apple Tatin
• Old Fashion Chocolate Mousse
• Flan Parisien
• Apple Tart
• Normandie Tart

Dessert Menu at Le Grand Bistro

Le Grand Bistro To go Menu

Early in the day you will be delighted to see a counter full of freshly baked goods available for $2 a piece. The offerings may include:
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• Croissant
• Savory Loaf Focaccia
• Miniature Braids
• Demi Baguette
• Sourdough Loaf
• Madeleines of the Day
• Fougasse of the Day

To Go Menu at Le Grand Bistro

 

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Lunch Experience at Le Grand Bistro on Ascent

We decided to visit during lunch as we didn't want to miss dinner with our families in the main dining room. As the bistro was not especially crowded on the day of our visit, we chose to sit beside the window in order to enjoy the ocean views.

Dining by a huge window at Le Grand Bistro

​The meal started with our choice of bread and butter. In the main dining room you always receive a basket of assorted bread/rolls/etc and admittedly it did feel fancier to have the slices hand delivered at Le Grand Bistro. 
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The bread was really good and I wish the basket came back around during the meal without having to ask. 

French Cocktails - $12 + $17

The sommelier handles all beverage orders.

​Shown here are the Lemonade Provençal and Champs-Élysées. 

Lemonade Provençal - Fresh lemon juice, lavender, sage, thyme, rosemary, Plymouth Gin

Champs-Élysées - Cognac, Green Chartreuse, Fresh Lemon, Angostura

French Cocktails

Steak Frites - $24

Maître d'Hôtel Butter - a compound butter consisting of butter, salt, lemon, and parsley. 

Lobster Bisque - $10

Lobster Bisque with Tarragon and Puff Pastry - Peeling back the cute little puff pastry beret (lol) to show you the soup inside! 

By the way, have you ever wondered what the difference is between a soup and a bisque? I hadn't until just this very moment! In a nutshell, a bisque is a type of soup that has a thick, rick, creamy base and is traditionally  made with some sort of shellfish. These days non-seafood creamy soups are also called bisques.

Take for example the following food math equation: tomato soup + cream = tomato bisque. Voila!  

The perfect companion for soup is a salad, right?   We did, but didn't, end up with 2 salads. You will understand by the end. 
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Baby Arugula Salad - $8

Big fan of arugula over here as well as the beauty of simple ingredients that are well prepared making the best of bites!

This baby arugula salad had toasted pine nuts, balsamic vinaigrette and 3 deep fried balls of goat cheese more elegantly known as croquettes. 

After procuring this glamour shot we got to wondering where the pork belly was... and the poached egg? 

Baby Arugula Salad with Goat Cheese Croquettes

​Wait.. Was this even the salad we ordered. Oops. No it wasn't. ​Quickly the correct salad arrived. 
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Frisée Lardon Salad - $8

Featuring crispy pork belly, poached egg, pickled shallots and parmesan on curly endive, this salad was a treat. Perfectly poached, if you're team dippy-egg yoke then this picture will no doubt bring you joy. 

Lardon Salad

Perfectly Poached Egg

The whimsical texture and freshness of curly endive played nicely with the salty, fatty pork belly and the bright yellow yoke of the poached egg added a pleasing pop of color and richness. 
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Crème Brûlée - $5

Caramelized vanilla egg custard with fresh berries.

Creme Brûlée is a quintessential French dessert much loved by cruise passengers. You may never order it out back home, but on a cruise you can usually indulge in several of these during your voyage. 

Creme Brûlée at Le Grand Bistro

We decided to try the creme brûlée at Le Grand Chef because we genuinely wanted to know if it was different than the "free" creme brûlée available in the main dining room.

To complete the experiment we ordered creme brûlée at dinner in the main dining room that night and we can confirm that YES, it is different! ​When you are paying extra you want to know you are getting a different product, a better quality, an advanced technique, a personal touch.. 
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Make it at home:

While you can use your oven broiler to caramelize the sugar topping, it's way more fun to use a butane torch ;) 

​Chocolate Chip Cookie - $3

I've never been to France and I have no concept of what a French-style chocolate chip cookie should be like. For context, I'm an American who loves a chocolate chip cookie that has that little bit of crunch on the outside, a super chewy inside and the deep toffee notes that only come from the labor of love that is known as browning butter. 

When I ordered a $3 chocolate chip cookie I was envisioning a large bakery style cookie. I didn't expect it to be the cookie of my dreams, but I also didn't expect it to be this little fluffy nugget. lol

Chocolate Chip Cookie at Le Grand Bistro

This chocolate chip cookie was more on the cake-like side and it honestly wasn't my jam.

I was teetering on whether to order it or not but overhead a lady at the table next to me tell the waiter that they are the best chocolate chip cookies she has ever had and that she had been coming down to order one every day! That locked me in.

The fact that I didn't care for it just goes to show how everyone's tastes are different. There is no right or wrong when it comes to food, it's all preference. So take posts like this with a grain of salt. Read them through the lens of the preferences you know you have already.

​If you know you love cake-like cookies then go for this chocolate chip cookie! If you're not a fan of cake-y cookies then skip it (unless you just want to see for yourself which is also cool) and try a more French-y option like a Madeleine or a cherry danish! 

Mocha - $5

Espresso, fresh steamed milk, cocoa powder

Mocha on Celebrity Ascent

 

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Le Grand Bistro Ambience 

Le Grand Bistro is very cute "inside" with a decorative piece constructed of French style baking dishes, pots and pans. The walk up counter where you can order pastries and fresh baked bread along with an espresso pulled from the copper espresso machine is a lovely concept along with the seating "outside" mimicking European al fresco dining. 

It's important to note that just outside of le Grand Bistro is the Grand Plaza. Shown below is a view of the Martini Bar at night on the lower level of the Grand Plaza (deck 3) 

Because various activities and music take place in the Grand plaza, during the day time when the doors of Le Grand Bistro are open, you lose a bit of the cute French bistro vibes. Consider checking the daily schedule and booking your reservation strategically.

I was surprised that during our visit there was no French music playing in the bistro. I would have really enjoyed that as well as having some of the shoji doors closed to block out the distracting lights and activity of the plaza and turn up the French charm. ;) 
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LE Grand Bistro Review on Celebrity Ascent 

​Everything we ate at Le Grand Bistro was good, with the exception of the chocolate chip cookie that I found underwhelming based on my chocolate-chip-cookie-girl high standards.

We had steaks in the main dining room that rivaled the Steak Frites in Le Grand Bistro which is testimony to how good the food on Celebrity is. On the other hand, the salads and the lobster bisque were unique items we didn't see elsewhere during our cruise.

​The Frisee Lardon Salad was excellent and unique. I would order that again next time I dine at Le Grand Bistro. 
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More Celebrity Ascent Reviews:

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The baby arugula salad was taken away when we noted that we had been given the wrong salad and that was a bummer as we didn't get to try it to share our thoughts with you. I'm sure the waiter would have left it if we asked, but it happened so quickly that he shuttled it away in an effort to please us and bring the lardon salad asap. 

The Lobster Bisque was very tasty. The puff pastry top and fancy bowl are always fun. I just wish there was a touch more bisque and that the lobster meat was more prominent. 

Would you have ordered any of these dishes?
​If you dine at Le Grand Bistro on your next Celebrity Cruise, I'd love to hear your thoughts! 
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Thanks to Celebrity for hosting this meal. All opinions are my own.
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About this cruise:
On this 7 night Labadee & Cayman Cruise on Celebrity Ascent we sailed in an Infinite Veranda cabin. We visited the ports of Nassau, Perfect Day at Coco Cay, and Grand Cayman. Stops at Labadee were paused during this time period and exchanged for a Perfect Day visit. 

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