Silver Star: dining same as Cap Limited?

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Not even close to true. The Dining car food is re-heated in a convection oven, which is what is used in many chain restaurants to re-heat "pre-prepped" entrees. Many of the items are reheated on the grill. The dining car also serves fresh made entree salads that are much better than the pre-packaged ones you get in the cafe. I'm not saying the dining car is 5-star food, but it's WAY more than just presentation.
OK sorry for saying "microwaved". It is mostly reheated stuff. The point is very few things are prepared in the Dining Car kitchen. And BTW, in my experience, the pre-packaged salads in the Contemporary Boxes are uniformly better than anything I have ever had in an Amtrak Dining Car of late. I have not had a pre-packaged salad from the Cafe of late, so can't comment on that.
 
I have yet to try the contemporary dining food so I can't comment on that. The cafe salads on the regional trains / acela can be pretty decent but the last one I got on the Silver Star was cheap gas station quality.

"mostly reheated" means what? The burgers come pre-cooked but aren't they reheated on the grill? Same for the french toast, crab cakes etc.

The Salmon is cooked to order I think ? as well as the steak. Baked Potatoes are cooked on board. The sides are just reheated but that's typical of most restaurants... heat em up in the convection oven and keep em warm on the steam table. I guess the chicken may just be reheated? Salads are prepared on board as much as you can prepare a salad? Eggs are freshly made on board (I've seen that myself on the single level diners) So what's left? The pasta dishes are just re-heated... and they are some of the less great dishes usually... some of the specialty dishes may just be reheated as well.

Edit to say - I'm in no way saying Amtrak dining is the best it can be. I just really get annoyed when people say things that are totally not true. AFAIK nothing in the traditional Amtrak dining cars are microwaved.
 
I’m just saying the electrical load can support it I’m not a proponent of it. Actually it wasn’t a private car but a car on an museum trip with Amtrak wiring.
 
I did not say (or at least did not intend to say) anything was totally not true. I only said it was partially not true. Intentionally or otherwise as a matter of reflex, try to give the impression that everything is cooked fresh in the Diner, and that is not true. That is my only point.

I do not believe BTW that the Salmon is cooked to order. All my attempts to get it a little less cooked has been in vain so far, because it comes pre-cooked.

AFAIK the Steak (and possibly the burger) is finished on board and the breakfast eggs and stuff are cooked on the grill, though only preparations from pre-prepared egg mix are available. No eggs over easy or anything like that. I have also never succeeded in getting a burger done medium, but that may be just me.
 
The burgers come pre-cooked but are re-heated on the grill (I think). The eggs come on board as eggs, that I have seen with my own eyes on the single level diners. The reason you can only get them scrambled / omlette is to make things easier for the one cook on board. Back when you could get eggs served any style there were 2 cooks in the kitchen (we all thought the sky was falling when they cut it down to 1 cook! Just shows it can always get worse.) ha.

But all of this is not my point... I agree much of the dining car food is partially pre-prepared and simply re-heated on board. But the dining car uses restaurant style methods (convection oven, grill, etc.) while the cafe car is literally just microwaving your food.

You said the difference was mostly the plating / presentation. That, in my opinion, is not true.

I'll also add my opinion that re-heating is not at all the issue. The best meals I've ever had on a train were the Lamb Shank and the Mahi Mahi filets on Amtrak from about 8 years ago. I'm sure the Lamb was pre-prepared and reheated on board.. not sure about the Mahi Mahi. Either way they were prepared in current amtrak kitchens with the current limited 1 cook staff. Both of these dishes were consistently good on multiple trains. These dishes were better than anything I've had on VIA Rail or the IPH Pullman trains or for that matter private varnish / dinner trains. So Amtrak is fully capable, with current dining cars and current staffing, to provide good quality food.
 
I'll be riding this train to Tampa with bus connection to St Petersburg in June. Is food service for sleeping car passengers the same as on the Capitol Limited?

Update: After the comments I read I took my own food. Took a look at what was offered in the cafe - garbage. Couldn't they at least offer "Contemporary" meals like the Lake Shore or Capitol? The cheese platter is good. Sleeping car attendant told me that many passengers are shocked to discover there is no dining car.
 
Hope you enjoyed your trip.
Interesting people are still shocked after all this time.
The lack of Contemporary meals on the Sliver Star indicates to me Amtrak is cutting service and not trying to update the service levels. If they put back the dinner on the Sliver Star then you would be hard pressed to argue it was just a cut.
Adding one car, and one employee is a bridge to far for Amtrak.
 
Update: After the comments I read I took my own food. Took a look at what was offered in the cafe - garbage. Couldn't they at least offer "Contemporary" meals like the Lake Shore or Capitol? The cheese platter is good. Sleeping car attendant told me that many passengers are shocked to discover there is no dining car.

That's good you did that, for Silver Star. I'll also warn that if you ride the Cardinal(NYC to Chicago, via DC, Charlottesville, West Virginia, northern Kentucky, Cincy, Indy to Chicago), that it ONLY has a cafe car but no dining car. So before riding Cardinal, I was glad I decided to bring my own food before riding that train. I will note if you're riding Card, that I noticed in Indianapolis that there are a lot of vending machines downstairs in the Amtrak/Greyhound waiting area you could use, if you're unsatisfied with the cafe car food. Also if you were extremely quick(the layover is longer for #51 going west, vs. #50 if it's going east. also DON'T do this, if the stretch stop is cut too short at Indy), you could run kitty corner to a nearby White Castle, to get food to go.

I remember hearing about the no dining car situation on Star, and I wish Amtrak would remedy this somehow. Maybe at the minimum, via adding contemporary dining?
 
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