P&O Cruises is set to continue its partnership with Barbados-based culinary talent for a second season, building on the Taste of Barbados programme introduced aboard Arvia and Britannia during winter 2025–26.
The extension keeps local food and drink at the heart of the line’s Caribbean offering. Rather than treating Barbados solely as an embarkation point, the programme has been designed to introduce guests to the island’s ingredients, traditions and contemporary dining scene while they are still aboard their ship.
Complete dates and the participant schedule for the second season have not yet been added to P&O Cruises’ public Taste of Barbados guide. The company’s published 2026–27 Caribbean flight programme does, however, confirm that both Arvia and Britannia will again operate fly-cruises in the region between October 2026 and March 2027.
How the first Taste of Barbados season worked
The original programme brought together chefs Sophie Michell, Damian Leach and Adrian Cumberbatch, alongside mixologist Shane McClean.
Aboard Arvia, the programme included appearances by the chefs, live cookery demonstrations, tastings and stories about Barbadian food. McClean created Caribbean cocktails to accompany the experience.
Britannia offered a different format. Michell curated a five-course Taste of Barbados dinner in The Cookery Club, hosted weekly during the ship’s Caribbean season. Both ships also served Barbadian dishes created by the participating chefs in the Horizon buffet, making the collaboration available beyond limited-capacity hosted events.
The chefs brought distinct perspectives to the project. Michell, a British-born chef who lives in Barbados, is the owner of farm-to-table restaurant Local & Co. Cumberbatch is the chef behind Follow de Smoke in Bridgetown, while Leach runs Cocktail Kitchen in St Lawrence Gap and is known locally as the Breadfruit Man. Their involvement gave the programme a direct connection to Barbados’ working restaurant community.
More than a celebrity-chef partnership
Cruise lines frequently use well-known chefs to shape menus and speciality restaurants, but Taste of Barbados takes a more destination-led approach. Its strength lies in inviting local culinary figures to interpret their own island rather than asking an international name to create a broadly Caribbean menu.
That makes the experience relevant even for guests who have visited Barbados before. Dishes based on cassava, breadfruit, macaroni pie and other Bajan staples can provide an accessible introduction to the island’s food culture, while the chefs’ restaurants offer passengers somewhere to continue exploring ashore.
The partnership also fits the way P&O Cruises operates from Bridgetown. With passengers joining and leaving the ships in Barbados, locally created menus can help connect the onboard experience with the destination from the beginning of the holiday.
What is confirmed for the second season?
The continuation of the Barbados chef partnership has been reported for a second season, and Arvia and Britannia are confirmed for P&O Cruises’ winter 2026–27 Caribbean programme. However, the line’s public-facing Taste of Barbados information still describes the first-season format.
P&O Cruises has not yet published a complete online calendar identifying which chefs will appear on individual 2026–27 sailings, whether every original participant will return, or which hosted dinners and demonstrations will be available on each ship. Those details should therefore be checked against the line’s updated pre-cruise information and onboard programme once released.
Even with that timetable still to come, extending the concept is a welcome move. The first season showed how a cruise line can use its dining programme to give local chefs a meaningful platform while offering passengers a stronger sense of the destination.
Sources and further information: P&O Cruises: A Taste of Barbados; Taste of Barbados programme launch; P&O Cruises’ winter 2026–27 Caribbean programme; and Original Barbados chef partnership announcement.