A Gourmet Diversion. Savory Snapshots From 30,000 Feet.
March 20, 2023
HERE ARE some pictures of airline food. Pardon such a vapid diversion, but most aviation news these days is depressing. Plus, I’m hungry.
Before the coronavirus madness began, we’d reached a point where the food in international premium class could rival that of a fancy restaurant. Carriers took pride in their onboard product: the food itself, the presentation, choreography — the whole indulgent kabuki of premium class, from the menus to each carrier’s signature cutlery. It could be pretentious, but always fun.
The pandemic wiped that out, but things have slowly bounced back. An airplane ride no longer feels like a medical evacuation and flight attendants have stopped dressing like the firemen at Chernobyl.
Here, in no special order, are some examples. New and old, fancy and not so fancy. I’ll be adding to the list as my photo archives cough up forgotten snapshots. And, hopefully, through future travels.
These weren’t employee freebies. I’ve spent a lot of money on these seats. Maybe let me flex a little…
Philippine Airlines
A business class meal aboard a Philippine Airlines A330, Singapore to Manila. Adequate if underwhelming. This was a three-hour, intra-Asia service; presumably the airline’s long-haul routes have a more lavish spread. Not visible are my second and third helpings of garlic bread. Yum.
China Airlines
The upper photo shows a business class dinner en route from Taipei to Amsterdam. The cabin decor on this Airbus A350 was strikingly handsome, gold highlights and elegant wood tones. The food was less impressive, and they were super stingy with the wine. The lower pic showcase the carrier’s shorter-haul service on the A330.
South African Airways
Economy class dinner on the quick hop from Lusaka, Zambia, to Johannesburg. The second pic beholds one of the sadder things I’ve seen on a plane. Believe it or not, this was the business class vegetarian entree, served on the Johannesburg-Victoria Falls route. Click here for a detailed review of this flight.
Qatar Airways
Qatar’s business class food is arguably the best in the world. What you see here is the short-haul version, served on a two-hour flight from Doha to Yerevan, Armenia. Keep scrolling for a peek at long-haul.
Sky Airline
Sky Airline (there is no “s”) is a Chilean carrier, and this was the economy meal on a 737 between Santiago and Punta Arenas. Let’s just say that I loved the paper tray liner, and leave it there. The green plastic silverware was a curious and, some would say, unappetizing touch.
Sri Lankan Airlines
A beautiful little menu to whet your appetite on the way from Bangkok to Colombo. The meal itself was standard economy fare. Maybe the best thing you can say about economy class food is to call it “uneventful,” and this was no exception. The seat-pocket magazine is called Seredib — a sanskrit term from which the word “seredepity” comes from.
Drukair
One of Bhutan’s two airlines, Drukair flies smaller planes and offers a limited, if tasty business class menu. Here you see the lunch options on the daily run from Paro to Bangkok. This flight is further reviewed here.
Qatar Airways
Here are the promised long-haul shots. Qatar’s business menu is on-demand, meaning you order whatever you want, whenever you want it. There’s no scripted service, per se, with trays and carts coming down the aisle. These are some of the appetizer or “lite bite” options — a delicious soup, a mezze platter, and a couple of mini-burgers — plus a wonderful dessert.
Korean Air
This was first class from Incheon to Bangkok in one of Korean’s inter-Asia 747s with an older configuration that is no longer used. Notice the pull-out style entertainment screen and non-sleeper seat. Talk about slumming it! And if that noodle concoction looks a little too sloppy and greasy, it was.
Singapore Airlines
For whatever reason, I failed to keep any photos of the business class delectables I enjoyed one night on the long ride from Singapore to Amsterdam. Instead I have this less interesting picture from a shorter flight. This is what you get on an A330 between Singapore and Japan.
Kenya Airways
Bangkok to Hong Kong with Kenya Airways. A decent lunch and a can of Tusker. What’s not to like? And although you can’t see it here, this airline provides the world’s most luxurious fleece blankets. The crew even let me abscond with one, and today it resides on my couch. What they didn’t have, at least on this vintage 767 (since retired), is an entertainment system. I spent several perplexed minutes trying to locate my screen before realizing there wasn’t one.
Thai Airways
On the red-eye from Bangkok to Incheon. Another satisfying if unspectacular economy dinner.
Air Malta
Like the aforementioned Drukair, Air Malta operates only narrow-body planes on shorter routes (pictured is Heathrow to Valetta), and they do what they can with limited time and space. This involves some improvising, such as folding down the center seat to create a kind of instant business class. The result, all things considered, is surprisingly pleasant. Read more about it here.
Emirates
Emirates first class is… well. You’re looking at flights to Mauritius, Johannesburg, and Phuket. Similar to Qatar Airways, this is dine-on-demand, and you’re free to mix and match entrees, appetizers, and desserts to your heart’s content. We start with a welcome-aboard glass of Dom Perigean; then we see a mezze appetizer spread (yes that’s an appetizer), a shockingly delicious chicken biryani, and a tuna dish. Flying out of Johannesburg, I was intrigued by the ostrich filet (see the menu photo), but the pesto ravioli was tempting too. My cabin attendant prepared both. All the while, there’s a snack basked on your console. Mind you this is first class; Emirates business is a lot less lavish.
Battle of the Bars
The Airbus A380s at Emirates and Qatar both have onboard lounges. Qatar’s is situated in the center of the upper-deck. The Emirates version is also upstairs, but in the back, behind business class. Emirates also has an exclusive upper-deck bar only for first class customers, located at the forward bulkhead between the shower spas. The lounge is staffed by a bartender, while the forward bar is serve-yourself.
Tea Time
At the top, tea service on Qatar. On Emirates, the forward bar is taken down prior to arrival and a tea station is arranged in its place, backdropped by ornamental stones and waterfall. I mean, it’s hardly an airplane without rocks and a waterfall.
The Quiet Americans
Looking at those photos from the Gulf carriers, it’s easy to see that none of this is fair. Competing with heavily subsidized, government-owned airlines is pretty much impossible for American, European, and even most Asian carriers. Which isn’t to say their onboard products aren’t good. My photo collection doesn’t show it, but I’ve experienced most of them, and they hold their own. We’ve come a long way since the early 2000s, when broken seats, lousy food and terrible service were the standard.
Going back to 2019, before the COVID fiasco re-set the clock, the clear U.S. winner was Delta. Its international business class, now branded as Delta One, offered good food and an elegant, choreographed presentation with appetizer, soup, and dessert courses all delivered separately. It was a professional and gracious experience that United and American didn’t match even with bigger planes. Heck, it even blew Emirates’ business away. Delta also has the world’s best inflight entertainment system.
None of the U.S. carriers have returned quite to where they were pre-pandemic, but it’s not by accident that Delta keeps earning most of the passenger choice awards.
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19 Responses to “A Gourmet Diversion. Savory Snapshots From 30,000 Feet.”
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I still crave the flavor of the Coquille St. Jacques that American Airlines used to serve in a scallop shell, long ago. They also served one of the best seafood omlettes I’ve ever eaten.
Wardair, a defunct Canadian airline, served steak on Royal Doulton china. I remember there being a vast desert tray. That was in economy class. Great airline.
Maybe I’m easy to please, or just plain unsophisticated but think some of the simpler services look and sound the most appetizing. The Qatar on-demand business class offerings look the best to me. Sometimes “less is more”, as the saying goes.
(But then, there was American’s abysmal “bistro bag” service on their DFW-ORD runs).
Having gotten accustomed to the service on domestic flights in the US, it’s always a pleasant surprise when I’m traveling in another part of the world and actually get a complementary meal in economy on a short flight. Like Zanzibar to Addis Ababa on Ethiopian in 2016. Unfortunately I was feeling a bit ill and didn’t have much of an appetite, probably due to the fish I’d eaten the previous night, which might not have been the freshest.
Maybe it’s just the purple mood lighting, but the Qatar bar kind of reminds me of the “Ten Forward” bar on the Enterprise in Star Trek: The Next Generation.
My most memorable in-flight dining experience (emphasis on the word experience)? “Dinner” on an Aeroflot flight from Moscow (Domodedovo Airport) to Irkutsk on a Tupolev TU-154 in 1993. First Course: “Juice” (its origin is questionable, but it looked something akin to that which came out of my 1976 AMC Hornet radiator when it was flushed). The “juice” was served in reusable plastic cups that looked like they had not been washed since Lenin’s time. I passed on the “juice”. Second Course: “Chicken”. Whatever species of animal(?) this was I will not even fathom a guess as the bone of this “chicken” was so long that it extended to my friend’s seat (and we had the middle seat empty between the two of us!). My curiosity got the better part of me, but in trying to wrestle the thing to cut, I had second thoughts…I could not afford to get any intestinal illness or be hospitalized in Siberia. So, I whipped out my carry-on a bottle of water, some peanut butter crackers and my trustworthy can of Cheez Whiz and I was set to go. Yes, people stared…but they were also licking their lips at the same time. Yes, in-flight dining can be really fun…for all the other reasons too!
Dear Patrick
If I could upload a photo i would include a menu from the Air France Concorde flight on January 30, 1978, from Washington to Paris. The one cabin seating was of course cramped, but Air France did, as one would expect, put on quite a nice meal. To get over water quickly the pilots crossed the Atlantic coast quite far south — then the nose went up, the afterburners went on and the cabin mach meter crept up to 2. Then dinner.
I join you in appreciation of the Qatar business class menu, but Taiwan’s EVA remains my favorite. And I also appreciate Delta for a US carrier — far superior to American, United, BA or JAL in business class. I can’t say i’m very fond of Delta’s frequent flyer program though.
Perhaps I’ll be with you on a Delta flight when we reach the far side of the pandemic. Meanwhile I’m appreciating askthepilot.com. Dean
Okay. THIS is my favorite Patrick Smith column.
I don’t remember the food but our kitchen spices are still kept on the little wooden tray that my first ever meal on an airplane came on: TAP Air Portugal 707, Dublin-Faro, 1982. Being the first time, everything about that flight was a novelty. I remember asking the stewardess afterwards if we could keep the tray. I don’t think I would bother with most of the plastic trays I’ve had since.
I love that even in the super fancy Emirates first class, you *still* get a tiny bag of Penn State pretzels.
Lol. Good observation.
As a mostly economy-class flier, it’s the bad meals that stand out. The OK ones are less memorable.
China Eastern is pretty good these days, but in the 90s it was not. On a flight from Shenzhen to Shanghai, I got a brown thing. It looked like a poo. It smelled… like a poo. I asked the FA what it was.
“It’s fermented minced fishbone sausage,” she said. I asked whether that was some sort of local speciality I’d never heard of. “No,” she said. “We have to serve a meal containing protein. This is the cheapest packaged protein that’s legal for human consumption in China. Whatever you do, don’t eat it. It’s awful.”
I took her advice.
Sichuan Airlines is weird. On a flight from Chongqing to Sydney, a forgettable meal was served. After we’d eaten, the FAs walked down the aisle, handing something white from a basket to each passenger using serving tongs. On other airlines, it would be ice cream or something, so I got my hopes up. When the FA got to my row, she handed me….. 1/4 of a boiled potato. Obviously.
You could tell the first-time flyers. They’d be the ones turning to their partners and saying, “Oh, yes, you always get 1/4 of a boiled potato after your meal on a flight.” Regular Sichuan Airlines flyers had turned down the offer. And regular fliers on their first Sichuan Airlines flight, like me, just stared at their 1/4 potatoes in bewilderment.
Patrick, you’re a tad too young to know this, but the food on Pan Am’s first class was, in its day, the best in the airline industry.
Thank you for sharing your in-flight meal photos. What a fun and refreshing diversion from the endless misery to which we are now subjected!
you have more experience flying all types of international airlines than anyone ive met, and i know a few. how many different airlines have flown on? I have flown 60 different airlines but i suspect you have me handily beat. is your menu collection growing? most seem to be newer, most of kine older(186 menus and counting)-there are airline nerds but none that I know of have flown such a varied array of carriers
If you think this food is good, you should try the food on trains. 😉
It’s funny how $25 of food can make us think the premium price of a flight is worth it!
My best meals were on Cathay Pacific (green curry—long ago), Alaska Air (3 or 4 years ago—something with salmon–and they used to have the most thoughtful snacks), and Turkish Air (2012: not recalling dish–they actually paraded the chef, wearing a chef hat, down the aisle).
Yes, the Turkish Airlines “chef.” As I understand it, it’s actually a flight attendant who receives some extra galley training and gets to wear a toque.
I’ve flown Turkish a few times. My last time was a two-leg journey and quite disappointing. On the plane, in the lounge, at the gate… every employee I encountered was surly and mean. I had better luck with them domestically, on flights within Turkey.
And it’s not “$25 worth of food.” I’ve enjoyed $100 bottles of port in first class. It’s the food, the wine, the lounges, the service, the seat, the entertainment, the chef in his silly hat, the slippers and pajamas…
I’m an airline nerd. I love the whole theater of it. This is what I spend my money on. Some people are into fancy cars or designer clothes. I enjoy traveling, and I especially enjoy the getting there part.
I miss Southwest’s peanuts.
Sadly, I’ll never have the First Class experience on any of these airlines, so these fine pix will have to do.
The blog “Why is this Interesting” recently had a spread I think readers here would find… interesting? It details the author’s long interest in United Airlines.
https://whyisthisinteresting.substack.com/p/why-is-this-interesting-the-friendly