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Virgin America Ranked No. 1 for Healthy Food

According to a new study, Virgin America has the healthiest airline food in the skies.

Charles Platkin at Diet Detective has again released his annual investigation of airline food, ranking each North American airline on the nutrient benefits of their meals. According to the study, Virgin America has the healthiest food in the air, thanks to a low calorie count of less than 400—the airline ranked at about 337 calories per digestible—for the average food item.

Second to Virgin is a tie between Delta and Air Canada, followed by Alaska Airlines and JetBlue. Delta, though, takes the prize for being the most improved over last year and may give Virgin a run for first place next year.

There were some bad eggs in the survey, though: Spirit and Frontier are at the bottom of the list, as they were last year. Neither airline appears to have nutrition information available for their food, or at least doesn’t share it with the media department.

“This has been a slow year in general for innovation in terms of healthy foods, transparency, and food consciousness (no GMOs, organic, lighter and sustainable foods),” Platkin said in his report. “Airlines other than Delta and Virgin America seem very slow to catch on to the food awareness that is going on around the country and around the world. I’d think it would be good business for them to provide better, healthier and more conscientious food.”

Overall the average calories per airline food choice have decreased over the last year, down from 400 to 392.

[Photo: Shutterstock]

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jonsg December 12, 2016

What's the calorie count got to do with healthiness in food? It might have low fat - but that fat could be saturated, and the meal could be filled with salt and sugars, whilst vitamins and vital minerals take a well-deserved holiday in other airlines' meals. To be fair, though, that's the FT article's emphasis; the actual report does take these things into account too.