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Old Jul 16, 2012, 10:05 pm
  #5  
Zoui21
 
Join Date: Nov 2011
Location: SFO-JFK
Programs: AA PLT; SPG GLD; HLT GLD
Posts: 87
Part 4.The made-me-drool-to-think-about business class itself!
July 3rd, 2012
London Heathrow-Washington Dulles
United Airlines Business Class
Boeing 767-300ER


I headed down the walkway, and the crew greeted me with a smile and pointed out the location of my seat for me. I stowed my carry-on in the overhead bins taking out only my headphones knowing the ones provided would most likely be worse than I expect them to be. I have yet to experience Lufthansa’s First Class, or American’s Business/First noise-cancelling Bose headphones. The grin on my face showed up again when my jacket was offered to be taken, I’m just not used to this yet!


A photo of my new view, except this time for a lengthy 7.5 hours. I stil wish it was longer!

One of the reasons why I fell in love with business class last time I flew it wasn’t the service or the seat, it was because I managed to have an interesting conversation about the world with my seatmate. Of course the aging businessman wasn’t planning on schooling a 10 year old in a debate, so we had an interesting conversation about current events and why I was so interested in it. This may be nothing much to most of you, however a stranger talking with you on a serious subject at that age was impressionable.

My seatmate this time managed to reach expectations, but not surpass them. People argue that having a 2-2-2 configuration in business class is a bad thing as it forces awkward situations when trying to leave the window seat. But they don’t account that it allows me to be staring out a window, while also having an interesting conversation.

The man was flying back home to his family in Colorado after a longer-than-expected stay in London for business. We exchanged opinions on flying United, but it seemed those were the bounds of this conversation. At least I managed to cheer him up by explaining he would get this plane all the way through to Colorado as it was the same flight number throughout. I can understand that he was most likely focused on the work he had to start, so as the subject sizzled, I took out my headphones and sat patiently in my seat, hoping the captain would turn on Channel 9, but the jazz music suggested it was of no avail, so I browsed for a movie.

Menus were handed out pre-taxiing and when we pushed off the purser walked around the cabin greeting us all by name (however she managed to get me and my consultant acquaintance mixed up) and taking our orders for breakfast and lunch.

The menu given out was minimalistic, but I find that because there’s less, that doesn’t mean it’s not better. The contrasts of brown, grey and silver played well on the cover, but it seems that United’s placement of anise and cinnamon on it were just for the colours. I began browsing the menu, giving some props to United for writing one of the “Welcome on Board” sentences in Russian. It seems that anyone flying to IAD/ORD from LHR in the month of July would receive the following menu:


The Complementing Colours of the Menu

Breakfast
Starter
Croissant with Butter and Apricot Preserves

Strawberry Yoghurt

Fresh Fruit

Main Course
Mushroom and Spinach Omelette
Breakfast potatoes, chicken sausage, ham, asparagus, grilled tomato

Chilled Deli Selection
Smoked salmon, Gruyere cheese, honey ham, salami, asparagus and egg wedge

Cereal and Banana
Served with milk



Featured Champagne and Wines
Champagne
Paul Dangin Brut NV, Champagne

White Wine
Burgans Albarino 2009, Rias Baixas, Spain

Chateau St. Jean Chardonnay 2010, Carneros

Kunde Estate-Bottled Chardonnay 2010, Sonoma Valley

Red Wine
Santa Duc - AOP Les Buissons Cairanne 2010, Cotes du Rhone Villages

Cosentino The Cab 2009, California

Trapiche Broquel Malbec 2009, Argentina


Lunch
Chilled Appetizer
Marinated Salmon, Shrimp-on-a-stick, Mango Chutney

Fresh Seasonal Greens
Tomato, dried cherries, mini fruit and croutons with your choice of creamy tropical fruit dressing or balsamic vinaigrette

Main Course
Pan-seared Steak
Red wine sauce, chanterelle mushroom-onion medley, potatoes, broccoli and carrots

Tandoori Breast of Chicken
Coriander-tomato sauce, saffron rice pilaf

Indian-spiced Shrimp
Spiced tomato sauce, basmati rice and julienned vegetables

Pici Pasta
Tomato-basil sauce and vegetable-mushroom medley with Parmesan cheese

To Finish
International Cheese Selection
Grapes and crackers served with Noval Fine Ruby Port

Dessert
Ice cream with your choice of toppings

Interestingly enough, the crew was ex-Continental, so when my seatmate asked for the Executive service that was listed on the menu, she said that they didn’t really do it, and it was “more of a United thing” that was being discontinued. This is most likely quite a hit for people who want to maximize the amount of sleep on the plane, so hopefully it was just a misinformed purser.

Although she informed him it wasn’t done anymore, she still requested it for him on the clipboard she wrote the orders on. She did warn him that she didn’t guarantee it being done and I later saw that the crew more-or-less disregarded the request.


Just feel like I should point out the Executive Dining option is on the menu. She may have been wrong.

Our BusinessFirst amenity kits were given out prior to push-off. I have no real comparison to other kits, therefore I will tell you that in my opinion, it seems good. It had some useful elements to it such as the fact that it had a pen, something I always forget to bring with me when I fly.


Just after being handed out. Still in the wrapper! It contained some info on the skin products

The kit contained a Comb, Earplugs, an Eyeshade, Floss, Hand Lotion, Hand Sanitizer, Lip Balm, a Mint, a Pen, a United Promotional card, Socks, Tissues, Toothpaste and a Towelette. The hand lotion, towelette and lip balm are made by philosophy. To sum it up, definitely better than anything I’ve gotten in economy!



A couple of snapshots of the amenity kit’s contents

We pushed off in time for out 7:55 am departure, and the dreary safety video, involving Mr.Smisek himself, was played. The Captain informed us that the flight would in fact come in 25 minutes earlier than scheduled. I quietly groaned hearing this, as it meant that my time in business class decreased and the time doing nothing in IAD increased. As it later turned out, the 25 extra minutes in IAD were not that bad at all. We sped down Heathrow’s frequently-used asphalt and the wind thrust our bird into the sky.

After we took off, beverages were served quickly. Having my Diet Coke served in an actual glass was a feature of flying I wasn’t used to. A little ramekin of mixed nuts was provided and having a wide selection is a little thing, but it’s appreciated. I still have a glimmer of hope that one day airlines will revert back to plain-old salted peanuts (highly unlikely due to the amount of people allergic to even the smell).


The casual, nutritious pre-breakfast Diet Coke. A simple piece of lime, but it’s the little things that put business in such a different category to economy (there are big things as well)

As they began serving breakfast, I muddled with my seat to find the perfect position. For any of you interested, I found that in terms of comfort, it was the seat back slightly reclined and the leg rest at full-flat position. I tried the massage feature of the chair as well, but it felt like someone behind you was pressing their knees into your kidneys, so I quickly turned off the silly feature.

The white table cloth was laid out, and I prepared to get a wide array of small plates. Initially, I miss-prepared as it was just the hot towels coming around. After the dreary, cold English summer weather, a warm towel hit the spot well.

I got an initial clutter of a croissant, strawberry yoghurt. The fact that they were placed on a tray didn’t bother me too much, however I found that the cloth on the tray was such a wretched colour and material. United definitely needs to look into some design work for their for their food presentation as I was disappointed that the salt and pepper shakers as well. They were so pale and basic; there was blatantly no attempt on making them look nice and a plastic cover on top of them made the meal service seem that much closer to Economy (I reiterate that it’s the little things that count).


The unlisted continental starter. Good thing the food was better than the presentation.

This continental-esque appetiser was great, although I wished that they had a preserve other than apricot. I guess United is keen on apricots as it was the only one available? It didn’t matter, instead I ripped pieces of the croissant and dipped them in the yoghurt, turned out to be better, especially since I’d already had a croissant, normal-style, back at the lounge. The fresh fruit was great, truly fresh, one of the few times I’ve had mango and it was the perfect proportion of sweetness-to-sourness. I hoped it was a good sign for food to come, as you don’t get good fruit on a plane often. I was happy about the freshness of the fruit and even pointed it out to the flight attendant serving us, she just shrugged off the compliment though.

In foolishness, I ordered the Mushroom and Spinach Omelette option as my main breakfast option. Oh how much I regretted it looking over at my neighbours deli-plate. The eggs were mediocre, and the mushroom and spinach stuffing was inedible because of the sheer amount of salt that was in it. The bacon was alright as was the chicken sausage. The potatoes were edible even though they weren’t crispy enough. The tomato and asparagus were way overcooked and I didn’t even try to finish them. Thinking back, I should have either requested to change to the deli-plate if possible or just asked if they had another portion of the continental part of breakfast.


The grossly over-salted omelette and barely up-to-par accompaniments.

Even though the breakfast was sub-par, United’s seat was definitely the best airplane seat I’ve ever been on, that said I’ve only been in economy and an angled lie-flat on Austrian. Of course I dream of one day experiencing a true first-class seat (something like Singapore or Emirates, definitely not United as it seems from this forum)!

After the meal service had ended I requested from a flight attendant that I was woken up for Lunch as otherwise this TR would be missing a pretty big chunk. The FA’s handed out water bottles, and I reclined my seat to lie-flat and listened to some jazz which smoothly eased me into hibernation. United’s big pillows were great, I thought I read someone said they got worse? I can’t really imagine them being that much better.
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