Concerto

I flew recently with Alitalia to Abu Dhabi and back and I was reasonably impressed with the catering. On the outbound flight there was a very light load, the crew were not stressed and service was excellent. I was served a copious meal tray in Classica (Economy Class) which consisted of a salad, fruit dessert and a very nice beef and potato dish. The cabin crew member serving me let me try the other meal option, pasta with spinach and ricotta, which was equally palatable. After he had finished serving, he remembered to bring me the pasta dish! The snack served prior to landing was a bit minimalist but pleasant enough, with a Madeleine and cookie on the small tray. Drinks were good with nice fruit juice (try the arancia rossa), decent enough wine for Economy and the usual tea, coffee and water.

The return flight consisted of a hot breakfast which was fair, with fruit and yoghurt, followed by a pre-landing snack with a nice beef sandwich.

Short haul flights are a different matter, however, with little offered except a small packet of biscuits even on a flight such as FCO-LCY with a block time of 2h40.

Any thoughts? If I can work of how to do so, I will post some photos.

R7U

Yes, Alitalia has nice catering service. I really like the red orange juice what they offer.

raistlin

You should try the long-haul Magnifica catering :-)

The only airline which matches it in my experience is Etihad.

ShopAround

My last AZ experience was not good. FCO-JFK last March in Classica Plus, the "pasta" was the most disgusting thing I've ever been served. Some sort of crepe-type thing with a thick, glue-like sauce and possibly vegetables buried in it, but I took one bite and gave up, I just couldn't eat it. I can get much better pasta at the Ciao Ristorante in the terminal and skip the nasty meal on board.

raistlin

Would that be, by any chance, a "Crespella"?
http://1.citynews-modenatoday.stgy.i...-salmone-2.jpg

ShopAround

It was similar to that but didn't look nearly as good (or taste as good as that might have)!

bungler

AZ catering is generally good on the longer routes but has sadly been downgraded on shorter routes over the years.

It's quite easy to know what you'll get on your flight:

Flight less than 3 hours (includes Kiev):
Choice of either sweet or salty snack + drink.
Alcohol only on international flights.

Flight longer than 3 hours (includes Casablanca) on n/b:
Cold meal on tray.

w/b flights shorter than about 11 hours:
Full meal after departure, small meal before landing.

w/b flights longer than 11 hours:
Meal after departure, mid-flight snack, and cold meal before arrival.


An excellent airline meal review website (with pics) is www.airlinemeals.net

orbitmic

Magnifica is very good. A few others are very good too, such as OS, TK, EY and QR, sometimes QF. For some reason, the only part which tends to be a bit less good in Magnifica are the mains, but it is also frequently the least interesting part of many meals in Italy, and typically, the starters and pasta dishes are truly excellent for airline food.

fly747first

Yes, blood orange juice very refreshing.

ajs123

I second this one!
What is the meal schedule on J flights short and medium haul flights?

ulxima

Because for the vast majority of Italians "Pasta" is traditionally the "Main" Course (and their flagship one)

Ciao
Ulxima

Concerto

The pasta I had was really quite good, considering it was airline pasta and in economy too. On European economy flights they serve little packets of biscuits from different regions of Italy (for example, Tarulli biscotti) with the drinks service. Maybe everybody else knows this, for I certainly didn't, but lemon was originally put in the water supply in Sicily to act as a disinfectant. That's the origin of the custom of putting a slice of lemon in water and other drinks, and this was explained on Alitalia's packets of Sicilian lemon biscuits!