Asiana Club - JFK-ICN-HKG F Food

Does anyone here have recent experience with the food in F out of JFK?

I'm not a fan of beef, shellfish, or raw fish, all of which seem to be somewhat prominent in the small amount of info I've seen about OZ menus. I do like Korean food, so something like bibimbap without the beef is fine with me. I'm just wondering if it's all steak and lobster out of JFK or is there a greater variety? I know I can't order the really special meals flying in this direction, but are there any alternates I should consider asking OZ for in advance?

I'm less concerned about the ICN-HKG leg, since I'll probably be stuffed with lounge food by the time I get on the plane.

Very timely OP, and I too would love to know the answer to the above, as I am scheduled to fly JFK-ICN-HKG in F in a couple of weeks time!

I also look forward to hearing what menu selections and wine/champagne options are available in OZ F. I will be flying ICN-LAX in July (F), and am hoping that I don't get the 1 OLD 747 with outdated seats! Are there any ways to ensure that you won't be on the old bird?

Does anyone here have recent experience with the food in F out of JFK?

I'm not a fan of beef, shellfish, or raw fish, all of which seem to be somewhat prominent in the small amount of info I've seen about OZ menus. I do like Korean food, so something like bibimbap without the beef is fine with me. I'm just wondering if it's all steak and lobster out of JFK or is there a greater variety? I know I can't order the really special meals flying in this direction, but are there any alternates I should consider asking OZ for in advance?

I'm less concerned about the ICN-HKG leg, since I'll probably be stuffed with lounge food by the time I get on the plane.

For JFK-ICN, the departure time is similiar to ORD-ICN, the menus may not be so different than ORD-ICN at all. Steak and bibimbap definately will be two of the choices, lobster ? maybe/maybe not, your third choice is probably a salad.

You are not going to be stuffed from the lounge food at all at ICN, the food in the F lounge at ICN is ok, but on the light side, eggs, small pieces of meat, porridge. There are cook-to-order noodles soup, unless you speak Korean, hard to explain to the attendant what you want, as there is no sign anywhere mentioned that at all, but locals knows about it.

Have a look at my trip report, than you will have an idea. OZ is not airline change menus frequently like CX and SQ, you may get served the exact same menus as I did.

http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/asiana-club/922804-oz-long-haul-f-intra-asia-c-trip-report-jan-feb-09-a.html

You are not going to be stuffed from the lounge food at all at ICN, the food in the F lounge at ICN is ok, but on the light side, eggs, small pieces of meat, porridge. There are cook-to-order noodles soup, unless you speak Korean, hard to explain to the attendant what you want, as there is no sign anywhere mentioned that at all, but locals knows about it.

Nice to know they can cook to order. I was planning to ask about that but didn't really have the need yet. Steamed rice would be nice so I'll have to ask if it's available this week on my next trip out of ICN.

I've been stuffed in all but one of my visits to the F lounge. Just yesterday, they had lobster tail thermidor, which I thought was excellent, as well as lamb. Those two dishes, plus lots of sushi and strawberries was more than enough for me. But then I guess my tastes aren't very refined. I grew up eating my mother's cooking nearly everyday, and very rarely ate out. Even in my adult life I don't go for expensive restaurants very often so I guess even many plain dishes are more than enough to satisfy me. With that said, I'm not a big breakfast eater, and I've never been to the F lounge in the morning, which apparently is what you're referring to, so don't know if I'd be satisfied at that time of day or not.

Nice to know they can cook to order. I was planning to ask about that but didn't really have the need yet. Steamed rice would be nice so I'll have to ask if it's available this week on my next trip out of ICN.

I've been stuffed in all but one of my visits to the F lounge. Just yesterday, they had lobster tail thermidor, which I thought was excellent, as well as lamb. With that said, I'm not a big breakfast eater, and I've never been to the F lounge in the morning, which apparently is what you're referring to, so don't know if I'd be satisfied at that time of day or not.

Yep, they have cook-to-order udon and rice noodles soup as far as I can see other Koreans were having, maybe they have more items, but I don't know about it.

I was referring to the F lounge in the morning, as the OP was asking about arrving to ICN from JFK. However, my return flight to ORD was in the evening, didn't see any lobster (about 6pm) at all, all I saw is some fried fish filet.

They change the menu everyday I think. That was the second time I had the lobster. I've also seen the fried fish fillet there at least twice. I'll try to remember next time I'm there to ask how many menu items they have to rotate.

ORDnHKG, thanks for the info. From the pic in your trip report it looks like the bibimbap without beef would be an easy request for the crew to handle. The banana crepe looks good, I hope they have that on my flight.

My trip is in 2 weeks, so when I call OZ this week to see if I can move forward from 3A to 2A or 1A, I'll see if they have specific menus for the JFK-ICN flight.

ORDnHKG, thanks for the info. From the pic in your trip report it looks like the bibimbap without beef would be an easy request for the crew to handle. The banana crepe looks good, I hope they have that on my flight.

My trip is in 2 weeks, so when I call OZ this week to see if I can move forward from 3A to 2A or 1A, I'll see if they have specific menus for the JFK-ICN flight.

Not sure if they will remove the beef for you, as it is a rather odd request, since you are flying in F, you may actually ask for a C menus to see if anything without beef, of course that has to be when C is not full.

Calling may not be too ideal especially with OZ, as I found none of the agents has not much knowledge about the menus, you can request special meal, but not about the choices, unless you are dealing with local OZ office in person.

They change the menu everyday I think. That was the second time I had the lobster. I've also seen the fried fish fillet there at least twice. I'll try to remember next time I'm there to ask how many menu items they have to rotate.

They change the menus everyday ?

Oh I think I had mistaken you talking about inflight menus than the F lounge food. But I do think the fish fillet in the F lounge is a rather regular item, as when I was there 3 years ago in the old F lounge, they had the same thing too. I doubt OZ will put lobster in the lounge all the times instead of inflight, as in flight lobster dish almost wipe out.

I have a trip report with pictures of all the food I ate HKG-ICN-JFK-ICN-HKG abeit this was Jan 2007 though.....

I just flew OZ 221 (JFK-ICN) last Friday. "The Lounge" (F side) in JFK was better then expected. I was not expecting much. Service was very professional and friendly and we had 3 different items on the menu (pasta and meatballs, caesar salad and something else). Plenty of soft drinks liquor beer and a couple of wine choices. Not fabulous but not bad.
Food choices on the aircraft were as stated earlier. My wife did ask if they could customize her selection and it was not a problem. She had the lobster with 2 small Korean sides and steamed rice. The FA's seemed very rigid at times but also very accommodating at times as well.
When we arrived ICN (our connecting flight was SQ F) we were directed to the lounge over at the pier. I was not fussy with the pier but went anyway. The F side was not open for another 40 minutes so we went into the J side. It was empty. After a shower I checked out the food choices. The usual meats cereal cheeses and alike. Not the Ritz but more then ample. ( I don't stay at the Ritz)
We were then called to the F side once opened. Basically the same as J but with a little more style. Food was fine, showers clean and well equipped and the view of the ramp was uplifting.
The girls at the desk were extremely courteous and helpful.
All in all food at both lounges were ample, food on the aircraft was plentiful and tasty. I don't know what kind of champagne was served, I didn't look.
I have never had so many FA's buzzing around in my life. SQ is fabulous......OZ MAY be a touch better.

useless, thanks for the very useful report ;) It's great to know they can do some food customization on the plane. Sounds as though I can do just fine by mixing and matching whatever looks good to me.

Is The Lounge at JFK before or after security? If it's before, how far in advance of departure did you head for the gate and how was the line to get through security? Is there a separate line for F?

useless, thanks for the very useful report ;) It's great to know they can do some food customization on the plane. Sounds as though I can do just fine by mixing and matching whatever looks good to me.

I'm not totally convinced that this will happen every time, but a little "nice talk" and pleasantry went a long way.

Is The Lounge at JFK before or after security? If it's before, how far in advance of departure did you head for the gate and how was the line to get through security? Is there a separate line for F?

The lounge is before security. If the other "Big Boys" (SQ, EK, LH, etc) are on time, not much time is needed. Boarding was a little unorganized, but dedicated First/Business line moves quickly.

Right now I'm in the SQ J lounge in SIN at 23:00. It's a bit of a madhouse. More selection in food then JFK but give me the peace and quiet of JFK lounge :)anytime.

useless, thanks for the very useful report ;) It's great to know they can do some food customization on the plane. Sounds as though I can do just fine by mixing and matching whatever looks good to me.



I don't think you can do mix and match anymore, more than likely, not.

Before OZ do away the old food service in F, you can do mix and match, as they use a cart to roll all the food out, then you can select whatever looks good to you. Now everything is pre-plated, I wonder how you can do mix and match, you may add a bowl of rice to your western option like on NH, other than that, it would look like you are giving FA a hard time.

They change the menus everyday ?

Oh I think I had mistaken you talking about inflight menus than the F lounge food. But I do think the fish fillet in the F lounge is a rather regular item, as when I was there 3 years ago in the old F lounge, they had the same thing too. I doubt OZ will put lobster in the lounge all the times instead of inflight, as in flight lobster dish almost wipe out.

Well, I haven't been recording what they have each time but will try to start from now on, and also try to ask the staff to determine what are the various menu items and when they change. And yes, I was talking about the F lounge, not F inflight.

I've never visited the F lounge on two successive days, so don't know if it's daily, but I'm in a period now where I'm visiting it once a week, and the menu does change from week-to-week, so I just assumed it was daily. The C lounge is similar, I've never seen the same food there twice on successive visits and have visited that on successive days before, so their cooking staff is definitely capable of changing the menu daily I think.

Both times I've seen the lobster there, the lounge was quite empty, so I'm not sure if they perhaps schedule it for days when they're not expecting many customers or not, though I sort of doubt it. Both times there was plenty there and I ate as much as I wanted. Both times they had the lobster, lamb was one of the other dishes, but don't know if that'll always be the case or not.

I've never tried the fish, being it didn't look very appetizing to me, but I'll make a point to do so next time. Both the lobster and lamb I thought were very good.

I don't think you can do mix and match anymore, more than likely, not.

Before OZ do away the old food service in F, you can do mix and match, as they use a cart to roll all the food out, then you can select whatever looks good to you. Now everything is pre-plated, I wonder how you can do mix and match, you may add a bowl of rice to your western option like on NH, other than that, it would look like you are giving FA a hard time.

I've done limited mixing and matching even in C, where I asked for a western dessert with a Korean meal, and it was no problem. I certainly didn't feel like I was giving the FAs a hard time as that's their job and as long as there's enough food, I don't think it would be a problem. If I was in Y, I'd feel a bit guilty perhaps asking the FA to do something like that as they're quite busy, but not in C, and certainly not in F would I feel at all guilty in doing so.

Now if this was a typical U.S. based airline, then I'd have to think twice before making such a request, but with OZ and other Asian airlines I've always felt that the FAs are very happy to fulfill your special requests if they can.

I've done limited mixing and matching even in C, where I asked for a western dessert with a Korean meal, and it was no problem. I certainly didn't feel like I was giving the FAs a hard time as that's their job and as long as there's enough food, I don't think it would be a problem. If I was in Y, I'd feel a bit guilty perhaps asking the FA to do something like that as they're quite busy, but not in C, and certainly not in F would I feel at all guilty in doing so.



Western desert with a korean meal definately not a problem, I had my chinese meal end with a western desert as well. But adding korean meal side dish to a western meal like useless mentioned seems rather out of the line.

Since you didn't start to fly OZ until they remove the old food service, I will let you know how OZ handle with mix and match in the past. Everything come on a cart for western options, when they do with mix and match is not mixing entree options, rather than side dishes, like even on Dec 05--Feb 06 ICN-ORD (OZ start flying to ORD since July 05) F menus

For dinner it said:

To complement your meal choice
Chinese Fried Rice, Baked Potato, Broccoli, Carrot Flower, Grilled Marked Stir Fried Vegetable

And for the arriving meal it said:

To complement your meal choice
Boiled Pumpkin and Steamed Rice, Deep Fried Cubed Potato with Fried Onion, Carrot and Zucchini stick, Chestnut, Cabbage roll with sweet potato, Boiled Bok Choi, Grilled Marked Eggplant and Pimento

You can actually choose as many side dish and quantity as you want, or having none at all, or simply skip the entree if you feel it is too heavy, and just have the side dish. (They are all in big portion) However, these options are all gone as everything are pre-plated now also with the cost cutting.

I called OZ today to reconfirm my flight and also asked about the food. They said there would be Western (steak), Chinese (not sure), and Korean (bibimbap and also perhaps seafood stew, if I remember correctly) as the standard choices in F. They can arrange bibimbap without beef for me, so I went with that since I like Korean food in general. I'll post more details after my flight.

As a side note, they were also able to move me from 3A to 2K on the ICN-HKG leg but said seats on the JFK-ICN leg are under airport control.

I called OZ today to reconfirm my flight and also asked about the food. They said there would be Western (steak), Chinese (not sure), and Korean (bibimbap and also perhaps seafood stew, if I remember correctly) as the standard choices in F.


No Chinese, Chinese is in the pre-order menus for flights ICN to the US only. They wouldn't put a Chinese meal as a regular option as this is not a Chinese airline, and your flight is not going to China either. You should have one more western option or a salad as main course (rather than as appetizer) Korean option should be either bibimbap or ssam bap.

I also look forward to hearing what menu selections and wine/champagne options are available in OZ F. I will be flying ICN-LAX in July (F), and am hoping that I don't get the 1 OLD 747 with outdated seats! Are there any ways to ensure that you won't be on the old bird?

I would be happy to post a wine list from two weeks ago (if ORDnHKG hasn't included one in his recent TRs). As for the champagne, on offer was a Tattinger 1998. A quick Google search shows it selling for up to $250 a bottle (wish I'd enjoyed it a bit more knowing this). ;)

To be perfectly honest, I'd never heard of Tattinger before but found it to be my favorite champagne, with Krug a relatively close second and Dom a distant third (the latter two served on SQ flights a day before my return on OZ).

I'll get around to posting a TR later, but as a short summary, I found the food quality and presentation to be absolutely excellent on OZ - better than SQ or TG, and at least comparable with NH. I stuck to the Korean options ORD-ICN, ICN-NRT, and ICN-LAX, and was not disappointed in the least. I asked for and was served a mix of Korean and Western food (usually I'd ask for the Western soup and dessert plus Korean entree and main). I also asked for the dumplings on the ICN-LAX flight and made a special request of no seafood - the F/A was happy to oblige and returned a few minutes later with only pork and vegetable dumplings. I waited a few minutes too long to eat them, but they were very good as well.

OZ has, IMO, some of the very best food (and champagne) of any of the *A carriers, but their seat is not nearly as private as SQ or NH. They also have the nicest slippers! I would highly recommend them despite some inconsistent in-flight service and the less-advanced seat. If an option for you, I'd also recommend the 3-class 777 over the 747.

Happy flying, eating, and drinking!

They also have the nicest slippers!

I actually like the NH slippers better, as NH slippers are more padded and more comfy. And the color is dark rather than red. I understand OZ used to use red for F, as also on their boarding pass. Somtime ago they decide to change to yellow/gold for F, I think they should change their color on their slippers as well.

Just made two separate calls to reservations yesterday.

(1) Called about a friend's honeymoon reservation, needed to request seats (ICN-JFK) and they also wanted Chinese meal. They're so far the only ones in the cabin for their June flight but the two seats together in F are still blocked. Agent handled the request for Chinese meal in seconds.

(2) Called back later about my own upcoming flight in April, ICN-LAX, did it on a separate call because I didn't want to confuse them, they couldn't quite follow that the reservation I was calling about in #1 above wasn't my own :) but I wanted the Chinese meal for myself. Took a few minutes on hold and much typing but they assure me it's been handled.

I hadn't even known about the Chinese option until ORDnHKG's trip report, and the photos looked great! ^

I had only known about the Korean pre-order option, which didn't really appeal to me. And I haven't flown OZ F since July '07.

They change the menus everyday ?

An update to this. I asked today at the lounge and they change the menu weekly. They have about 6 or 7 different hot dishes that they rotate. Today's hot dishes were Potatos, Deep Fried Fish with Tartar sauce, and Stir Fried Beef & Vegetables. Plus the usual Dimsum and Porridge. I took some pictures and will try to start a new thread just on the F lounge when I get a chance. BTW, the fish wasn't bad, but I do prefer the lobster and lamb. Only four people in the lounge today and they all left within a few minutes of my entering so I was the only one left.

They have about 6 or 7 different hot dishes that they rotate. Today's hot dishes were Potatos, Deep Fried Fish with Tartar sauce, and Stir Fried Beef & Vegetables. Plus the usual Dimsum and Porridge. Only four people in the lounge today and they all left within a few minutes of my entering so I was the only one left.

Sounds like what they served before my flight for ICN-ORD in February.

For some reasons, the F lounge had more people in the morning than late afternoon, not sure why, I would think more US departures at that time should have more people, but it is not. The people who visit in the morning are not coming from any US flights in F either, I saw more Korean than anything else.

I hadn't even known about the Chinese option until ORDnHKG's trip report, and the photos looked great! ^

I had only known about the Korean pre-order option, which didn't really appeal to me. And I haven't flown OZ F since July '07.

As far as I know, this Chinese pre-order option is fairly new, I didn't see it on my menus on Feb 06, probably is not on your menus July 07 either. The current Korean pre-order menus doesn't appeal to me either, if you still have your menus from your flight on July 07, take a look. The Korean pre-order menus were a lot extensive and more choices, it had 9 different choices compare to now only has 3.