FlyPointyEnd

Last exMNL trip I had I saw that the cockpit crew meal had pancakes...while J pax had those egg crepes filled with cream cheese...

For BKK flights I always see a Thai dish...wonder if its only in BKK.

QRC3288

Now now....somebody is calling BS on the famously over-described "Dingley Dell" sausage and "rasher" of bacon?

maortega15

Even Homer Simpson would be very well disappointed with the bacon served on CX and you know how he loves his bacon.

Rivarix

For those who are not familiar with CX sausage.



I probably should've gone for the local breakfast option but at that time I wasn't sure if CX could get those right and there was no congee option (which is always a safe choice).

Justinroundtheworld

Thanks for the photo. That says it all... I mean if people are happy with THAT I have nothing else to say.

Look at Etihads's
British Airway's
Qantas's

Purely judging on food it's pretty clear who's losing.

sxc

I agree that QF food is generally much better than CX. But if you compare breakfast specifically, QF breakfast is pretty mediocre just throwing you a yoghurt and pastry if you're lucky. I think they have reintroduced a hot component but I haven't experienced that myself yet.

Moscowflyer

Couldn't agree more about CX food these days. I travelled from HK to London last week in business:
(a) tasteless hot breakfast and no longer a cereal choice, just muesli
(b) my first (and ideally only) choice of main on the lunch service had run out very near the front of the cabin, where I was
(c) no snacks listed on the menu left two hours into the flight
(d) snack basket in the galley stripped bare within three hours - one packet of crisps carried around by a cabin crew member as the sole food item left for 40 business class passengers
(e) lunch served early to those too hungry to manage the eight hours between breakfast and lunch
(f) no drinks service pre-lunch (perhaps we were all too hungry)
(g) still no salt & pepper on CX long-haul flight, but available on KA short-haul.
Very long and hungry flight.
It sucked and I've told them so.
I now take Delta to NY rather than Cathay; the latter still has the edge on the London route because of frequency but I'll know to eat in the lounge first in future.

QRC3288

Do you mind sharing your routing? That's a pretty serious choice, especially considering DL doesn't have a nonstop! Do you connect in SEA? Or do something in Japan or China and then fly over? How does that work?

Your London flight seems pretty bad. I'm not sure how far downhill Europe has gone, I rarely fly these days. But I fly to/from North America heaps, and it seems there hasn't been much change in the last few years IMO. I'm a little surprised by some previous "it's going downhill fast" comments, because frankly it has always kinda been lame!

But...if you exclude EWR and "supper" flights, I usually find the service to be consistent and predictable. Certainly not great, nor blow-you-away style, but it works and I certainly haven't considered switching my business (to JFK no less) from CX on account. Ironically, I find CX to JFK to be perhaps the most consistent in J class! Particularly on CX840 and CX846, both which are full dinners on take-off, snacks in between, and breakfast before landing. I've flown these heaps of times in recent years, as well as CX830...which is a worthy F upgrade, IMO, due to the frequent mid-flight meal served in J. My personal choices for flying to/from JFK is CX840/846, and I don't have too many complaints beyond the horrific infrastructure at JFK and New York upon arriving, which is outside the scope of CX's services

I shop my business to/from SFO (thanks to the SQ nonstop), but I haven't really considered switching carriers to New York...and if I did, I'd probably have to (gasp) consider United, at least they have the non-stop to EWR versus Delta having to connect in SEA.

Would be keen to know your thinking on why you switched away from CX to JFK in favor of Delta.

Justinroundtheworld

What I love about most is they advertise the variety of amazing gourmet in HK on their website yet they feed you rubbish food on the flight to HK, as if they are playing sarcasm to the maximum. It's like you have to go through a learning curve 'oh yes you have to go through us first. After our meal anything you eat in HK will be gourmet'.

Justinroundtheworld

I used to fly to London exclusively with Virgin between 2000-2007. They've gone sluggish, I switched to CX. Now CX has been racing downhill and I am shifting to BA. I used to absolutely hate BA but look, they did catch up and catch up quick. I am happy.

Passengers change. They aren't as loyal as airlines think they are. Miles, statuses and freebies don't really lock them in. They don't lock me in.

fakecd

cant agree more on this which cx fails to grasp. miles and status are fringe benefit but they can fool consumers only so far... do you remember those canapes they used to serve on CX J maybe 10yrs back.. where have they gone? cx arrogantly mistakenly believe they got the cirrus bed so forget about catering... yes when cirrus came out 4 or os years ago it was WOW but come on even Delta has those beds...

FlyPointyEnd

I think one of the reasons why CX will never improve or is happy with the quality of food they serve on Business Class is because some people (maybe a majority) actually like it....



The BEST CHINESE RESTAURANT IN HK IS CX!?!? this guy is insane! Where does he eat? Cafe de Coral? I know we have bad Chinese restaurants but there are a handful that can do decent dim sum...and it's definitely better than CX IMO.

QRC3288

true...but to be fair, at least you were switching to carriers that still had non-stops HKG-LHR! I had a time when I swapped CX to BA as well, back in the days when you couldn't guarantee a flat bed on CX J. It was around 2008 time. CX was rolling out the coffins in J, but BA had Clubworld's guaranteed flat bed to/from HKG. So I flew BA until CX's flat bed transition was complete.

In the example we're responding to above, admittedly it's a bit more radical. Someone is taking their HKG-JFK business from CX and giving to DL, an airline that doesn't have a HKG-JFK nonstop (or HKG-EWR, or HKG to anywhere near the east coast). DL operates once a day to/from HKG, to Seattle.

I fly hundreds of thousands of miles a year, based in HK, and I can't fathom why I'd switch to Delta for my New York (or even North America) business. If a gun was to my head and I had to choose a US carrier, I'd switch to United before DL, because at least United has a SFO, ORD and EWR nonstop daily ex-HKG. That's why I'm certainly curious to hear the poster's rationale for choosing Delta, perhaps it's something I haven't thought but it seems radical enough to me. He's a CX Diamond so I'm keen for his opinion.

To keep the theme of this thread in here, I don't see a recent shift in CX's J food. It has been pretty lame for years! Never been great, although to their credit back in 2012 they instituted the separate rice/main plating for Chinese courses, which helped keep the rice less soggy and it looks a lot nicer (although now the rice tends to dry out and get hard...still, it's an upgrade IMO). In general, the competition has gotten much stronger - Eva's hard J product is very similar to CX's J product, for example, and it's a small point but Eva has Dom Perignon in J class (and apparently Krug too? But I haven't seen the Krug firsthand).

Personally my recent business shift has gone to BR, SQ and EK. And the rationale is pretty straightforward: SQ to SFO, thanks to SQ1 and SQ2 nonstop to HKG-SFO. BR to San Francisco and Los Angeles: TPE is an easy jumping off point for me due to business and personal reasons in Taiwan (I suppose I could also fly BR to New York if I needed to transition my JFK business). And EK for an Africa and Europe trip out of Hong Kong.

Rivarix

I feel sorry for his wife ...

But yeah, what one thinks about CX food is all relative. For someone whose prior experience was only intra-Europe (or first trip abroad in J), I don't disagree that CX is a definite step-up. I suspect this may especially be true for the crowd who are active on FB, instagram or whatever social media platform out there. They may have limited exposure to non-western airlines. Not everyone is as fortunate as us and have the option to try all these different airlines.

Moscowflyer

Thanks for the sensible questions on why I use Delta rather than CX to NY, which isn't intuitive at first sight.
I pay for my own airfares and I'm one of those who use the ex-TPE fares to NY so in the morning I fly HKG-TPE using Asia Miles, pick up the return TPE-HKG first leg of my trip to connect to the afternoon HKG-JFK. Coming back I take the JFK-HKG flight (and then never bother with the final leg back to TPE). The regular business class fare is around US$13,000 (sometimes cheaper if I fly midweek rather than weekends) but with a bit of planning the ex-TPE fares are US$4-5,000. To get that fare of course I have to take 3 flights (2 quick ones and the long haul) to get to NY but only one long-haul back. My time (which I spend on the short-hauls reading the news paper and a book) isn't that valuable :-)
So I'm taking 4 flights anyway to and from NY and the Delta connection through Seattle is quite comparable in terms of the number of flights. Arriving in Seattle isn't anywhere near as bad as arriving at JFK at 8pm in the evening, behind three other flights into T7 - and when the Delta flight was a connection in Tokyo, that was an easy transfer and it arrived at T4, where immigration was through a machine and predictably fast. With a bit of planning I can get these fares for US4-5,000, comparable with the ex-TPE CX fares.
The hard product is the same, the IFE is American rather than global, the crews are generally pretty good and the catering is better. It's also been a change from what I know, having been a DM for 13 years now, a change is as good as a rest.
I do think Cathay is a pretty good airline, they generally look after me well, I get asked to give my thoughts on various new ideas they have, I cancelled, refunded and rebooked a ticket a while ago to save $US2,000 and the refund arrived within 4 days, the lounges in HK are very good and the staff are friendly. But for a comparable fare, I get a comparable number of flights, a very comparable product and a change in my travel habits, which is refreshing
This won't suit everyone of course. If your travel is paid for by a company, you don't do the same flights all the time, your time isn't your own or you're travelling solely in economy or PE, the direct flight probably suits most people. I just have the flexibility to be slightly different (and some would say accept a bit more inconvenience) in my travel.