AA72
Airbus A321
MCO-DFW
Lunch
This flight was an interesting one. An open bar PDB was offered (first time this year for me on AA metal). No hot towel, no warm mixed nuts...
Upon boarding, I saw the FA load some nuts into one of the ovens and begin warming them, however that's where they remained throughout the flight. Odd. After departure drink orders were taken and I ordered what I would typically have along with the nuts, only to find that lunch was served immediately.
Today's options were pear/chicken salad or the spinach/kale ravioli. Not being a fan of many of the components of the salad, I went with the pasta:
This was exactly the same as the post 9/1 'ricotta cavatelli in Mediterranean sauce' except that the ricotta cavatelli has been replaced with a very pasty and questionable ravioli which really didn't seem to have much to do with kale or spinach. Only three raviolis in the sea of Prego with some little chunks of eggplant sprinkled on top for some reason or another.
Salad was the same as it has been since it was introduced on 9/1. Tiny, and not really a salad so much as it was an amuse bouche. Also, if you end up blessed with this menu, I would highly recommend avoiding this:
It is tongue-twistingly bitter and about the most disgusting thing I've ever had the displeasure of tasting before. It took two or three drinks to clear out the taste of that. Finally the rolls were pretty burned. I long for the old cheesy focaccia bread that used to be offered. It seems as though crews have a very hard time properly heating things in the ovens on the A321s. This is the fourth time this year I've gotten burned rolls and burned cookies out of 4 AA A321 flights. No cookie photo, but suffice to say it was the typical burned on board variety.
All in all, about on par with what I expected it to be. Fortunately I had a few hours in the Centurion at DFW immediately following this flight so I just picked at things and waited to have a substantial lunch there. Had I been connecting to another midcon towards the west coast I would have been pretty miffed and hungry.