QRC3288

what they've done is taken the cheapest elements of what they showed to a few of us a year ago as the "a la carte dining" concept, and gone forward with those less expensive modifications (plating, menu design, etc.) while ditching the more-expensive stuff like better quality wine, upgraded / more abundant main courses, etc.

I do think it's an upgrade overall. Plating, dining timing, a few more options, etc.

But there is a lot of "cheek" as posters upthread mention. CX boasted to us this new J class wine list, they had the bottles, they were on the menu, it was quite solid. What they had planned were far superior to the terrible wine currently on offer (not saying much...) and being rolled out in this refreshed service. Plus they intended / showed us a lot of genuinely new and abundant food options, etc. It was reasonable to expect a few downgrades since the event where they showed us was the promotional roll-out event last year of the new J class a la carte service. But virtually everything they presented to us as fact food-wise a year ago isn't happening after all. It's really quite shameless. They then kindly gave us all a bottle of Bollinger to signify the change (that was to be the new Champagne), among tons of other changes. What remains of that is a ghost: the plating and menu design, and a few twists, and the old terrible wine in J class.

Regardless of this being disappointing compared to the substance of what was originally planned, I count this as a decent upgrade (no doubt they'll market it as groundbreaking though, when it's clearly not). But they could lose all goodwill in my book if they don't load enough food options. F class, for example, has had loadings cut significantly in the last decade I've been flying CX F. If you're 5 or 6/6, you better be DM or not care about your primary food choice. My last F flight was 2 months ago, we were full house 6/6. Only 3 of the congees were loaded and they ran out. I forgot to check, it's possible some of the pax were op-upped but I still find myself fretting about food choices in J and F. If I'm thinking of having a burger I always tell the crew when I board to save one, or it's realistic they'll be gone if you ask later in the flight. So if this is how CX does this new menu roll-out, with maybe 1.1x main courses to passengers, then I'll think even less of it.