Originally Posted by
Artpen100
For BA out of IAD, I’ve never had a problem getting full dinner service even when I’ve had a snack in CW dining first. Many people do not eat on board, so I’m sure they provision accordingly but don’t seem to overdo it.
AF out of IAD only had full dining in the lounge for F. They may have provisioned for less than everyone eating, but not on account of the lounge. Maybe their new lounge will be different.
Trust UA to err on to err on the cheap side, though. They’ve been reducing quality for the food, beverage and service in Polaris since they rolled it out.
I haven't done the preflight dining bit at IAD but sampled both out of JFK and in each case (BA/AF) on their dedicated sleeper-service routes, J pax are marked off if they enter the lounge dining area and are not proactively offered meal service on board. At least for me, I wasn't interested in eating 2h or so later in the midst of a short eastbound redeye, but I don't doubt the crew would put something together for hungry pax even if a meal was taken in the lounge. I wouldn't be pleased if UA moved to this model.