AC Food & Beverage - Business Class - International (Jul 2021 - ???)
#1
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AC Food & Beverage - Business Class - International (Jul 2021 - ???)
This thread is to report on and discuss in-flight food and beverage for all Air Canada flights in Business Class, also known as Signature Class, outside of North America. From a meal perspective, “North America” includes “Sun” destinations such as Mexico, Central America, and the Caribbean.
Post your menus, photos, questions, and opinions in this thread. To the extent updates are needed to these initial posts, please advise @Adam Smith via PM. If you post a menu and/or photos, please add a listing to the wiki in the format detailed in the wiki. PLEASE MAKE SOME SUGGESTIONS ON AN APPROPRIATE FORMAT
In order to keep information relevant it is expected that this thread (and its companions on other locations/classes of service) will be periodically refreshed – for example, at the end of 2021, this thread may be closed, and a new thread on the same topic (with the same information from the first few posts) may be created.
COVID NOTE: For most of the pandemic, AC has been offering significantly reduced meal service. As the world starts to normalize, AC is also normalizing its meal service. The posts below largely describe the normal, pre-COVID world, to which we are slowly returning. However, for the time being, there may be inconsistencies. Please feel free to discuss these inconsistencies and current service levels here.
Overview of AC North America J meal service
AC offers several different types of food and beverage service on its intra-North America flights:
• Premium Long-Haul (“PLH”) service is offered on select routes deemed premium by AC (YVR/YYC/YEG-YYZ/YUL/YOW, YVR/YYC-EWR, YYZ/YUL-SFO/LAX)
• Signature Service is offered on widebody aircraft on PLH routes
• A basic service is offered on all other routes
Breakfast is served on flights departing [xxx]-[xxx]. Lunch/dinner is served on all other departures.
Full meals are served on flights above 2.5 hours block time. On shorter flights, a snack is served rather than a full meal.
Meal selections change frequently, typically every month, although many items have been in the rotation for years and reappear over and over again.
Post your menus, photos, questions, and opinions in this thread. To the extent updates are needed to these initial posts, please advise @Adam Smith via PM. If you post a menu and/or photos, please add a listing to the wiki in the format detailed in the wiki. PLEASE MAKE SOME SUGGESTIONS ON AN APPROPRIATE FORMAT
In order to keep information relevant it is expected that this thread (and its companions on other locations/classes of service) will be periodically refreshed – for example, at the end of 2021, this thread may be closed, and a new thread on the same topic (with the same information from the first few posts) may be created.
COVID NOTE: For most of the pandemic, AC has been offering significantly reduced meal service. As the world starts to normalize, AC is also normalizing its meal service. The posts below largely describe the normal, pre-COVID world, to which we are slowly returning. However, for the time being, there may be inconsistencies. Please feel free to discuss these inconsistencies and current service levels here.
Overview of AC North America J meal service
AC offers several different types of food and beverage service on its intra-North America flights:
• Premium Long-Haul (“PLH”) service is offered on select routes deemed premium by AC (YVR/YYC/YEG-YYZ/YUL/YOW, YVR/YYC-EWR, YYZ/YUL-SFO/LAX)
• Signature Service is offered on widebody aircraft on PLH routes
• A basic service is offered on all other routes
Breakfast is served on flights departing [xxx]-[xxx]. Lunch/dinner is served on all other departures.
Full meals are served on flights above 2.5 hours block time. On shorter flights, a snack is served rather than a full meal.
Meal selections change frequently, typically every month, although many items have been in the rotation for years and reappear over and over again.
Last edited by Adam Smith; Nov 16, 21 at 9:55 am
#2
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Join Date: Feb 2015
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Warm nuts (mostly almonds with a few cashes) are served during the pre-meal beverage service.
For breakfast. PLH offers three entrée choices:
For lunch/dinner, there are usually four entrée choices:
Cheese course
Dessert consists of either:
Unlike basic meal service, when the tray is brought to the passenger, it will not have the entrée. The passenger will be given a few minutes to eat their salad and bread before the hot entrée is brought out. Trays are cleared after the entrée is finished and dessert is served on its own a short time after that.
For breakfast. PLH offers three entrée choices:
- Pancakes with chicken sausage
- Omelette
- Fruit plate
For lunch/dinner, there are usually four entrée choices:
- Beef or lamb
- Chicken
- Fish
- Vegetarian, often pasta
Cheese course
Dessert consists of either:
- Something sweet like a cake or brownie
- Bowl of fruit
Unlike basic meal service, when the tray is brought to the passenger, it will not have the entrée. The passenger will be given a few minutes to eat their salad and bread before the hot entrée is brought out. Trays are cleared after the entrée is finished and dessert is served on its own a short time after that.
Last edited by Adam Smith; Apr 29, 22 at 1:43 pm
#3
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Snack Basket
On most flights (both short and long), a snack basket will be offered sometime after the meal has been served (on TCONs, it may be offered multiple times).
The snack basket typically consists of:
At times, the snack basket items will not be available for one reason or another, and a snack basket may be assembled from other items, usually from the Y BoB offering, such as Pringles, Hershey’s Mix, etc.
Ill-informed or misleading Service Directors may say that the snack basket offering has been updated and this is the new standard going forward, but true changes to the snack basket offering are incredibly rare. The Lindt 70% and Miss Vickie’s chips have been consistently present since the snack baskets were first introduced nearly a decade ago, and the most major change was to swap out Lindt milk chocolate bars for the Kit Kats several years ago.
The snack basket typically consists of:
- Lindt 70% dark chocolate bars
- Miss Vickie’s 50% reduced fat Original flavour chips
- Kit Kat chocolate bars
- are there other items typically in there?
At times, the snack basket items will not be available for one reason or another, and a snack basket may be assembled from other items, usually from the Y BoB offering, such as Pringles, Hershey’s Mix, etc.
Ill-informed or misleading Service Directors may say that the snack basket offering has been updated and this is the new standard going forward, but true changes to the snack basket offering are incredibly rare. The Lindt 70% and Miss Vickie’s chips have been consistently present since the snack baskets were first introduced nearly a decade ago, and the most major change was to swap out Lindt milk chocolate bars for the Kit Kats several years ago.
#4
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Beverages
Non-alcoholic
Alcoholic
- Water
- Coffee
- Tea
- Fruit juices (orange, apple)
- Soft drinks (Coke, Coke Zero, Diet Coke, Sprite, Canada Dry ginger ale, AM I MISSING ANYTHING?)
- WHAT ELSE? TONIC WATER? CLUB SODA? V8? CLAMATO? I ONLY DRINK DIET COKE, WATER, AND JUICE…
Alcoholic
- Vodka [SMIRNOFF?]
- Scotch (Johnnie Walker Black)
- Rum (what is it, Bacardi?)
- Molson Canadian
- Heineken
- Rotating red wine selection
- Rotating white wine selection
- [WHAT ELSE AM I MISSING? GIN, PROBABLY? IS IT BEEFEATER? IS THERE SPARKLING WINE? MAYBE OTHER THINGS?]
#5
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As a few of us have noted - with and without photos - the Texas Chicken is still there. From another thread:
Thanks to @mimo123 who posted a link to an interesting article in the Premium Economy meal thread, I noted some comments from Andrianna Pischos, manager of catering product design at AC.
I always assumed the Texas Chicken has been served on every afternoon eastbound transcon since December because AC bought a lifetime supply from somewhere.
Well, she said "we look at what can be sustained from a supply chain perspective", so..... 
Best line in the article was "Pischos says that Air Canada does have plans to launch new food “enhancements” later this summer". (ok, maybe AC FT has affected my ability to see the word "enhancement" in a positive light. LOL)
.
Thanks to @mimo123 who posted a link to an interesting article in the Premium Economy meal thread, I noted some comments from Andrianna Pischos, manager of catering product design at AC.
I always assumed the Texas Chicken has been served on every afternoon eastbound transcon since December because AC bought a lifetime supply from somewhere.


Best line in the article was "Pischos says that Air Canada does have plans to launch new food “enhancements” later this summer". (ok, maybe AC FT has affected my ability to see the word "enhancement" in a positive light. LOL)
.
#6
Join Date: Jul 2009
Location: YEG
Programs: AC
Posts: 805
Recent flight in J from Toronto to Edmonton.
I could have done without the spinach (personal taste only) but overall it was really good (other than the cold bread). I absolutely loved the cheesecake.



Full report on the trip here: A Trip Down Memory Lane - AC J YEG to YYZ - FlyerTalk Forums
I could have done without the spinach (personal taste only) but overall it was really good (other than the cold bread). I absolutely loved the cheesecake.



Full report on the trip here: A Trip Down Memory Lane - AC J YEG to YYZ - FlyerTalk Forums
#7
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Location: Toronto
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Looking at the menu options on ac.com pasta appears to be a replacement for the chicken. Reviewing of the new menus from YYZ there are 4 different choices of pasta on the J menus.
#8
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#9
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#10
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@capedreamer
But, but, but, they are also non-meat meals for those so inclined.....when multiple choice was available.
That said, I went sifting through my years of AC meals and I present you with AC Pasta on a Plane
This was YYZ-FRA in 2016

This was YYZ-PHX rouge Jan 2017. Apologies for the bumpy ride.

This was YVR-YYZ Nov 2017

YVR-HKG in March 2018

YVR-YYZ March 2018

YVR-TPE April 2018

TPE-YVR Sept 2018

There was also an era where the chef had an obsession with mushrooms and there was one pasta dish with a heavy cream sauce and multiple varieties, none of which were edible. lol. I couldn't find the photo.
.
But, but, but, they are also non-meat meals for those so inclined.....when multiple choice was available.
That said, I went sifting through my years of AC meals and I present you with AC Pasta on a Plane

This was YYZ-FRA in 2016

This was YYZ-PHX rouge Jan 2017. Apologies for the bumpy ride.

This was YVR-YYZ Nov 2017

YVR-HKG in March 2018

YVR-YYZ March 2018

YVR-TPE April 2018

TPE-YVR Sept 2018

There was also an era where the chef had an obsession with mushrooms and there was one pasta dish with a heavy cream sauce and multiple varieties, none of which were edible. lol. I couldn't find the photo.
.
#11
Join Date: Jun 2010
Location: LHR
Programs: AC SE
Posts: 4,130
@capedreamer
But, but, but, they are also non-meat meals for those so inclined.....when multiple choice was available.
That said, I went sifting through my years of AC meals and I present you with AC Pasta on a Plane
[...]
There was also an era where the chef had an obsession with mushrooms and there was one pasta dish with a heavy cream sauce and multiple varieties, none of which were edible. lol. I couldn't find the photo.
.
But, but, but, they are also non-meat meals for those so inclined.....when multiple choice was available.
That said, I went sifting through my years of AC meals and I present you with AC Pasta on a Plane

[...]
There was also an era where the chef had an obsession with mushrooms and there was one pasta dish with a heavy cream sauce and multiple varieties, none of which were edible. lol. I couldn't find the photo.
.
But if it's the only main offered, that's lazy and disappointing IMHO.
#13
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I like good pasta. I like good vegetarian meals. But if it's going to be bad either way, I'd rather have meat. Or at least a choice.
#14
Join Date: Jun 2010
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In my ideal world, I’d like AC to offer a choice of a high quality meat dish and a high quality vegetarian dish on every flight over a certain length. I’d like that vegetarian dish to not be pasta, but if it has to be, fine. I certainly wouldn’t summarize my position as “completely in favour”. But only offering a crappy pasta dish with no choice is really disappointing.
#15
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In my ideal world, I’d like AC to offer a choice of a high quality meat dish and a high quality vegetarian dish on every flight over a certain length. I’d like that vegetarian dish to not be pasta, but if it has to be, fine. I certainly wouldn’t summarize my position as “completely in favour”. But only offering a crappy pasta dish with no choice is really disappointing.