Special meal requests are not honored on DL Connection carriers. I believe they are on any mainline flight long enough to get a meal. The cutoff to request one is 12 hours before departure except for Kosher, Hindu, and Japanese which are 24 hours.

If his allergy was that much of an issue and he wasn't prepared with his own food, he had no right to throw a hissy fit.

I've got a gluten/dairy allergy, and have found making a nice curried quinoa/brown rice salad the day before and freezing it means it'll thaw out in my carry on and be chilled and ready right about the halfway point between SEA and CDG. TSA hasn't cared so far.

That said, it is nice to have the gluten-free snack box offering on Alaska. Some sun chips, a bit of hummus, some olives, almonds, and dried fruit... yum.

You might try a kosher meal. Likely to be better than the veg meal, and if it has dairy, it will be completely separate from any part with meat.

Rule of thumb is to inquire at the gate and inquire immediately upon getting on board the aircraft. Regardless, be prepared that the food was not boarded and come prepared. Throwing a fit at 37000 feet won't do anything - just follow up with written complaint to get compensated.

Not really, have gotten it twice, once tlv-jfk, the other tlv-atl. They just gave me my kosher meal from y

This is true, except for the egg part. Thanks, though! Vegan is okay - tried it once (and I think I ended up eating it!).

I do agree with PP's though - if you have a food allergy and don't bother to bring something to eat for yourself, then please don't have a hissy fit! You need to be proactive when it comes to these things.

I used to bring my son's own food even to nice restaurants when he was little.

1. If you have an allergy or have any other special need, you absolutely need to have a backup plan if you are going to travel. You should never be reliant on anybody else.

2. Special meals can not only affect OPUP's but all manner of changes (IRROPS, SDC and the like). Basically, it may not be possible to get your meal from Flight A to Flight B.

3. I would take zero comfort in cross-contamination issues. If you really are allergic, does it really matter that you have a meal which doesn't contain "X" if the meal was prepared next to meals containing "X?"

As an egg allergy sufferer myself, I typically go into a flight expecting to survive of my three favorite food groups: liquor, wine and beer. I recently requested a vegan meal (pure veg) when my upgrade cleared at the window for JFK-SJU. When the tray came out there was cheese on the salad and cheesecake. While I'm not allergic to dairy, I decided not to eat the main course (black bean burgers) in case they were vegetarian and not vegan (meaning they would have egg).

While I don't think delta should offer a meal for every allergy under the sun, if they do have the option available they should follow through.

But it's always smarter to stick to a liquid diet. ;-)

The vegetarian meal is almost always just the pasta option--but they set one aside for you so there is not a concern about running out.

SDC
 

Just curious as to how Delta handles special meals if someone SDC's? Do they try to accomodate the request or is the person just out of luck since Delta is accomodating them on an earlier flight that was at the PAX request?

+1 - You will be outside the special meal request time cutoff. Can you maybe wheedle somebody into asking? Possibly, but the real answer is that you should absolutely not count on it and need a backup plan.