halls120

UAflyer93

With comments like those upthread (hot dogs and hamburgers, seriously??), maybe it's not so surprising that food on U.S. based airlines has become what it is today.

In all seriousness, my advice would be to provide more customization à la Jetblue Mint and to partner with a reputable catering/food services organization.

While the idea of celebrity chef-inspired menus reads well on paper, it doesn't mean squat when it's just an airline paying a chef to use his/her name, and then plating said food like a frozen TV dinner. Instead, United should partner with a food services company like Do&Co or Whole Foods for its premium menus. Even better, and perhaps this is more suited for domestic F, United could partner with a few popular restaurants and feature local favorites like a Katz Deli pastrami sandwich, Russ & Daughers lox bagel, mac and cheese from Hog Island Oyster, salads and proteins from Lemonade, etc. I've never understood why airlines don't partner with existing institutions and carry dishes that are already classics on the ground? Why must they try to reinvent the wheel?

findark

Honestly, I think the combination of 2016 domestic meals and immediately post-launch Polaris meals were quite good. Nothing is 3-cabin First worthy, but UA is not trying to sell that product. The biggest things that have disappointed me recently are the wholesale cuts to catering levels domestically and what feels like a complete surrender on trying to make decent salads (at least half my domestic flights are a pile of spinach with maybe a ball of cheese or a tomato thrown in). I think the key to airline catering is to focus on dishes which will present well on an aircraft (including surviving the delivery process), and in general UA does that pretty well. Pretty much all of the places where I find UA catering lacking are due to obvious conscious cuts, not incompetence in executing. A lot comments upthread though have me convinced both that when it comes to food pax at large at almost impossible to uniformly please, and I'm really glad some of you don't run UA's catering

In terms of actual tweaks, I really wish they would get more interesting cheese. The int'l cheese plate is terminally boring and always the same (cheddar, Brie, blue). It's the one food-related thing that pretty much every other carrier does better.

steveo

We would rig up a smoker to be powered by the engines and have delicious smoked bbq on all fights. Also have beer that's not Stella or Heineken saying United flies to come great beer towns. We need Shiner, Revolution, maybe some Anchor Steam and Fascist Pig.

zombietooth

Your ideas would cost UA more and therefore, have no chance of implementation. The American carriers have commoditized J-class travel and are doing everything they can to decrease costs. That is why the idea of providing comparatively cheap things like hamburgers, but of high-quality, might just appeal to them.

Agree completely with these sentiments. UA used to have some good/interesting salads, but now they universally suck. The Acai-Pomegranate dressing is truly abysmal
Also, the cheese cart was pretty decent back in the day.

1P

Then you don't enjoy good Indian food. The majority of "Indian" restaurants on both sides of the Pond do not offer Indian cuisine but the Bangladeshi equivalent, geared to the English/US market. It uses a lot of fat, and your clothes stink of the food afterwards.

True Indian quality cuisine is not like that, does not use a lot of fat, and your clothes don't smell afterwards. One example is genuine North Indian Moghul cuisine. But such cooking is very rarely encountered. Once you have experienced it, you can never go back to the other sort, except as a third-best.

ExplorerWannabe

I don't think that's what I was getting in Jaipur or Bharatpur but I bow to your expertise. My favorite local restaurants claim to be inspired by Nepalese cuisine but Nepal is closer to Bangladesh than Chicago or Colorado are so you could still be right. I apparently didn't smell what I smelled entering Indian/Pakistani homes even when they weren't cooking.

In any event, the better dishes I got in India were (IMO) not compatible with the TV dinner-type of reheating in airplane galleys so I did assume the advocates for Indian food were talking about the kinds of curries that lend themselves to reheating. Whatever cuisine you want to advocate, I do not recommend any with strong odors that have a tendency to linger or permeate fabric/paint/plastic on flights over 2.5 hours.

jbone9877

IAH2MEL

What about a jetBlue mint set up?

Pick 3 medium size portions from a list of 5 (maybe add a few more for long haul).

HNLbasedFlyer

On the first part of your question - what is wrong with US based serving foods that are highly popular in the US? Even Morton's has a burger on the happy hour menu. German airlines serve German food, Japanese airlines serve Japanese food, etc - I personally find it odd many of the offerings on US airlines do not resonate with US based fliers.

On the second part - that is easy. Whole Foods? Otherwise known as Whole Paycheck? The economics don't work - even if all the places you mentioned were willing to be partners with UA, they'd balk across the board on the onboard meal budget. You can't get a decent dinner for the $7-$10 at Whole Foods they probably budget for the domestic F meal. None of the partners listed want an inferior meal served to airline passengers. Then you have to deal with logistic issues. etc....

UAflyer93

The U.S. has one of the most diverse food cultures in the world. It's one of the only places where you can get good Japanese, Chinese, "American," Italian, Indian, and Korean food all in one city. It's very different from the other countries you mention. In an ideal world, premium cabin meals in the U.S. would offer plenty of options and celebrate the diversity of our food culture, whether it's a steak, clam chowder, ramen. (Moreover, and perhaps this is just an SFO-based thing, but most premium cabins I've been in have a very diverse set of customers, often leaning more Asian. And increasingly, I've seen people turn down meals because of how high-carb/unhealthful they've become.)

That said, I'm not opposed to comfort food like hamburgers. But just as Morton's relegates those to a happy hour menu (as you say), those should only appear on a midflight/anytime snack menu (at least on International J flights). In fact, I'll be the first to admit that I often order a hamburger from Y while seated in domestic F.

As for the economics, you're probably right. If only they would increase the budget from $7-10 to $20, they could certainly have significantly better food. As for Whole Foods, I'd actually mentioned them as they do have many affordable things grab-and-go foods in their deli/salad bar/hot food bar section, and probably have a better grasp of logistics than a celebrity chef or mom and pop establishment would.

Austin787

I'd follow Eva Air format. For lunch and dinner offer a seafood, chicken, pork, beef, and duck option. As well as "special" meals (vegetarian, kosher, etc). For breakfast, I'd use Air New Zealand format where people select food a la carte. And of course, I'll give passengers the option to pre-order their meals.